PITTSBURGH’S PEACE & JUSTICE NEWSPAPER
VOL. 43 No. 8, September 2013
50th MLK March Strengthens Movement Nationally and Locally for Justice
What Does “New Economy” Mean?
Photo taken by Michael Drohan
by Molly Rush and Ron Gaydos "...And one day we must ask the question, Why are there forty million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I'm simply saying that more and more, we've got to begin to ask questions about the whole society..."
by Michael Drohan Pittsburgh was well-represented at the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Justice which took place on Saturday, August 24. Many of the stalwarts of the struggle against racism and discrimination from Pittsburgh made the journey to D.C. including Tim Stevens, Celeste Taylor, Molly Rush, Rick Adams, Sala Udin, Vince Eirene, Jon Robison, Jan Neffke, Ginny Hildebrand, and Kay Wetzel. In total, 500 people from Pittsburgh attended. The Merton Center, together with B-PEP (the Black Political Empowerment Project), organized the local delegation for the rally and march to re-energize our participation in the struggle for racial and economic justice. In 1963, when the original march took place, its organizers A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin put forward a radical set of demands to abolish racism and to further full employment and living wages. At this time Martin Luther King, Jr. was devoting his energy and eloquence to organize for economic justice related to the demands of sanitation workers in Birmingham, AL. As leader of the Southern Christian leadership Conference (SCLC), he was invited to give the keynote address delivering the famous “I Have a Dream” speech, which has now become iconic in the U.S., ranked just below the Gettysburg Address of Lincoln.
Martin Luther King, Jr. to Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1967
March on Washington August 24, 2013 MLK, Jr. Memorial
In this Issue Table of Contents —Page 2 Drones in Every State? — Page 7 Life Off the Grid — Page 14 Justice for Trayvon — Page 15
Continued on page 4
"A savage capitalism has taught the logic of profit at any cost, of giving in order to get, of exploitation without thinking of people... and we see the results in the crisis we are experiencing."– Pope Francis Dr. King spoke the words above just four years after the fabled March on Washington in his final presidential address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, months before he was assassinated. Today, the results of that unbridled capitalist/corporate stranglehold surround us - in our state, our country and our distressed and endangered globe.
350.org Aims to Reverse Cause of Climate Change by Warwick Powell
You might think the fight against global warming has gone cold, given the lack of progress in Congress and the relative lack of media coverage. But don’t say that to Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org and winner of the 2013 Thomas Merton Award. Now that we have recently reached 400 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the mission of 350.org is even more critical.
What is that mission? The mission of 350.org is to build a global grassroots movement to solve the climate crisis. To that end, Bill McKibben and his organization are driving for policies that will put the world on track to get back to 350 ppm, a concentration level we haven’t seen since the mid-1980s.
Continued on page 3
350.org’s online campaigns, grassroots organizing and mass public actions are led from the bottom up by thousands of volunteer organizers from over 188 countries.
Above the Safe Zone To preserve our planet in its present form, scientists tell us we must reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Accelerating Arctic warming and other early climate impacts have led scientists to conclude that we are already above the safe zone and that unless we are able to return to below 350 ppm within this century, we risk irreversible effects, such as the melting of the Greenland ice sheet and major methane releases from melting permafrost. (continued on page 8)
TMC works to build a consciousness of values and to raise the moral questions involved in the issues of war, poverty, racism, classism, economic justice, oppression and environmental justice. PERMIT NO. 458
TMC engages people of diverse philosophies and faiths who find common ground in the nonviolent struggle to bring about a more peaceful and just world.
September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 1
PITTSBURGH, PA
PAID
THOMAS MERTON CENTER, 5129 PENN AVE. PITTSBURGH, PA 15224
U.S. POSTAGE NON-PROFIT ORG.
To Submit Articles, Photos, or Poems to The New People: www.thomasmertoncenter.org/newpeople/submit-article or photo
To Submit an Event to The New People or Post in TMC Calendar: www.thomasmertoncenter.org/calendar/submit-event IS PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY THE THOMAS MERTON CENTER 5129 PENN AVENUE, PITTSBURGH, PA 15224 Office Phone: 412-361-3022 — Fax: 412-361-0540 Website: www.thomasmertoncenter.org
Thomas Merton Center
East End Community Thrift
Monday—Friday: 10 am to 4 pm Saturday: Noon to 4 pm
Tuesday—Friday: 10 am to 4 pm Saturday: Noon to 4 pm
New People Editorial Collective Paul Butler, Jingjie Chen, Rob Conroy, Ginny Cunningham, Michael Drohan, Russ Fedorka, Martha Garvey, Carol Gonzalez, John Haer, Bette McDevitt, Charles McCollester, Diane McMahon, Kenneth Miller, Jonathan Reyes, Joyce Rothermel, Molly Rush, Marcia Snowden, K. Briar Somerville, Jo Tavener, and Laiyin Yuan
TMC Staff, Volunteers & Interns Managing Director: Diane McMahon Office/Intern Coordinator: Marcia Snowden Office Volunteers: Kathy Cunningham, Mary Clare Donnelly, RSM, Judy Starr, Kathy Cunningham, James Lucius, and Meagan McGill Finance Manager & Assistant: Roslyn Maholland & Mig Cole New People Facilitator and Layout Manager: K. Briar Somerville East End Community Thrift Store Managers: Shirley Gleditsch, Shawna Hammond, Dolly Mason Interns from local high schools, colleges and universities: Jingjie Chen, Junwei Shen, Xinpei He, Qing Li, Andrew Marczak, Emily Neff, Russell Noble, Evan Schindler, Yiqun Sun, Maddy Weiss, Laiyin Yuan, and Paul Butler
2013 TMC Board of Directors Ed Brett, Rob Conroy, Kitoko Chargois, Kathy Cunningham, Michael Drohan, Patrick Fenton, Carol Gonzalez, Mary Jo Guercio (President), Wanda Guthrie, Shawna Hammond, Ken Joseph, Chris Mason, Jonah McAllister-Erickson, Francine Porter, Joyce Rothermel, Molly Rush, Tyrone Scales, and M. Shernell Smith
ADVERTISE IN PITTSBURGH’S MOST PROGRESSIVE NEWSPAPER New People Advertising Rates Below The New People is distributed to 3,500 people who belong to diverse organizations, businesses and groups each month. An additional 10% discount is available for non-profit organizations and faith-based groups. Ads must be submitted by the deadline which is the 14th of the month. Page Size (length x width)
Monthly
Full Page (14’’x 9’’) $250 Half Page (7’’x 9’’) $130 Quarter Page (7’’x 4.5’’) $70 Sixth Page (5’’x 5’’) $50 Eighth Page (3.5’’x 4.5’’) $40 Business Card Size (3.5’’x 3.5’’) $15
6 Months at 10% off 12 months at 20% off $1350 ($225) $702 ($117) $378 ($63) $270 ($45) $216 ($36) $81 ($14)
$2200 ($200) $1144 ($104) $616 ($56) $396 ($36) $352 ($32) $132 ($12)
www.thomasmertoncenter.org or call (412) 361-3022
TMC Projects:
TMC Affiliates:
Anti-War Committee info@pittsburghendthewar.org www.pittsburghendthewar.org
Allegheny Defense Project, Pgh Office 412-559-1364 www.alleghenydefense.org
www.newpeoplenews.org/advertise/
Association of Pittsburgh Priests Sr. Barbara Finch 412-716-9750 B.a.finch@att.net
Book‘Em: Books to Prisoners Project bookempgh@gmail.com www.thomasmertoncenter.org/bookem
Amnesty International info@amnestypgh.org www.amnestypgh.org
Capital’s End 724-388-6258, iamholtz@iup.edu
The Big Idea Bookstore 412-OUR-HEAD www.thebigideapgh.org
CodePink: Women for Peace codepinkpgh@aol.com, 412-389-3216 www.codepink4peace.org
Black Voices for Peace Gail Austin 412-606-1408
East End Community Thrift Shop 412-361-6010, shawnapgh@aol.com
CeaseFirePA
Economic Justice Committee drohanmichael@yahoo.com
www.ceasefirepa.org
Environmental Justice Committee
Global Solutions Pittsburgh 412-471-7852 dan@globalsolutionspgh.org www.globalsolutionspgh.org
environmentaljustice@thomasmertoncenter.org
Fight for Lifers West
info@ceasefirepa.org
fightforliferswest@yahoo.com
Citizens for Social Responsibility of Greater Johnstown Larry Blalock, evolve@atlanticbb.net
http://fightforliferswest.mysite.com Formerly Convicted Citizens Dean Williams (412) 295-8606
PA United for a Single-Payer Health Care www.healthcare4allPA.org www.PUSH-HC4allPa.blogspot.com 2102 Murray Avenue Pgh, Pa 15217 412-421-4242
Harambee Ujima/Diversity Footprint Twitter @HomewoodNation Human Rights Coalition / Fed Up (prisoner support and advocacy) 412-802-8575, hrcfedup@gmail.com www.thomasmertoncenter.org/fedup Marcellus Shale Protest Group melpacker@aol.com 412-243-4545
Pittsburgh Area Pax Christi 412-761-4319
marcellusprotest.org
Pittsburgh Committee to Free Mumia 412-361-3022 pghfreemumia@gmail.com
New Economy Working Group MollyRush@verizon.net
Pittsburgh Cuba Coalition 412-303-1247 lisacubasi@aol.com
Pittsburgh Anti-Sweatshop Community Alliance 412-867-9213
Pittsburgh Independent Media Center info@indypgh.org www.indypgh.org North Hills Anti-Racism Coalition 412-369-3961 www.northhillscoalition.com
Pittsburgh Campaign for Democracy NOW! 412-422-5377, sleator@cs.cmu.edu www.pcdn.org Pittsburgh Darfur Emergency Coalition jumphook@gmail.com; www.pittsburghdarfur.org
Please make your check payable to the “Thomas Merton Center” and send it to: TMC, 5129 Penn Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15224 by the 14th of the month before the ad will appear. Ads should be submitted via the form at:
Pittsburgh Haiti Solidarity Committee jrothermel@gpcfb.org 412-780-5118 www.thomasmertoncenter.org/hs
Pittsburgh North People for Peace 412-367-0383 pnpp@verizon.net Pittsburgh Palestine Solidarity Committee info@pittsburgh-psc.org www.pittsburgh-psc.org Raging Grannies 412-963-7163 eva.havlicsek@gmail.com
www.pittsburghraginggrannies.homestead.com
Religion and Labor Coalition 412-361-4793 ojomal@aol.com
Progressive Pittsburgh Notebook Call 412-363-7472 tvnotebook@gmail.com
EAST END COMMUNITY THRIFT
Roots of Promise 724-327-2767, 412-596-0066 rootsofpromise@gmail.com spiritualprogressives.pgh@gmail.com
SHOP THRIFTY! SUMMER SALE Aug. 27 to Sept. 14 All summer clothing and miscellaneous items 1/2 off! Special thanks to the Thrift Store volunteers for their memorial donation made in honor of Shirley Brock!
For General Information about the Thomas Merton Center:
SW PA Bread for the World Donna Hansen 412-812-1553 United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) 412-471-8919 www.ueunion.org
School of the Americas Watch W. PA 267-980-4878 nobler@thomasmertonccenter.org Stop Sexual Abuse in the Military 412-361-1581 swahrhaftig@@afsc.org Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens Group/ Roots of Promise 724-327-2767 murrysvillemarcellus@gmail.com Who’s Your Brother? 412-928-3947 www.whosyourbrother.com Pennsylvania Interfaith Impact Network 412-621-9230 office@piin.org
Page 1 March on Washington New Economy Climate Change Page 3 New Economy Cont. USW’s Rob Witherell Page 4 March on Washington Honduras and US ACLU, Know your rights Page 5 Jim Wallace Book 2 - NEWPEOPLE
Table of Contents Review—Freedom Budget Page 6 Big Charlie K Water Inequality Page 7 Illegal Drone Warfare Drones in Every State Page 8 350.org Bill McKibben’s Mom
September 2013
Page 9 NO to County Fracking Thrive-ability Petition Page 10 Indiana Pride Event PPT in Neighborhoods Page 11 Prisoner Abuse Nations that Incarcerate Page 12
Int’l. Day of Peace Medicare for All Page 13 Reportback Cuba Trip Beijinger in Pittsburgh Page 14 Windstax New Economy Growing Page 15 Trayvon Articles
Urban Bikers urbanbikes@yahoo.com Veterans for Peace kevinbharless@yahoo.com 252-646-4810 Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) Eva 412-963-7163 edith.bell4@verizon.net
TMC is a Member of: Pennsylvanians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty Martha Connelly 412-361-7872,
osterdm@earthlink.net
Page 16 Nuns Solidarity The Pope Says “Gay” Page 17 Student’s Plight Why Vote? Page 18 Original 9/11 Freedom in China? Page 19 Community Perspective Page 20 Sept. Activist Calendar
New Economy Continued try harder, come up with more ideas about how to make the product better and more cost effective because they are listened to. In a traditional setting you may have an idea but you may not want to tell your employer because it might eliminate your job. In a co-op, another job would be found for me. I could find another way to be productive and add value to the co-op.
The New Economy Comes to Pittsburgh—A Conversation with USW’s Rob Witherell by Jo Tavener (Part I of III) Jo: Tell me about yourself Rob: I’ve worked with the Steelworkers since 1989, organizing, contract bargaining, benefits research and analysis. One thing that led me to think about the New Economy and our worker-owned green laundry project was figuring out how to create and promote green jobs. While working with Gamesa, a company that makes wind turbines, I met Michael Peck, North American delegate from Mondragon Cooperatives in Spain. In 2008 I went to Spain on business. While I was there, I talked with Jesus Hesasti, the head of Mondragon’s international division. It was around the time of the big financial collapse. Nobody knew what was next, or had any confidence in the current financial system and the existing economy or how to keep this from happening again. Was there a better way to create a more sustainable economy? It was an open question but after talking with Mondragon, we decided to work together. Even though we didn’t have any specific plans, we made the announcement in October, 2009. We were wiping the board clean and asking how would it look to create our own economy our own businesses and our own jobs? We thought the co-op structure would be a big part of the answer. To have good jobs for workers, it made sense that the business should be owned by workers. Jo: Given the increase in productivity per worker over the past 30 years, we should be making a minimum of $22 an hour! Today, capital ownership is forcing workers to work for less than they are worth.
Jo: It’s not a zero sum game. With co-ops, one keeps using workers, re-educating them within an ongoing self-renewing system. Rob: One thing that has made Mondragon so successful over the past 50 years has been its emphasis on education, research and development. They are on the cutting edge of technology and efficiency; knowing that if they do straight production without innovation, they won’t be able to compete with factories in Bangladesh and India. Jo: So Mondragon goes beyond what unions do here. It’s not just about labor but about capital as well. It’s about the factory floor but also about corporate headquarters. Rob: Yes, they do the whole thing. Unlike most corporations, they don’t stick to one’s core competencies but are always about trying to broaden their markets. If someone has a good idea, Mondragon helps develop it with worker training, resources and start-up funding. They do not only auto parts but home appliances, agricultural operations, grocery store chains, etc. They not only sustain existing businesses but incubate new ones. Jo: ...that work synergistically. What seems important here is that you have an integrated system. My experience with co-ops is as separate entities with little connection to one another.
Rob: One of the big challenges for co-ops in the US right now is that they are small with limited access to capital and are very risk Rob: And we’re all too familiar with having adverse. Ten people in a bakery co-op are our jobs shipped overseas in order to make something for 5 cents less. It wasn’t because trying to do co-op work as best they can. They aren’t thinking about creating a it wasn’t profitable to make it here while new business or a new economy of paying good wages and providing good benefits. It was just more profitable making it interconnected co-ops, but how to get health insurance this year. somewhere else. Factories closed just because it hiked up someone’s stock price. Worker-owned businesses aren’t going Jo: That’s what’s so good about the Steel Workers’ approach. You’re looking at the big to give their jobs away picture. Jo: One reason businesses can take jobs Coming Next Month— overseas are the free trade agreements, enabling capital flow all over the globe while Part II: A CLEAN & GREEN labor stays put, a commodity to be bought and LAUNDRY COMES TO PITTSBURGH sold. Since free trade agreements turn labor into a buyer’s market with many more people More on Gar Alpervitz at www.garalperovitz.com and his needing jobs, the wage scale is easily presentation in Seattle on the depressed. So how do co-ops survive inside New Economy in April, 2013 on that sort of capitalist organization? You Tube called “What Then Rob: It’s true that labor becomes a cost of doing business and not a market. Unlike Henry Ford, who paid workers enough to afford his cars, a lot of these co-ops compete because these businesses were profitable to begin with, making stuff that people want and need; there would be just be a lower rate of profit. The productivity and efficiency you gain outweighs the savings of low wage production overseas for a home market. They are also more productive. People
Must We Do?”
Jo Tavener, a member of the TMC editorial collective, taught film production at NYU before retiring from the University of Pittsburgh where she taught media and cultural studies.
everyday life to step back and see what it looks like and how we all fit in. The New Economy - Continued from page 1 Working Group [NEWG] is a project of the Merton Center. Money rules. Democracy We’re trying to see what this be damned; justice be new economy looks like. damned; workers, the poor, Over the past year we have the unemployed, be damned; begun to identify and connect our very earth be damned. with many disparate groups, In the pages of The New campaigns, programs, People, you read of coalitions and projects right many valiant struggles here in our region that have against a system of wars, of taken on that task in a wide injustice, of secrecy, of variety of ways, from exploitation and violence growing a community against people and against garden, organizing a co-op, to nature itself. We must developing a worker-owned continue to point out clean and green laundry. inconvenient truths; engage Read Mark Dixon’s piece people to become more aware on the NEWG Mapping of them, and to help provide Project in the July-August the tools of information and issue of the New People at organization as the Merton newpeoplenews.org. And Center has done for over read Ron Gaydos on our forty years. plans for a fall event to bring We, like millions of many folks together for a others, have come to believe community sharing. And read our current global corporate Cait Lamberton on a new and financial system of book by Gar Alperovitz, who control is unsustainable. We has best articulated just what must keep battling in streets, this new local, national and in the courts and the global New Economy is statehouses. already doing. But we also need to be creating an alternative For more information go system, one that is locally to http://facebook.com/ based, owned and run by the NEWGatTMC. Participation people, environmentally is open to everyone. sound, and just. That new economy is, in fact, Molly Rush and Ron Gaydos emerging; we are just too are two lead coordinators of involved in the fray of the Thomas Merton Center’s New Economy Working Be There Sept. 28! Group in western PA
A “New Economy?”
New Economy “Un-Conference”
When: Saturday September 28, 10 am to 4 pm Where: First United Methodist Church, Center and South Aiken Avenues in Shadyside Who: Anyone working to bring about a shared value, environmentally sustainable, just economy Why: It’s happening now; find out how you will benefit when you join in the movement!
More information on page 14
Every Monday at 9:00 PM
Progressive Pgh Notebook TV Series
airs within city limits: Comcast Channel 21 + Verizon FiOS Channel 47 Watch live at www.pctv21.org See more at www.youtube.com/ richfishpgh
September: Sierra Club
Climate Change Roundtable October: FRACKENSTEIN: An Environmental Rich Fishkin: Camera Nightmare from and Editor Marcellus Shale C.S. Rhoten: Community Producer for PCTV21
Pittsburgh Community Television Corporation
September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 3
National Insecurity March on Washington, Continued from page 1
Washington and the “I Have a Dream Speech” took place on Saturday August 24. In Rev. Al Sharpton’s speech, one of the principal organizers of the event, he proclaimed “we had voter ID when we voted for Johnson, we had voter ID when we voted for Nixon, we had voter ID when we voted for Carter, for George H.W. Bush, for Clinton and for George W. Bush, so why when we come to Obama do we need special voter ID?” Sharpton nailed it. The entire voter ID campaign is a scam, a fraud and a means to disenfranchise African -Americans and other minorities. It is racism by no other name. It makes the dream a joke. Thus, one of the most sobering aspects of the 50th Anniversary is that it was as much a lamentation as a celebration because of the country's significant regression in recent decades. But beyond lamentation or celebration, the 50th Anniversary was a call to action and vigilance. Rev. Joseph Lowrey, a confidante of Martin Luther King, Jr. put it well when he said that “We came here to Washington to commemorate, but we go back to our homes to agitate.” We cannot be lulled into some fantasy land by the media and mainstream press into imagining that MLK’s dream has been realized. The struggle for racial equality continues as the score card over the last 50 years has measured limited progress, of which we can truly be proud. The B-PEP, and Thomas Merton Center Pittsburgh contingent traveling to the 50th Anniversary and its organizers, Diane McMahon, Celeste Taylor, Tim Stevens, and Theresa Chalich, can be proud of having Pittsburgh so well represented in D.C. We all came back tired but energized for the task and work ahead.
King dreamed of a day when discrimination on the basis of race, gender or any category would be no more and social and economic harmony would be established. In great part due to the original March on Washington, the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts were passed under Johnson in 1964 and official discrimination and segregation on the basis of color was rendered illegal. After the passage of the Act, a period of rollback ensued, and the advances made were diminished. Although discrimination in housing and jobs was outlawed, it continues today. Currently, unemployment among African-Americans is 15%, while in 1963 it stood at only 10%. Today unemployment among AfricanAmericans is twice that of Caucasians. As a country we have regressed and there is much to do to further MLK’s dream. In 1963 the African-American right to vote was greatly abridged. Today in state after state, through voter-ID laws, legislators aided and abetted by the courts are introducing legislation that will deny this right to many in the African-American community. The justice and law enforcement system is no better. Through “stop and frisk” and “stand your ground” laws, there have been innumerable cases where African -American youths have been killed or gravely injured with the perpetrators going scot free. The case of Jordan Miles of Homewood and Trayvon Martin in Sanford, FL are the latest in a long list of civil rights and judicial horrors. This is the context in which the For further follow-up work on the 50th Anniversary of the March on 50th Anniversary we invite you to join with us by contacting Michael Photo by Laiyin Yuan Drohan, Chair of the Economic Justice Committee at (412) 361-3022.
The U.S. and Honduras: Four Years after the Coup by Dan Beeton Below is a summary of a presentation that occurred at the Merton Center in July of this year. It has been excerpted and edited by “The New People”.
The U.S. government continues to support human rights abusers in Honduras despite the Leahy Law against them, the concerns of its citizens, and regional political isolation. Why is this? Honduras is important to the U.S. government for geostrategic reasons: it is close to the Caribbean, South America, Mexico and the allimportant shipping lanes through the Panama Canal. Historically, Honduras served as the launching pad for the contra war against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua in the 1980s, and remains the epicenter of the U.S. military presence in Central America. The U.S. operates from seven bases there, and has significantly increased military support – including for the construction of new bases – since the 2009 coup. Every country in the region is important to the U.S. government, and its allies there now are few. Drugs serve as the pretense for our presence there, but the U.S. is increasingly isolated in its “war on drugs” approach, in view of a push toward decriminalization/legalization from Guatemala’s and Colombia’s presidents – among others - and Uruguay’s plans to legalize marijuana. The Obama administration offered hope of a change on Latin America policy when President Obama went to the Summit of the Michael Drohan is Americas in Trinidad in April 2009, co-chair of the and accepted a gift of Eduardo New People Galeano’s book, "The Open Veins of Editorial Collective Latin America" from Venezuela’s and a member of late president Hugo Chavez. Obama the board at the declared the beginning of a new era Thomas Merton in the history of U.S.-Latin American Center. Pittsburgh March posters were printed by Mike Stout at Steel Valley Printers relations. "I just want to make absolutely clear that I am absolutely opposed and condemn any efforts at violent overthrows With recent concerns about the security of the public in regards to law enforceof democratically elected ment, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has released a guide highlighting the rights and responsibilities of anyone who is stopped or questioned by the governments, wherever it happens police. Knowing your rights can prevent the spread of racial profiling and other in the hemisphere,” he said. He has also said, “The test for all of illegal activity by a police officer. us is not simply words, but also In any interaction with the police, always be calm, polite, and honest. Although deeds.” you have the right to remain silent, you should say that out loud to prevent further Within a few months, confusion. No matter what the police tell you, you can refuse to give consent to a however, the Honduran military search of any of your belongings. In the case that things go badly, prepare your removed the democraticallyfamily and those close to you. If you are arrested, make sure you request a lawyer immediately. But preventing an unwarranted arrest is ideal. If you are stopped for elected president, Manuel Zelaya questioning, be sure to ask if you are free to go. If they say no, they must tell you at gun-point while he was still in why. If your car is stopped, you can refuse to have it searched. If you are ques- his pajamas, and flew him out of tioned about your immigrant status, you still have the right to remain silent. You the country – stopping first to refuel at the Soto Cano U.S. don’t have to discuss your citizenship with anybody. military base in Honduras. Remember to be cooperative while defending yourself and if you feel that your The U.S. never made the rights have been violated, make sure you consult your local ACLU to report the official determination that this was infraction. The guide in full can be found on the ACLU’s website (aclu.org). a “military coup,” and did not
4 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
condemn it, as all of South America did. We now know – thanks to Wiki leaks – that the U.S. ambassador to Honduras at the time described it as a coup. Yet the U.S. continued to provide assistance to Honduras, though it had suspended aid following coups in Mauritania and Madagascar. Porfirio Lobo was elected president in November in elections held by the military regime, under conditions condemned by Amnesty International and other human rights groups. The U.S. pushed for greater recognition of his government while most of Latin America refused to recognize the election results. Why did the Obama administration react the way it did? The administration continued the Bush administration policy of leaving Latin America on the back burner. The senior White House advisor on Latin America was relatively inexperienced; policy was mostly left to the State Department. The Obama administration, through its actions, squandered the goodwill seen at the April 2009 Summit. While more countries have recognized the Lobo government in Honduras, the rift between the U.S. and Latin America has widened. Members of Congress, however, have taken an increasing interest, with 94 members of the House writing to then -Secretary Clinton last year urging her to “to suspend U.S. assistance to the Honduran military and police given the credible allegations of widespread, serious violations of human rights attributed to the security forces.” 21 U.S. Senators wrote to Secretary Kerry last month expressing “concern regarding the grave human rights situation and deterioration of the rule of law in Honduras” and calling for a “thorough review” of U.S. security assistance to Honduras “to ensure that no U.S. assistance is provided to police or military personnel or units credibly implicated in human rights violations.” While the resistance movement to the coup inside Honduras continues, a significant sector has moved its strategy into electoral politics, backing the former first lady, Xiomara Castro de Zelaya for president in this November’s elections. The repressive apparatus has shifted accordingly, assassinating candidates and members of Zelaya’s LIBRE party and threatening others – including Xiomara herself. International solidarity and attention around the elections will be key. The international response will be crucially important – that includes the media, the U.S. Congress, and the U.S. left itself. Dan Beeton is the International Communications Director for the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
Recommended Reading
By Jim Wallis — On God's Side:
What Religion Forgets and Politics Hasn't Learned about Serving the Common Good Book review by Joyce Rothermel With a quote from Abraham Lincoln on the book jacket, Jim Wallis, president and CEO of Sojourners and editor in chief of Sojourners magazine gives a direct lead into the theme of his newest book, On God’s Side: “ My concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God’s side.” “Common good” is a phrase too little used in our daily conversations. It is egalitarian going beyond class, racial, cultural, religious, and national loyalties to a global understanding of who is our neighbor. Wallis notes that this is coming more naturally to younger people, who have a far more global perspective than previous generations. As a central purpose, Wallis challenges the hateful ideological warfare between the conservative and liberal sides in our ongoing political battles and our inability to listen to or learn anything from one another. In their respective values of the justice of personal responsibility and social responsibility is the combination of what can create a quality of life here at home and around the world. Wallis wisely recognizes the need for political/social movements. Leaders committed to change need to
have movements in front of them and behind them to accomplish anything of significance for the common good. Community organizing based on direct relationships in neighborhoods and communities, gatherings on the streets and calls for involvement on the web, direct action, and the social media can all be effective tools for the mobilization of vast resources and large numbers of people to focus on social justice issues. Wallis specifically mentions the influence and importance of 350.org (created by Bill McKibben who will receive the Thomas Merton Award on Monday, Nov. 4 at Station Square). Wallis ends his books with “Ten Personal Decisions for the Common Good.” He contends that the places where we come together as neighbors and citizens to share public space will never be better than the quality of human life, in our own lives and households. Finding the integral relationship between our own personal good and the common good is our best contribution to the future…the best hope we have for a better life together. They are: “1. If you are a father or a mother, make your children the most important priority in your life and build your other commitments around them. If you are not a parent, look for children who could benefit
from your investment in their lives. “2. If you are married, be faithful to your spouse. Demonstrate your commitment with both your fidelity and your love. If you are single, measure your relationships by their integrity, not their usefulness. “3. If you are a person of faith, focus not just on what you believe but on how you act on those beliefs. If you love God, ask God how to love your neighbor. “4. Take the place you live seriously. Make the context of your life and work the parish that you take responsibility for. “5. Seek to develop a vocation and not just a career. Discern your gifts as a child of God, not just your talents, and listen for your calling rather than just looking for opportunities. Remember that your personal good always relates to the common good. “6. Make choices by distinguishing between wants and needs. Choose what is enough, rather than what is possible to get. Replace appetites with values, teach your children the same, and model those
values for all who are in your life. “7. Look at the business, company, or organization where you work from an ethical perspective. Ask what its vocation is, too. Challenge whatever is dishonest or exploitative and help your place of work do well by doing good. “8. Ask yourself what in the world today most breaks your heart and offends your sense of justice. Decide to help change that and join with others who are committed to transforming that injustice. “9. Get to know who your political representatives are at both the local, state, and national level. Study their policy decisions and examine their moral compass and public leadership. Make your public convictions and commitments known to them and choose to hold them accountable. “10. Since the difference between events and movements is sacrifice, which is also the true meaning of religion and what makes for social change, ask yourself what is important enough to give your life to and for.” Joyce Rothermel is a volunteer at the Thomas Merton Center.
September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 5
International Activism Big Charlie K The World’s Greatest Global have Sweatshop Organizer Lands in also worked Pittsburgh at the USW Building closely with by Kenneth Miller Before Charlie Kernaghan (aka Amirul Source: http:// “Charlie K”) founded the National Haque www.globallabourrights.org/ Labor Committee, he and his colleague Amin, Barbara Briggs spent time supporting the president of the National Garment land reform revolutions in Central Workers Federation of Bangladesh The Pittsburgh AntiAmerica. Then, Charlie Kernaghan (NGWF). Sweatshop Community Alliance spent some time as a Duquesne University adjunct. One of his early celebrated Martin Luther King Day publications, Paying to Lose Our Jobs, 2010 at the offices of the NGWF. We explains the Multi Fiber Arrangement were represented at this gathering by (passed in 1973, the mother of the “free Jonathan Christiansen of the Boston trade agreements” that have followed Industrial Workers of the World. Neil since) as an instrument of U.S. Bisno of SEIU visited with the NGWF imperialism. The publication describes in Bangladesh some years ago as well. So, one of the most important labor “Free Trade Zones” as places the U.S. government created to put landless activists and muckraking journalists of our time - struggling to communicate peasants. Since then, Charlie Kernaghan and with millions of workers, reporting on Barbara Briggs have been advocating one hard-hitting campaign after another, for workers in Bangladesh, those who “Big Charlie K.” is here in Pittsburgh, reside at the mouth of the Ganges, for and he has made himself available to the TMC community to help us make as long as I can remember. contribution to stopping When I was in college at Indiana our sweatshops. It is a gift that is hard to University Bloomington during the first comprehend and something we need to Workers Rights Consortium (WRC) campaigns (Michigan, Wisconsin, and take advantage of. The global forces Indiana joined the WRC on the same that have landed Big Charlie K in day), their National Labor Committee Pittsburgh also reveal something about published a purple book with pictures of us and the challenges before us. If I could take Charlie to a Pirates’ Bangladesh labels next to specific game, I’d talk to him about my friends worker testimony for us to present to our university administration. These Amin and Kalpona. I’d ask him to feel books helped direct the work of U.S. safe at PNC Park, and we’d chat about AID’s AFL-CIO Solidarity Center in the Major League Baseball (MLB) Revenue Sharing Agreement and Bangladesh. Charlie and Barbara work closely Marvin Miller. I’d ask Charlie what the with the Bangladesh Center for global apparel union looks like. I’d ask Workers Solidarity and stood with them him about Mohandas Gandhi. Maybe and the Pittsburgh Anti-Sweatshop we’d strategize about our local Senators Maybe Charlie will Community Alliance, a large group of and U.S. AID. Pittsburgh area labor unions, and the attend a baseball game with me and Black Political Empowerment Project in other members of the Pittsburgh AntiPittsburgh. Barbara Briggs has Sweatshop Community Alliance this presented testimony before Pittsburgh year - if he is not in Bangladesh or City Council with Kalpona Akter of the Switzerland or Washington D.C. Charlie’s niece is the director of Bangladesh Center for Workers health services at Carlow University Solidarity. Charlie Kernaghan has been around and has helped to usher in the Worker the block with the AFL-CIO. First, he Rights Consortium there, connecting was with the apparel industry union him to Pittsburgh even closer. On April 24, 2013, Raza Plaza in UNITE in New York City. He had a short run in the Washington D.C. Dhaka, Bangladesh, collapsed, killing One of the largest offices of AFSCME before coming to 1,124 people. Pittsburgh, where he moved into the industrial accidents ever. It is a sick irony for someone like offices of the United Steelworkers Charlie, and everyone else in the belly (USW). A piece of federal legislation, that of the beast, that a disaster like this is a would utilize the same mechanisms that focus on the front pages of The New currently enforce intellectual property York Times on sweatshops. Charlie is an organizer too often laws in U.S. courts to protect the human faced with disasters. rights of workers manufacturing for the Charlie motto matches the IWW’s U.S. consumer market, has been added to the priorities of the AFL-CIO. The (Industrial Workers of the World), USW’s Rapid Response Committee, “Don’t Mourn, Organize” and “Fight directed by Tim Waters, has been like hell for the living.” championing the work of the Institute for Global Labor and Human Rights and the legislation. Waters also directs Kenneth Miller is a member of the the USW’s support of United Students Industrial Workers of the World and Against Sweatshops and Jobs with co-founder of SweatFree Baseball and Justice, that Kernaghan calls the most the Pittsburgh Anti Sweatshop effective group of activists in America. Community Alliance. Kernaghan and Barbara Briggs 6 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
Water Inequality at Boiling Point in Occupied Palestine by Wanda Guthrie To even begin to talk about water in the Middle East, we must recognize that this is the most important commodity in the region. Moreover, Israelis and Palestinians together use 20 percent more water every year than is naturally replenished. It is also a shared opinion that the next war in the region will On the road to Hebron, West Bank, an not be over oil, but over apartheid wall segregates the nearby water. settlement. Photo by Katharine Thurman The Green Zionist Organization, based in the families are now dependent on United States, considers the non- what little they can grow on their profit work they are doing in lands, but nothing grows without Israel “grassroots. ” They warn water. In the Beqa'a Valley just that Israel is contemplating outside Hebron, farmers have fracking for oil, a process that been repeatedly fined for threatens to poison the region’s watering their fields. Farmers limited fresh-water supply, have been arrested. The Beqa'a further escalating tensions and Valley farmers had been making new peace agreements promised they would be given between Israel and its neighbors access to water, but the Israeliharder to achieve, since such only bypass Road 60 was built agreements will include division on farm land confiscated from of water rights. them. Farmers have never Meanwhile, the water received official waterlines and inequalities for West Bank, therefore tapped into the line to Gaza, and the Golan Heights are Harsina settlement with the unbelievable. attendant consequences. Fifty liters a day is the Yet in the hottest weeks of average available water for West the year, in the Israeli settlement Bank Palestinians for all uses, of Kiryat Arba overlooking including for industry and Hebron, an automatic sprinkler agriculture. The World Health system waters green lawns and Organization and the United lush flower gardens. States Agency for International While the water lines have Development recommend 100 resumed flowing in Hebron, liters of water per capita per day some 200,000 persons in West as the minimum quantity for Bank small towns and rural areas basic consumption. This amount have no water lines and rely on includes, in addition to domestic trucked in water. use, consumption in hospitals, Farmers have sold off many schools, businesses, and other of their animals--one rarely sees public institutions. Palestinian sheep grazing on the West Bank daily consumption is one third hills anymore, as there is not less than the recommended even enough water for human quantity. needs, let alone for animals. Water is collected on The United Nations, while rooftops of every building and trying to regulate this, declares sent to underground cisterns. this division of water rights as Mekarot, the Israeli water practiced a serious violation of authority, complains that its Palestinian rights that goes efforts to get Israelis to conserve against international water law. water have been largely unsuccessful. Because water has Wanda Guthrie is a member of been over-consumed for many the board of the Thomas Merton years, the water authority is Center, and spent the summer forcing conservation on the West visiting Israel and Palestine Bank by turning down the tap, with her daughter on a religious and virtually prohibiting water diversity tour organized by use for agriculture. Elmhurst College and the Siraj Two years ago, Ha'aretz Center for Holy Land Studies reported that 80 percent of the located in water from the West Bank and Palestine. Gaza goes to Israelis on both sides of the green line, while 20 percent is left for Palestinians. With Palestinian unemployment at 60 percent,
Ending Drone Warfare FIVE REASONS WHY DRONES ARE ILLEGAL by Bill Quigley
never likely to be legal.” Can drone killings be justified as anticipatory self-defense? “Applying One. Assassination by such a scenario to targeted killings threatens to eviscerate the human rights law prohibition the US government has against arbitrary deprivation of life.” Likewise, been illegal since 1976. countries which engage in such killings must Drone killings are acts of provide transparency and accountability, which no premeditated country has done. “The refusal by States who murder. Premeditated conduct targeted killings to provide transparency murder is a crime in all fifty states and under federal criminal law. These about their policies violates the international law framework that limits the unlawful use of lethal murders are also the textbook definition of assassination, which is murder by sudden or secret force against individuals.” Three. International law experts condemn US attack for political reasons. In 1976 U.S. President Gerald Ford issued drone killings. Richard Falk, professor emeritus of Executive Order 11905, Section 5(g), which states international affairs and politics at Princeton “No employee of the United States Government University thinks the widespread killing of shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, political civilians in drone strikes may well constitute war assassination.” President Reagan followed up to crimes. “There are two fundamental concerns. make the ban clearer in Executive Order 12333. One is embarking on this sort of automated Section 2.11 of that Order states “No person warfare in ways that further dehumanize the employed by or acting on behalf of the United process of armed conflict in ways that I think have States Government shall engage in, or conspire to disturbing implications for the future,” Falk said. engage in, assassination.” Section 2.12 further “Related to that are the concerns I’ve had recently says “Indirect participation. No agency of the with my preoccupation with the occupation of Intelligence Community shall participate in or Gaza, a one-sided warfare where the high-tech request any person to undertake activities side decides how to inflict pain and suffering on forbidden by this Order.” This ban on the other side that is, essentially, helpless.” assassination still stands. Human rights groups in Pakistan challenge the The reason for the ban on assassinations was that legality of US drone strikes there and assert that the CIA was involved in attempts to assassinate Pakistan can prosecute military and civilians national leaders opposed by the US. Among involved for murder. others, US forces sought to kill Fidel Castro of While stopping short of direct condemnation, Cuba, Patrice Lumumba of the Congo, Rafael international law expert Notre Dame Professor Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, and Ngo Mary Ellen O’Connell seriously questions the Dinh Diem of South Vietnam. legality of drone attacks in Pakistan. In powerful testimony before Congress and in an article in Two. A United Nations report directly America magazine she points out that under the questions the legality of US drone killings. charter of the United Nations, international law The UN directly questioned the legality of US drone killings in a May 2010 report by NYU law authorizes nations to kill people in other countries only in self-defense to an armed attack, if professor Philip Alston. Alston, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary authorized by the UN, or is assisting another country in their lawful use of force. Outside of executions, said drone killings may be lawful in war, she writes, the full body of human rights the context of authorized armed conflict (eg applies, including the prohibition on killing Afghanistan where the US sought and received international approval to invade and wage war on without warning. Because the US is not at war another country). However, the use of drones “far with Pakistan, using the justification of war to authorize the killings is “to violate from the battle zone” is highly questionable fundamental human rights principles.” legally. “Outside the context of armed conflict, Four. Military law of war does not the use of drones for targeted killing is almost Earlier in 2011, The New York Times revealed that the Mexican government was allowing U.S. Customs and Border Protection—under direction of the Pentagon—to fly drones deep into Mexico to conduct surveillance and gather intelligence on major drug kingpins. (“Drone Wars: U.S. Customs and Border Protection Considers Equipping Drones With Non-Lethal Weapons by Melissa del Bosque”) In the next few years we can expect to see a huge increase in the use of drones in the US. President Obama has announced that 30,000 drones will be in use here in coming years. While not all of these will be used by law enforcement agencies, we can anticipate more states turning to drones not only for surveillance but also to carry weapons. Police departments have requested authorization for the FAA to fly drones. Department of Homeland Security has used drones together with local police department to apprehend people, as in North Dakota where cattle wrestlers were apprehended with the aid of a drone. Financially strapped universities are turning to the Department of Defense for support for exploration of the use of drones. At least 34 of the recent authorizations to fly drones went to universities, and some of this exploration will be
authorize widespread drone killing of civilians. According to the current US Military Law of War Deskbook, the law of war allows killing only when consistent with four key principles: military necessity, distinction, proportionality, and humanity. These principles preclude both direct targeting of civilians and medical personnel but also set out how much “incidental” loss of civilian life is allowed. Some argue precision-guided weapons like drones can be used only when there is no probable cause of civilian deaths. But the US military disputes that burden and instead directs “all practicable precautions” be taken to weigh the anticipated loss of civilian life against the advantages expected to be gained by the strike. Even using the more lenient standard, there is little legal justification of deliberately allowing the killing of civilians who are “incidental” to the killings of people whose identities are unknown. Five. Retired high-ranking military and CIA veterans challenge the legality and efficacy of drone killings. Retired US Army Colonel Ann Wright squarely denies the legality of drone warfare, telling Democracy Now: “These drones, you might as well just call them assassination machines. That is what these drones are used for: targeted assassination, extrajudicial ultimate death for people who have not been convicted of anything.” Drone strikes are also counterproductive. Robert Grenier, recently retired Director of the CIA Counter-Terrorism Center, wrote, “One wonders how many Yemenis may be moved in the future to violent extremism in reaction to carelessly targeted missile strikes, and how many Yemeni militants with strictly local agendas will become dedicated enemies of the West in response to US military actions against them.” Recent polls of the Pakistan people show high levels of anger in Pakistan at US military attacks there. This anger in turn leads to high support for suicide attacks against US military targets. Bill Quigley teaches Human Rights Law at Loyola University, New Orleans, LA. Also works on human rights with Center for Constitutional Rights and Pax Christi USA
Drones in Every State? by Scilla Wahrhaftig
There has been a rapid development of Department of Defense, (DOD) drone bases in the US. In 2012, 34 states had drone bases, and more are being developed as DOD presses for bases that will expand having states economically invested in the program. A number of bases are located in urban settings near large population centers, which is a threat to those areas in the event of an enemy attack. Outside Philadelphia at Horsham Air National Guard station a new drone war command center is being built to go into effect in October 2013. From the Horsham base, MQ-9 Reaper’s can be launched by remote control to target people as far away as Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia. We are not the only country that is seeing the value of drones in modern warfare. Drone use has become commonplace by militaries in Israel, Russia, Turkey, Pakistan and India for surveillance; or, as in Israel, to attack targets in other countries. Drones are already being deployed domestically especially on the Mexican border.
for surveillance, tracking and targeting. It is clear drones are going to be a part of our lives; in fact they are already being used for mapping, sea level monitoring, and pollen analysis. Of special concern is the use of drones militarily. Actions that are being taken include: •Protests outside of bases or potential bases. Philadelphians are protesting monthly outside the proposed site at Horsham. Members of the new Pittsburgh Anti-Drone Warfare Coalition are hoping to attend their September protest. •The ACLU is challenging the CIA and the military for carrying out “Targeted Killings” killing people without a charge or trial. •Charlottesville, VA has passed a city resolution banning use of armed drones in the city. •A new Pittsburgh Anti-Drone Warfare Coalition in Pittsburgh is meeting at the Merton Center on the third Sunday of the month at 1:30 pm. •There are plans to create a Pennsylvania coalition of groups and individuals interested in this work. Scilla is the Pennsylvania American Friends Service Committee Program Director. September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 7
350.org Fighting Climate Change About 350.org
Not an Impossible Task Although difficult, rapidly reducing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is not impossible. We simply need to stop taking carbon out of the ground and putting it into the air. This means we need to stop burning so much coal and start using solar, wind and other sources of renewable energy instead, while ensuring less industrialized countries have a fair chance to develop. If we can do that, then the earth’s soils and forests will slowly cycle some of the extra carbon out of the atmosphere, and eventually CO2 concentrations will return to a safe level. By decreasing use of fossil fuels, and improving agricultural and forestry practices around the world, scientists believe we could get back below 350 ppm by mid-century. But the longer we remain in the danger zone—above 350— the more likely we are to see disastrous and irreversible climate impacts.
Organizing in a New Way 350.org works hard to organize in a new way—everywhere at once, using online tools to facilitate strategic offline action. It aims to be a laboratory for the best ways to strengthen the climate movement and catalyze transformation around the world, believing that if a global grassroots movement holds leaders accountable to the principles of science and justice, solutions can be found to ensure a better future for all. In 1989, Bill McKibben wrote The End of Nature, one of the first books on global warming for the general public. Almost 20 years later, in 2007, he, in conjunction with others, organized more than 2,000 actions at iconic locations in all 50 United States with a campaign called Step it Up. These creative actions—from skiers descending a melting glacier to divers holding an underwater rally—helped convince many political leaders, including then-Senator Barack Obama, to adopt a common goal: cutting carbon 80% by 2050. Starting in 2008, the people of 350.org built upon the Step It Up model of creative activism and broadened its reach to include people around the world. •On October 24th, 2009, they mobilized over 5,200 actions in 181 countries. •They took their message to the UN climate conference in Copenhagen in December 2009. •On October 10, 2010 (10/10/10), they hosted a Global Work Party, conducting more than 7,000 climate solutions projects in communities around the world. •In 2011, they pushed for thinking beyond fighting fossil fuels with rallies in 180 countries. •In early 2012, they helped connect the dots between climate change and extreme weather with Climate Impacts Day. •And on February 17, 2013, more than 200 busloads of activists converged on Washington, D.C., for a Forward on Climate Change rally. The 40,000 voices raising awareness about climate change and the Keystone Pipeline included two busloads of Pittsburghers, organized in conjunction with local chapters of the Sierra Club and with the Thomas Merton Center. As it charges ahead, 350.org continues to become more global, more strategic, and more focused on building an unstoppable movement for climate solutions—a movement that will be impossible to ignore. 350 is more than a number. It's a symbol of where we need to head as a planet. Warwick Powell was a bus captain on one of the Pittsburgh buses that went to the 350.org and Sierra Club rally in Washington, D.C., on February 17, 2013. 8 - NEWPEOPLE
Reflections of a Grateful Mom
(from page 1)
September 2013
by Peggy McKibben
Bill McKibben
How can a mother be anything but grateful when asked THOMAS MERTON to write about one of her children? 2013 AWARD WINNER My thanks to the Thomas Merton Center for honoring Bill with Environmental activist, author and your award named for Thomas founder of the grassroots climate Merton, one of my great heroes, campaign 350.org, is considered and for inviting me to reflect on “one of the most important why Bill may have become an environmentalists of the century” environmental activist. and will receive the Thomas Basic reasons are likely Bill's Merton Award: natural curiosity and early sense of fair play. Once he could talk, DATE: Monday, November 4, 2013 @ 6:00 PM he conversed in sentences, asked LOCATION: Sheraton Station Square Hotel, Southside questions and listened intently. REGISTER NOW: www.thomasmertoncenter.org Bill was blessed with many fine teachers and mentors. laughing uproariously. Bill dedicated his first book to Foremost, was his dad, Gordon McKibben, a journalist Kathy's memory and to his wife, Sue. and an ardent hiker, whose love and respect for nature Books were another huge influence. Even after he was infectious. As soon as our two sons could walk we was a voracious reader, we read aloud together as a took them on short hikes in the mountains near our family, most memorably C. S. Lewis' Narnia series. Southern California home. Nature was to be enjoyed, Those Christian allegories about boys and girls taking respected and celebrated. Gordon hated litter and the on heroic adventures in another world had a boys soon felt that defacing nature was despicable. tremendous impact on Bill who re-read them many When Bill was nearly five we moved to Toronto times. and encountered a new kind of nature: snow. Sledding When Bill was 12, his Dad was one of many on neighborhood hills and later tobogganing in citizens arrested on Lexington Green after the town Toronto's ravine parks, the boys also learned to skate selectmen voted against allowing John Kerry and and enjoy the fun of hockey. Greg, an older members of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War to neighborhood boy whose dad taught science at camp on the Green. Citizens defied the order and University of Toronto, invited Bill and his third grade camped with the veterans, hence the arrests. Bill was buddies to join a Nature Club, which Bill remembers furious that we wouldn't let him stay and be arrested happily. too. The event made him aware of citizen non-violent Bill and his brother learned about courage from the protest. friends with whom we vacationed regularly in the 70s. At Lexington High School he was co-editor of the Kathy, who had cystic fibrosis, was full of pluck and student newspaper and a dedicated member of the joy. Her parents made daily treatment times hilarious, debate team, working with mentors who strengthened telling funny stories that kept Kathy and the boys his ability to tackle issues effectively. Through our church he went on Youth Group trips to Appalachia where the students repaired homes, worshiped and had fun. As a Harvard freshman he marched in a demonstration urging divestiture of funds from South Africa's apartheid government and later had the thrill of seeing nonviolent efforts pay off. Editor of The Harvard Crimson, he and other reporters took on many issues and sometimes got into trouble. At The New Yorker, Bill's "Talk of the Town" essays were often lighthearted but he twice took on homelessness, eating and sleeping in shelters and spending freezing days in jeans, tee shirt and light jacket. He wrote about his experiences, which inspired him to start a shelter at Riverside Church where he listened to William Sloan Coffin preach. Social justice issues were already important to him; but Bill Coffin, who became a great friend, confirmed the urgency of social action. Researching and writing an article for The New Yorker on the afterlife of rubbish, sewage and other waste focused Bill on environmental problems. The writings of James Hanson, Wendell Berry, John Muir and other environmentalists were huge influences. Bill wrote The End of Nature in 1989, beginning his environmentalist path to becoming the founder of 350.org. The Thomas Merton Center is a proud consumer of TriEagle Energy.
Peggy is the mother of Bill McKibben, who will receive the Thomas Merton Award on Nov. 4 at Station Square.
Pittsburgh’s Fossil Fuel Resistance Saying “No!” to Fracking Our County Parks Marcellus Protest Group Update ALLEGHENY COUNTY, PA— In February, Allegheny County Council voted to lease both the Pittsburgh International and Allegheny County Airports to Consol Energy for shale gas fracking. In the months leading up to this vote, County Executive Rich Fitzgerald held closed-doors meetings with industry and pushed the decision through with scant opportunity for public comment. (Although one public hearing was held, it was scheduled only after public outcry; and Council did little to publicize the week- night session.) Most disturbing, the exact terms of the lease were withheld from the public, and most members of County Council did not understand exactly what they were agreeing to before they voted. Mr. Fitzgerald has said on several occasions that he wants to “take a look at all county land” for the purposes of Marcellus gas extraction. Now, news reports tell us that he wants to lease the
Allegheny County Parks, starting with Deer Lakes Park in the North Hills. Although Mr. Fitzgerald got his way on fracking the airports, the outcome for County Parks is not decided. The vote to lease the Airports was 9-4, and one of the members who voted in favor has since admitted that he regrets his vote. Only a few votes would have to change in order to defeat Mr. Fitzgerald’s plans to frack our publicly owned spaces. Why would these leases be a problem? We are told in news articles that the rigs themselves would be located on nearby private land, and that the drilling and fracturing would take place under the parks. However, it is clear to anyone who understands Marcellus gas extraction that noise, smell, and air pollution would affect the county parks themselves, and that we would expose ourselves to water pollution and dangerous pipelines cutting through both public and private land. Ask Washington County
residents whether they still enjoy taking their kids to Cross Creek Park, for example. We are also told, “The drilling will happen anyway. We just don’t want to miss the opportunity to cash in.” However, those who follow this industry know that corporations decide to drill or not based on many factors, and we have no way of knowing how a decision regarding profitability would be affected if a given park were not leased. In any case, the real question is:
For Allegheny County residents, the first step would be to contact your representatives on County Council to voice their concerns through the “Do we want our elected officials County Council website. Readers living elsewhere can help to publicize to resist industrial shale gas this issue. This question is far from extraction on our behalf, or do we decided, and we encourage you to want them to invite it into our check our website often and stay tuned communities?” at www.marcellusprotest.org
Invest in Thrive-ability — Divest from Fossil Fuels by Wanda Guthrie We don't have to go along with what the gas and oil industries want. Instead, let us join other cities that will lead the way in creating a new model for quality of life, environmental thrive-ability and economic success. We call on the City of Pittsburgh to: immediately freeze any new investments in fossil fuels. divest from direct ownership and any commingled funds that include fossil fuel public equities and corporate bonds within five years.
What can we do?
help inspire an urgent, accelerated and popular commitment to leave untapped 80 percent of the known carbon reserves, while developing renewable energy resources capable of meeting human needs, while making possible the continuation of life on Earth as we’ve known it.
I don’t believe we can say it any better than the text of the UCC Resolution: WHEREAS, the leaders of 167 countries (including the United States) have agreed that any warming of the planet above a 2°C (3.6°F) rise would be unsafe, and we have already (as of 2012) The goal is to unhook Pittsburgh from the grip raised the temperature 0.8°C, causing far more of the fossil fuel industry, which prevents us from damage than most scientists expected; and addressing climate change and forces Pennsylvania WHEREAS, computer models show that even to become a gas colony that advocates for the if we stopped increasing CO2 levels now, the Keystone pipeline. temperature would continue to rise another 0.8°C, You can find a link to both online and paper bringing the planet over three-quarters of the way to petitions on the Thomas Merton Center the 2°C limit; and Environmental Justice Page. WHEREAS, scientists estimate that humans Faith communities are divesting. The can pour roughly 565 more gigatons of carbon Resolution of the United States Conference of the dioxide into the atmosphere and still have some United Church of Christ makes clear the need for reasonable hope of staying below 2°C; and leadership by faith communities: WHEREAS the proven coal, oil, and gas If you follow this path of divestment from reserves of the fossil-fuel companies, and the fossil fuel companies you will countries (e.g. Venezuela or Kuwait) which act like drive public awareness of the incalculable fossil-fuel companies equals about 2,795 gigatons of damage being done for huge immediate profits CO2, or five times the amount we can release to in exchange for an uninhabitable future; maintain a 2°C limit of planetary warming; and build public recognition of the urgent need to WHEREAS the purpose of fossil fuel drastically and rapidly reduce dependence on companies is to make money for their shareholders fossil fuels; by providing for the energy needs of the world using call widespread attention to the consequences of the resources they currently own or have rights to continuing a "business as usual" approach to the tap – and if they simply continue to carry out this extracting, marketing, and burning of fossil purpose, they will raise the temperature of the earth fuel; and far beyond what is hospitable for life as we know it; and WHEREAS, because we are a covenant people and affirm Jesus’ call to love our neighbors as ourselves, we join God in recognizing our moral obligation to take into account how our decisions and activities affect all of creation now and into the future; and WHEREAS even though God loved the world and called it very good, humanity’s normal, everyday activity is putting God’s world in jeopardy; and WHEREAS over the past five or more decades, many bodies of the United Church of University students rally in front of city hall, Christ, including the General Synod on numerous San Francisco.
Jim Antal, UCC Pastor, speaking at the Forward on Climate Change Rally. The UCC Convention decision to divest was motivated by the 350.org climate change campaign, which is also urging colleges and universities to divest from fossil fuel companies. The final vote came during a national convention in Long Beach, California.
occasions, have recognized our moral obligation to be faithful stewards of God’s creation as well as acknowledging, in one way or another, that wrecking creation is a sin; and WHEREAS the Core Purpose of the United Church of Christ states (in part): “… we serve God in the co-creation of a just and sustainable world as made manifest in the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” Let’s break bread and talk about this: Join us for the Monthly TMC Potluck on
Thursday, September 19 at the Thomas Merton Center as we talk about Thrive-ability and Divestment from Fossil Fuels. George Hoguet, a Buddhist postulant, will speak to the moral and ethical reasons for divesting from fossil fuel for the health and wellbeing of all people and the survival of the planet. Bonnie DeCarlo, longtime TMC supporter and a professional financial planner will talk about socially responsible investments. Please bring food or drink to share. For more information contact Wanda Guthrie at 412-596-0066 or 724-327-2767, or environment@thomasmertoncenter.org
Wanda Guthrie is the chair of the Environmental Justice Committee of the Thomas Merton Center.
September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 9
Regional Activism Indiana County Celebrates First Pride Event by Melissa King On June 28th, members of the Indiana community gathered to see The Center for Community Growth’s screening of 8: The Mormon Proposition, a documentary that exposes the involvement of the Mormon Church in passing Proposition 8 in California. The law, passed in 2008 banned gay marriages, but was invalidated by a recent Supreme Court decision. Many gay couples have married in California, after Governor Jerry Brown ordered the state to resume performing the marriages. By interweaving the story of a young Mormon man and the pain that he and his husband experienced after Proposition 8 was passed, the accounts of members of the Mormon Church and their views on the topic, and the hidden campaign that the leaders of the Mormon Church ran for the passage of Proposition 8, the creators of the documentary uncovered this issue without generalizing the entire Mormon or Christian population. Even though most of the film covered some incredibly depressing topics, it ended showing LGBTQ protesters not giving up and fighting for their rights. The film screening was accompanied by a discussion panel that related the events of the movie to national and local activism. The Center hosted this “Indiana Pride” event just in time for the Supreme Court’s rulings regarding marriage equality as well as the Pride celebrations happening in cities all over America. This event was originally meant to be a somber reminder of the oppression that members of the
LGBTQ community face on a daily basis, but the celebrations happening nationwide helped to turn what would have been a heavy atmosphere into a hopeful one. Lynn Alvine, the moderator of the night’s panel and longtime activist with the Indiana Cares Campaign and the IUP Safe Zone, admitted during the panel that the recent events changed her outlook on the film. “I had seen the film once before, and to be honest, if it weren’t for Wednesday’s events, I wouldn’t have been able to watch it again tonight” she mentioned as she started off the panel. Dr. Alvine asked the panelists, Rita Drapkin, Dave Porter, the Reverend Joan Sabatino, Bonnie Humphrey and Ted Hoover, all of whom are active in the LGBTQ community throughout the area, three questions; first, what their goals and challenges were regarding LGBTQ issues and how living in western Pennsylvania has shaped those goals. Secondly, she asked them their thoughts regarding the defeat of DOMA and Proposition 8 and what changes they thought would result from this event. Finally, Dr. Alvine asked the panelists what they thought still needed to be done in LGBTQ activism. The answers that the panelists gave showed how diverse the members of the LGBTQ rights movement are, for each one had his or her own story to tell that gave
Neighborhood Activism for Transit Needs and affordable transit accessible to all. Secondly, for transit workers the right In Pittsburgh, one movement is to living wages, benefits, safe working working to ensure that our right to public conditions, and union representation. transit is not taken away. Thirdly, that there be established in the city This activist social movement is and in the State a dedicated and sustainable known as “Pittsburghers for Public arrangement for funding. Fourthly, the cost Transit” (PPT). As defined on their of public transit be equitably shared and website, PPT is “a volunteer, grassroots that corporations pay their fair share of the organization of riders, drivers and other funding. Lastly, no community be left out concerned Pittsburghers that advocate for in the provision of public transit and the mass transit because it’s essential for needs of all be met. It was reported that healthy environments, economies, and over 5,000 signatories to the Transit Bill of communities.” Rights have been collected and delivered to On July 20th, PPT held a members’ the Governor of Pennsylvania. meeting to discuss various strategies the Another project launched at the organization should employ moving meeting was what is called Transit Tales. forward. Through this project, the stories of riders, After introductions a basic set of drivers and members of the public will organizing goals were discussed. relate their stories and experiences with A proposal was made by the organizers public transit, the good, the bad and the to focus on the public transit needs of ugly. specific neighborhoods by forming Even if you do not ride the bus, your chapters to empower residents to advocate help would be greatly appreciated. If you for their public transit needs. are interested in getting involved, After much discussion on the proposal, donating, or telling your story about public it was adopted by those assembled. In the transit go to course of the discussion, many participants www.pittsburghforpublictransit.org or mentioned the difficulties they were contact Helen Gerhardt at 412-518-7387. enduring due to the cutback in bus routes already implemented by the Port Authority. Andrew Marczak was a summer intern at Difficulties included people having to the Thomas Merton Center. We wish him travel long distances to the nearest bus luck in his future career endeavors! stop, difficulties for people with wheelchairs and long waits for buses to arrive. Pittsburghers for Public Transit has developed a “Transit Bill of Rights” which was once more endorsed at the meeting. There are five rights outlined in the Bill which are as follows: Firstly, the right to safe, reliable, environmentally sustainable,
the audience a glimpse into their experiences and reasons for getting involved in the movement in the first place. While the panelists celebrated the Supreme Court victory, they all agreed that for many in the community, the right to marry is a symbolic victory, and the LGBTQ community is more in need of changes that affect the stability of their lives such as job protections and a broader cultural acceptance of their community. These activists plan to keep fighting the good fight in order to gain even more acceptance and safety for the LGBTQ community. The Center for Community Growth will be researching how the citizens of Indiana County can use the DOMA decision to move the conversation forward with regard to equal rights for people of all sexualities. One place to start would be for Indiana County and local municipalities to adopt policies which protect workers from discrimination due to sexual orientation. The mission of the Center is to unite and strengthen local activism, and its members hope that the Supreme Court’s decision will provide a gateway for Indiana County’s LGBTQ activists. Melissa King is the current intern for The Center for Community Growth in Indiana, PA. She is a senior at Indiana University of Pennsylvania.
Strike Support Network for Every Giant Eagle Family
By Andrew Marczak
10 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
by Kenneth Miller The United Food and Commercial Workers Local 23 has two Giant Eagle contracts, one for Meat and another for Grocery, that expire at the end of June next year. However, we are bargaining for all Giant Eagle employees beyond these divisions, in the union stores and the non union stores and so refuse to be divided by the company. Giant Eagle is a double breasted company, using its huge non union footprint to bargain against us. There are at least two other union contracts at the Okay Grocery Warehouse (a wholesale distributor of the Giant Eagle Company), warehouse workers and truckers represented by Teamsters 249 and 636. Their contracts have different expiration dates. At Giant Eagle we have rights at work that Wal Mart workers don’t have. Those rights are important. They mean workers can talk union all night long at work. They mean we can protect our free speech with the grievance procedure all the way up through binding arbitration. They mean we can organize against police brutality and for public transportation while we are at work. We cannot let ourselves be divided by age or race or nationality. Those are all
strengths of our union and we can experience the strength of that diversity instead of allowing ourselves to be overwhelmed by it. We can try extra hard to understand and accept and celebrate one another. More information about the history at Giant Eagle is needed by the workers from the union organizers including our history of collective bargaining and organizing. We need to compare our wages and benefits to the non-union Giant Eagles and to Wal Mart. We all need to understand how the contract treats older workers differently than younger workers and bargain up to the higher standard. In the struggle for a better life, we need community support now. What the community can do is to support us is join a strike support committee and adopt a Giant Eagle family. Solidarity with the workers and being acquainted with their needs and demands is necessary if a good contract is to be the outcome. Kenneth Miller is a member of the New People Editorial Collective, a member of the Industrial Workers of the World, the Wobblies and UFCW 23. Market District 40/ Shadyside Grocery Night Crew - Market District 47/Robinson Bakery
The Injustice of the Prison Industry The Department of Corruption (AKA: the DOC) by William (Juicy) Coward
opening it. They show bias at disciplinary hearings by denying To all citizens of the inmate witnesses and favoring the Commonwealth: listen up. This is evidence of staff. all true, and you’re hearing it today Many of the people who come from an LGBTQ inmate. People to jail young are abused and taken behind bars deal with hate, advantage of, fighting for their discrimination, abuse, sexual safety and lives because of harassment, and medical and misbehaving correctional mental health staff with poor officers. They often physically training. and verbally abuse inmates. They The Department of Corrections manifest hatred towards (the DOC), the attorney general of inmates. On the street, when Pennsylvania, the state police, and people injure individuals because the district attorneys have a lot to of their sex, religion, or race, it is answer for. Some of these officials classified under 18 USC § 249 as a abuse tax-payer dollars; they hate crime, and they get jail time falsify documents and charges; or a fine depending on the nature they misrepresent the facts; and of the crime. Not so for they lie and cover for each correctional officers who commit other. They tamper with inmate such acts with impunity in prisons. mail either by withholding or The medical staff and mental health staff are undertrained Prisoner Pen Pals Needed! and/or overworked too, so people with serious medical Please write to these individuals: needs get even sicker or die Gregory Middleton Paul McMillan because they’re not getting the #JX 0365 #JW3538 right treatment or medication. I P.O. Box A P.O. Box 631 know at my jail, the mental Bellefonte, PA 16823 5706 Glades Pike Somerset, PA 15501 health and medical staff don’t Wayne Pettaway know what they’re doing, so all Robert Auker #HM 1581 #BK 1943 10745 Route 18 they’re doing is billing and 175 Progress Dr. Allison, PA 16475 Waynesburg, PA 15370 killing people slowly. A lot of Jeremy Anthony people behind bars being Robert Mills #DQ 1846 physically and mentally abused #KP 5033 1111 Altamont Blvd. by staff are scared to report the 10745 Route 18 Frackville, PA 17931 Albion, PA 16475 abuse. They fear that they are Richard Phipps going to be made out to be Ed Iaccarino #KA 8464 #FB 3661 301 Moreda Rd. trouble-makers, especially if P.O. Box 999 Frackville, PA 17932 they are transgender, 1120 Pike Street Frank Hafer Huntington, PA 16652 homosexual, bisexual, or queer. #VI 6234 No matter what or who you are, Derrick Murph #C-14-225-0 #AS 0304 you have the right to say no to P.O. Box 409060 175 Progress Drive Ione, CA 95640 sex you don’t want. The real Waynesburg, PA 15370 reason homosexuals are singled G. Sean Miles James W. Curry #04A1587 out is because the DOC wants #BK 0245 12-61-19B us to submit to their need. If 175 Progress Drive P.O. Box 119 Waynesburg, PA 15370 they can’t have us, no one will, State Route 96 Romulus, NY 14541 and if you don’t give in to their
Tell Pennsylvania to Investigate
Write to your legislators and ask for an investigation into abuse of Pennsylvania wishes, they falsify prisoners, calling inmates like Juicy who your charges and put you in Restricted have suffered at the hands of DOC staff as Housing Unit (RHU); witnesses against the corrupt prison I mean solitary system. Senators Smith and Kitchen are confinement. already in support of such hearings when I’ve been sexually the Legislature returns to session this fall. harassed by a The citizens need to keep the pressure on correctional officer, for this corruption to stop! told a night stick would get shoved in my manhole and get my jaw Correctional officers should be broken. I was told to show my treated the same as anybody else assets or I would be lied about, who breaks the law. People need to alleging I spit on him, and would fight for a bill to force the get more jail time. This is cruel Department of Corrections to and unusual punishment, and my release all allegations of abuse, mother, who has been back and criminal violations, and sexual forth to the hospital, is my only assault and harassment, with no reason for standing strong and not tampering with or falsification of giving these people what they the DOC’s records. Allegations by want. inmates must be taken seriously On April 24, 2013, I got into a and the officers charged be fight, the inmate threatened me brought to justice. and tried to assault me, thereafter I ask that people fight this lying about it. I got 270 days injustice and seek to close down because the officer said I hit him the prisons. ‘Cause prison ain’t the with a closed fist and superiors cure; it’s the problem. Most of the knew the officer had lied. The inmates locked up could be home chief hearing examiner, program with our families, but we’re stuck review committee, and behind bars in the RHU on long superintendent, they all conspired term administrative custody together to give me extra RHU because of the corruption in the time. justice system — because of lies. I’ve been locked up for four years. Three different times I spent William Coward goes by the over 6 months filing grievances nickname Juicy and is a queeragainst staff for harassment and identified inmate at State abuse. On more than one occasion Correctional Institution – I wrote to the state police, the Huntingdon. You can write to district attorney, and the attorney Juicy there until December 7, general, who each refused to 2013: investigate. The state police sent my complaint to the DOC, the William Coward district attorney didn’t respond, # JS-6508 and the attorney general’s office SCI Huntingdon said they couldn’t investigate 1100 Pike Street private complaints about the Huntingdon, PA 16654 government.
Nations that Incarcerate More than the U.S.
by Molly Rush A lot has been reported about our nation's prison system and its bloated population, but this is what it looks like when you take all of the countries that jail more people than we do. Yeah, we're actually number one and that's not a good thing. At 716 per 100,000 people, according to the International Centre for Prison Studies, the United States tops every other nation in the world in percentage of citizens jailed. Next is St. Kitts and Nevis at 649;
Seychelles at 641; Virgin Islands (U.S.) at 539; Rwanda at 527; Cuba at 510; and Russia at 490. U.S. taxpayers spend $60 billion a year to lock up millions of mostly nonviolent prisoners. Daily Costs: According to "NPR"'s crime and punishment correspondent, Laura Sullivan, the incarceration of one inmate costs, on average, approximately $60 per day. Sullivan points out that in areas like New York, the estimate rises to around $198 per day. Yearly Costs: According to a June 2010 article published by The Economist, yearly spending on a single inmate ranges from $18,000 in Mississippi to approximately $50,000 in California. In comparison, Americans spend an average $10,213 per pupil on education. Number of Inmates: The Economist estimates that between 2.3 and 2.4 million Americans are incarcerated, roughly one in every 100 adults, five times the rate of incarceration in Britain and nine times higher than in Germany.
at lowering the rate of incarceration at the federal level. The United States and Pennsylvania need to do much more. Molly Rush is the co-founder of the Thomas Merton Center and the co-chair of the New People Editorial Collective.
Read more at november.org. The Attorney General has made a good start September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 11
Envisioning Peace and Health for All Celebrating the International Day of Peace by George D’Anglo On September 21st, globally millions of individuals and groups will honor the International Day of Peace (IDP), through community prayer and other observances. Pittsburgh will be joining with these groups in at least two events that week. Locally, events, both spiritual and secular, have been held for the past decade. This year, a major observance will be celebrated in Mount Washington at St. Mary of the Mount Parish from 7:00 pm to 8:15. The event will include an International Flag Ceremony and an interreligious prayer service for peace in Sullivan Hall, 115 Bingham Street. Sullivan Hall will also serve as the venue for the 24-hour spiritual Vigil. All are welcome to participate in the celebration. On Sunday, September 22, the “Pittsburgh North People for Peace” will hold their annual North Hills International Day of Peace Festival at Point Grove on Lakeshore Drive, North Park.
All are welcome. In 1981, the United Nations General Assembly, with a unanimous vote, established the International Day of Peace, now often referred to as Peace Day. Twenty years later the same body modified its resolution by calling for a global ceasefire on that day and fixing September 21st as the annual date for its novel idea. It might be called a noble idea but at the same time it reminds us of how violent and wartorn our world has become when all we can realistically envisage is one day in the year. This resolution seeks no less than to have the entire world observe 24 hours of global ceasefire and non-violence. This is the vision behind the United Nations’ resolution for an International Day of Peace: Building peace one day at a time. Many peace-based NGOs and individuals, representing a wide variety of religious and spiritual traditions, support and celebrate an International Day of Peace Vigil. The IDP Vigil movement envisions global 24-hour observations for peace that will demonstrate the power of meditation, prayer and other spiritual observations in promoting peace and preventing violent conflict. This year, 2013, the International Day of Peace is on Saturday September 21st, and special activities and celebrations will take place all across the world. These will include festivals, concerts, a global Peace Wave with moments of silence at noon in every time zone, and much
more. Since its inception, Peace Day has marked our personal and planetary progress toward peace as well as the distance we have to go to achieve planetary peace. It has grown to include millions of people in all parts of the world, and each year events are organized to commemorate and celebrate this day. Events range in scale from private gatherings to public concerts and forums where hundreds of thousands of people participate. Peace Day provides an opportunity for individuals, organizations and nations to create practical acts of peace on a shared date. Anyone, anywhere can celebrate Peace Day. It can be as simple as lighting a candle at noon, sitting in silent meditation, or doing a good deed for someone. Or it can involve getting your coworkers, organization, community or government engaged in a large event. The impact of millions of people in all parts of the world, coming together for one day of peace, can make a huge difference. To learn more and to see the global happenings for Peace Day, please go to: http://www.internationaldayofpeace.org/ https://www.facebook.com/peaceday George D’Angelo is a United Nations Representative, Pathways to Peace. George can be contacted at gadangelo2@aol.com or by calling 412 849-3600.
Why Improved Medicare for All Still Makes Sense by Sandra Fox th
July 30, 2013 marked the 48 anniversary of the passage of Medicare, the landmark law that has protected the health and economic well -being of millions of Americans. The vast majority of Americans today have grown up with Medicare as a fact of life. It would be terrifying to imagine the poverty, illness, and premature death that would (and did) accompany the absence of this vital safety net. Unfortunately, threats to Medicare are real, from both sides of the aisle and the White House. The partial privatization of Medicare through so-called “Medicare Advantage” policies increases the cost of Medicare in two ways: first, by issuing subsidies to the private insurance companies who sell these policies, and second, through high administrative overhead. While an average 28% of Medicare beneficiaries nationally are enrolled in Medicare Advantage rather than traditional Medicare, that percentage is expected to increase. On average, Medicare pays private health insurance companies 13% more per enrollee than is paid for by traditional Medicare. In April of this year, after massive lobbying by the health insurance industry, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reversed their decision to cut subsidies to Medicare Advantage by 2.2% in 2014 and instead raised the subsidy by 3.3% to a staggering 16.3%. Meanwhile, administrative overhead for the private insurance companies ranges from 15-30%, as compared to 2% for traditional Medicare. Even with the passage of the Affordable Care Act and the requirement that overhead be limited to 15-20%, private insurers are relabeling certain administrative costs as clinical care in an effort to sidestep this new requirement, as documented in an April 2010 report from the Senate Office of 12 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
Oversight and Investigations. Additional threats to Medicare include recommendations to completely privatize the program through vouchers, as called for in a 2011 Ryan-Wyden bipartisan plan, and President Obama’s 2014 Budget Proposal. The President’s proposal has enraged many of his own supporters. Highlights of his budget proposal include cuts to Medicare through increases in premiums, deductibles, and co-pays for new Medicare beneficiaries starting in 2017. While some call it “skin in the game,” the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare states: “We do not share the Administration’s view that people with Medicare make wiser choices about using healthcare services if they have to pay more of the cost. Rather, we agree with research which shows these additional costs could lead many seniors to forego necessary care, which, in turn, lead to more serious health conditions and higher costs.” U.S. Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, an early and ongoing supporter of the President, has yet to make public his position on Obama’s proposed cuts to Medicare, in spite of twice-monthly vigils outside his Pittsburgh office, phone calls, emails, and two meetings with his staff. Meanwhile, U.S. Representative John Conyers, Jr. of Michigan has continued to reintroduce HR 676, “The Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act.” As early as 1991, Congressman Conyers requested that the Government Accounting Office examine the impact of an improved Medicare for all system of healthcare on the U.S. The results of the study were clear: “If the US were to shift to a system of universal coverage and a single payer, as in Canada, the savings in administrative costs [10 percent of health spending] would be more than enough to offset the expense of universal coverage”. Subsequent economic analyses, including
those done by the Congressional Budget Office in 1991 and 1993, confirmed the superiority of a national single-payer system in controlling healthcare costs, while providing true universal coverage with minimal or no out-of-pocket costs. On July 31, 2013, Gerald Friedman, Ph.D., Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, unveiled his economic analysis of HR 676. He concludes: “Under the single-payer system created by HR 676, the U.S. could save an estimated $592 billion annually by slashing the administrative waste associated with the private insurance industry ($476 billion) and reducing pharmaceutical prices to European levels ($116 billion). In 2014, the savings would be enough to cover all 44 million uninsured and upgrade benefits for everyone else. No other plan can achieve this magnitude of savings on health care.” There are lessons to be learned from current threats to Medicare and the economic analyses. We need to take the private health insurance industry out of the formula, negotiate lower drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies, eliminate out of pocket costs, and expand coverage to include all. Sandra Fox is the Co-Chair of Western PA’s Coalition for Single-Payer Healthcare
Building International Bridges Pastors for Peace Defies Blockade of Cuba to Aid Hurricane Sandy Victims By Lisa Valanti For the 24th time in 20 years Pastors for Peace (P4P) successfully defied the longest economic blockade (52 years) ever carried out against any nation, a United States policy condemned by the United Nations as a “crime against humanity.” Seventy-five people reiterated Pastors’ unwavering commitment to stand in solidarity with the self-determination of the Cuban people by making the annual pilgrimage to Cuba in July. With the assistance of generous supporters, former TMC board members Reverend Thomas Smith and Lisa Valanti, along with GeAnita Smith, represented Pittsburgh in the delegation. For the first time since the Caravan began, no actual vehicles rambled through Canada and the U.S. holding town meetings and events highlighting a desperate need to change U.S.Cuba policy. Instead, supporters held independent events to raise funds for aid, and participants gathered in Mexico City. This year’s Caravan focused on helping Cuba recover from Hurricane Sandy. Readers who remember images of the destruction in the northeast still couldn’t imagine the devastation in Santiago de Cuba. No school, place of worship, hospital, home or hotel remained intact. It was deforested, and food crops destroyed. The government of Cuba had immediately directed all available resources into the region. It put out a call for international solidarity and humanitarian assistance. Pastors for Peace answered that call. After the flight and quick stop at the AntiImperialist Plaza in Havana, we found ourselves on a sixteen-hour bus ride to Santiago de Cuba via an overnight stop in the province of Villa Clara, where we visited the National Monument and tomb of Che Guevara. In Santiago de Cuba, though recovery efforts were evident, conditions were very difficult. The average daily temperature was 104 degrees; with the trees gone
Beijinger in Pittsburgh by Laiyin Yuan In the 1990s, there was a popular TV series in China called “Beijingers in New York.” The Chinglish (Chinese-English) word “Beijingers” was made up to describe the natives of China’s capital city Beijing. The TV series described the experiences of first generation Chinese who were self-employers in the US three decades ago. At that time, China was recovering from the damages of the Cultural Revolution; and most of its people were living in poverty. I still remember the lyrics of the series’ theme song: “time and time again you ask me whether I hate you, but time and time again I ask myself whether I can survive without you.” In my eyes, this is exactly what the Chinese immigrants wanted to say: that the United States was both heaven and hell, able to provide a better life for the hard-workers, but also a torturous place of alienation and discrimination. Nowadays, Beijing and New York City share many similarities. In appearance, they are both metropolises with high living costs and a poor living environment. As a native of Beijing, indifference, estrangement and the worship of money haunts me. Tired of the intrigues and manipulations of the concrete jungle, I wished to look for a way out for a better self. As a result, I stepped on this land as an international student twenty years later. So many things have changed since “Beijingers in New York” was produced. As a “Beijinger” in Pittsburgh, I experience a different life than my
there was no shade for relief. We stayed in cramped quarters, many on the floor in a church sanctuary, some choosing to sleep outside. Securing access to showers and toilets, as well as enough rice-based simple food and potable water for our group were serious issues every day. With limited medical supplies, the Cubans were nonetheless working hard to make sure diseases like cholera, which commonly occur in disaster areas, were controlled. We washed our hands with bleach and wiped our feet on bleach soaked mats entering all buildings. While the Caravans always bring humanitarian aid, we also earned our keep. We helped plant trees and spent a day working at a housing construction site. We were also proud to participate in the anniversary celebration of the Moncada, the site of the Cuban revolution. We paid tribute to the Cuban people and their accomplishments: free and universal healthcare, the highest literacy rate in this hemisphere, the highest percentage of home ownership in the world, the lowest infant mortality, and even after fifty-two years of the blockade, an average lifespan that exceeds the U.S. by 10 years! The stated U.S. policy objectives to restore Cuba, given its geo-political strategic importance, as a proxy state, is as actively pursued today as it was over 100 years ago when Teddy Roosevelt went up San Juan Hill and acquired Cuba as a colony. We still spend millions of taxpayer dollars each year to instigate a civil war in order to create an opening for intervention and bring about regime change that will favor U.S. interests above those of the Cuban people. This policy’s success depends on maintaining the blockade to strangle economic development in Cuba, and keeping Americans out of Cuba so they cannot see what is going on and make up their own minds. To that end, Americans traveling to Cuba without state department authorization is a crime punishable predecessors described in the TV series. Our generation enjoys the benefits of a prosperous national economy and developing international influence, giving me financial independence, a better education and more understanding about life in the U.S. I enjoy less social discrimination and a smaller cultural gap thanks to modern communication technology. Many Chinese students receive respect for their excellent performance in both study and work. To me, life in Pittsburgh is so different from Beijing or New York. My first sight of the Cathedral of Learning buried the seed in my heart to come to this “Steel City,” which I learned about in middle school geography. Pittsburgh was described as an example of a city that transformed from an industrial city to a garden city. I love the sight of bridges on the rivers, little red cabins of the Duquesne Incline, and the Downtown night scene viewed from Mt. Washington. What is more important, I love the smiles on people’s faces, which reveal calmness and confidence from the bottom of their hearts. People take care of each other. There are also organizations like the Thomas Merton Center fighting for social justice and civil rights. What impressed me most was a scene when all the passengers on a bus waited for a disabled person to get on. It took almost five minutes to put down the ramp and position the wheelchair. In Beijing, this would never happen because the bus is too crowded for a wheelchair, and most people would think it a serious waste of time to wait so long. Pittsburgh is a clean and tranquil city with a comfortable lifestyle. As a person who is used to
by a $250,000 fine and ten years in prison. U.S.Cuba policy has nothing to do with the Cuban Rev. Tom Smith from Pittsburgh Monrevolution umental Baptist Church, planting trees or Fidel in Santiago de Cuba. Castro. Photo Source: Lisa Valenti Like a magician’s sleight of hand, the U.S. government churns up fear while working undercover to pander to powerful political lobbies. Many people ask me why this work is so important. Cuba is a small nation, perhaps of little consequence to most people. But this policy affects every American. Millions and millions of our tax dollars are wasted keeping up the blockade. Your government is deciding where you can and cannot go in the world. The enforcement is arbitrary and punitive. GeAnita was detained upon her return to the US and her journals and photos copied for potential prosecution. Amazingly, Pastors for Peace has challenged this destructive policy for twenty years, and will continue to do so. We plan to return to Cuba in November to help with more reconstruction efforts. A full report of this delegation, photos, and more information about the November caravan will be available in September. For further information contact Lisa Valanti at 412-303-1247. The author has participated in all 24 Pastors for Peace Caravans and is co-founder of the Pittsburgh CUBA Coalition and the PittsburghMatanzas Sister City Partnership.
scrambling and competing, I find Pittsburgh a perfect place to slow down, relax, and discover the little merits surrounding me. Living in another country without any relatives is not easy. As a Beijinger who had gotten used to life in the capital, I miss the countless choices of restaurants and the convenient public transportation. In Beijing, I do not need a car; nor do I need to calculate the exchange rate between dollars and Renminbi. I hesitate to purchase expensive daily supplies. From living to studying, difficulties hide in every detail. Every time I assemble furniture by myself, every time I carry heavy supermarket bags to catch buses, every time I get caught in the rain after work, every time I go back home from the library at two a.m., every time I get unsatisfying scores after working hard, or every time I am homesick, I always want to ask myself: “Is it really worth it?” But I know the answer is “Yes.” Today’s difficulties will be tomorrow’s treasures, and what I learn and experience here will benefit me for my entire life. I believe that what does not kill me will always make me stronger. In August, I will have lived in Pittsburgh for a whole year. I love this city so much not only because of its beauty and tranquility, but also because it reshaped me to be more placid, leisurely and confident. I am here alone, but I am not lonely. Beijingers in Pittsburgh, I really enjoy being one of them. Laiyin Yuan is a student in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at Pitt and a management intern at the Thomas Merton Center. Good luck Laiyin! September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 13
Is there Life Off of the Grid? More on the Coming Sept. 28 New Economy “Unconference” Saturday September 28 10 am to 4 pm First United Methodist Church, Center and South Aiken Avenues in Shadyside
What is “The New Economy?” Definitions differ; but let’s say it is the economy of the future: one where economic success means fair and equitable benefits; one that uses of social, financial, and environmental resources efficiently; and where business activity replenishes our environment.
Examples of “new economy” projects, businesses, and community activities will be featured, from around the region by Ron Gaydos and beyond. Most importantly, attendees will highlight how their “Capitalism, in its current form, relatively small actions have no longer fits the world around helped to make big changes. It’s us. We have failed to learn the lessons from the financial crisis of not about adding more to your 2009. A global transformation is plate of responsibilities; it’s about urgently needed and it must start making small changes in your with reinstating a global sense of routine, or how you spend your money, to change everyday social responsibility.” business from a “money vacuum cleaner” to spreading the seeds of This was spoken not by an fair and sustainable growth right isolated or relatively powerless activist, but by Klaus Schwab, the here at home. founder of the World Economic Forum – the leading forum of the WHY YOU WILL WANT TO global financial and political elite. ATTEND: Spend one day getting in step with others who are helping to create the economy we Well, it’s about time that our want, build stronger ties, and economic leaders got a sense of social responsibility, you may say. cultivate what is already working. In fact, transformations are taking Help set in motion an economy that creates shared value – for place right now that are making businesses, employees, owners, or the local, national, and global economy more equitable, just, and employee-owners, and host communities alike – for environmentally sustainable. generations! On Saturday September 28 from 10 AM to 4 PM at the First United Who: Anyone working to bring about a cooperative, Methodist Church in Shadyside environmentally sustainable, just the New Economy Working economy. Group will hold an informal conference, an open conversation, Why: It’s happening now; learn on recent economic conditions, how you are part of a growing people’s experiences and challenges, what individual people new economy right here in western PA. and organizations are doing to Ron Gaydos is a “community make the economy more beneficial to themselves and their economist”, entrepreneur, and long-time peace and justice neighbors, and where anyone concerned can join in to help lead advocate.
Concourse --Michael Albright He steps from the jetway in full desert camo boots and duffel bag a handshake uninvited the forty or fiftieth time thank you for your service a smile and a nod and leave me alone I’m twenty years old and you are a fool if you think you know what I have seen. Michael Albright has published poems in the Loyalhanna Review and is a member of Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange and the Squirrel Hill Poetry Workshop. He lives in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. 14 - NEWPEOPLE
Windstax
the way.
September 2013
Ron Gdovic
Photo by Bette McDevitt
by Bette McDevitt
for the right mix to find the right niche in the wind power industry. The technology of creating energy from a split cylinder -a wind turbinewas invented by a Finnish engineer, Sigurd Johannes Savonius, in 1922. There are many applications of the principle, but WindStax is a unique design. Here’s what you need to know, as a lay person. The vertical wind turbine is adaptable to an urban setting. The towers, in a 20, 40 or 53 foot model, can be placed on an existing building or on the ground. The unit is hybrid, with a solar unit on top of it, and the energy created by the movement of the cylinders is stored in a battery on the bottom of the unit. The WindStax is light weight, takes little space, and is affordable, priced from $7900 to $14,900. Each WindStax is custom built for the location, taking into account the wind and power needs. As well as reducing carbon emissions, this unit can help us to form micro grids reducing the dependency on the national grid. “Every national disaster shows us how vulnerable our grid is, and needs consideration from a national security perspective, as well,” said Ron. “Entire subdivisions out west have already started on micro grids.” What might Don Quixote think about this new sleek cylinder with no blades? I can’t resist finishing off with a quote from Cervantes’ classic story, just for fun. “Do you see over yonder, friend Sancho, thirty or forty hulking giants? I intend to do battle with them and slay them. With their spoils we shall begin to be rich for this is a righteous war and the removal of so foul a brood from off the face of the earth is a service God will bless." "What giants?" asked Sancho Panza. "Those you see over there," replied his master, "with their long arms. Some of them have arms well nigh two leagues in length." "Take care, sir," cried Sancho. "Those over there are not giants but windmills. Those things that seem to be their arms are sails which, when they are whirled around by the wind, turn the millstone."
If you have driven past the 3200 block of Smallman Street lately, you have probably seen the flatbed truck parked in front of the WindStax factory, holding the handsome wooden cylinder turning in the wind. Dean Schafer, plant manager said the cylinder has two names “WindStax and ‘What the heck is that???’” It looks like a work of art, but a functional one; creating energy, more than enough to power the office of the company. You’ll see the yellow power cord running up to the second floor office. Ron Gdovic had been thinking about this particular design, a vertical wind turbine- not a windmill- for twenty years. Last year, he said to his long time friend and fellow rugby player, Dean Schafer, “Whaddya say we have a go at this wind project? I think this is the time to do it.” They spent one year, building the prototype, in a building in Apollo, and securing the patents, then set up shop in a former Alcoa building on Smallman. “The building has good Pittsburgh karma,” said Ron. Karma, and a hot item. The company has a production line up and running and just sent off a forty foot WindStax to power an oil field pump in Kansas. They named this wind turbine Dorothy, having to do with wind and Kansas. We can be glad then, to have, in the midst of the city, a new industry, creating alternative energy that will reduce our carbon footprint, and hire some of the many displaced workers with good skill sets. Ron Gdovic brings his own special set of skills to do this; he is a graduate of Penn Hills High School, having worked in a sheet metal shop as a youngster, then trained as an engineer at Pitt, and headed a research institute at CMU, “The research at CMU had nothing to do with wind, but everything to do with technology and sustainable development. I got very interested in the policy aspects of urban planning.” He went on to obtain a masters and PhD degree in urban and regional planning at Bette McDevitt is a beloved member of the University of Pittsburgh. His academic background, along with hands the New People Editorial Collective. on work as a building contractor, make
Justice for Trayvon Martin Zimmerman: Not Guilty? Opinion by Andrew Marczak
Or he's on drugs or something. It's raining and he's just walking around, looking about. Dispatcher: OK, and this guy - is he black, white or Hispanic? Zimmerman: He looks black. Here it is evident that there was no blatant racial hate going on, and that Zimmerman was only responding to the dispatcher’s question. But while George Zimmerman may not have been a racist, it does seem unfitting that he would get away from this incident without at least a manslaughter charge. He disobeyed the dispatcher’s instructions and went out of his way to track down someone that was simply walking home from buying a snack and a drink. Even if Trayvon Martin was the first to start the fight, Zimmerman should surely have been partially accountable for the events that took place but walked away without the slightest hit to his record (although his safety will surely be an issue for a long time). And the question remains; Would Zimmerman have chased Martin down had he been white? This “not guilty” verdict enraged people across the nation and brought people together under the issue of racial profiling and police brutality. In Pittsburgh, the rally in front of the Federal Building involved powerful protest poems, raps and speeches from community leaders and activists. The crowd seemed more positive than angry which was nice to see. While anger and sadness was most definitely present at the rally, there were many smiling faces, encouraged by each other’s support and the community attitude for change present in the crowd. No one would deny that Trayvon Martin’s death was a horrible loss, and perhaps even just a tragic misunderstanding between two people, but an inkling of good has come out of it in the form of community strength. Moving forward, we can hope events like these start to become much less frequent, and we can hope that laws like “stand your ground” are examined in detail.
If you were downtown on July 20th, you may have noticed a large gathering in front of the William S. Moorhead Federal building. Or perhaps you were one of the 200-300 souls taking part in the lively rally, which was spurred on by the tragic death of Trayvon Martin. If you are somehow still unaware of the details, Martin, a 17-year-old African-American high school student from Miami Gardens, Florida, was shot and killed by a member of a neighborhood watch in after an altercation between the two had taken place in a Floridian gated community. The man who pulled the trigger was George Zimmerman, a Hispanic and white mixed race individual. Zimmerman had spotted Martin late at night sporting a hoodie and walking about and thought he was up to something. He called 911 and asked what he should do. He was instructed to stay in the vehicle and not to follow him, but did so anyway. This led to a chase and a violent fight in which it still seems unclear who struck first. The act eventually led to a highly publicized trial in which Zimmerman was found not guilty of second-degree murder, the jury deciding the murder or manslaughter charges, which were both possible choices, were not suited to the case. This was because of the“stand your ground” law which allows someone to use deadly force if they believe their own life could be in danger. This event became a rallying point for several civil rights groups and many saw Zimmerman’s actions as a form of racial profiling. Zimmerman has responded to these accusations by stating that he is in no way a racist, and is in fact half-Hispanic, despite many calling him a “cracker” or only highlighting his white half. Additionally, the media did have some role in perpetuating his racist persona. NBC selectively edited and aired his 911 call before the shooting took place, making it sound like he said “This guy looks like he’s up to no good. He looks black”. This kind of statement would obviously make the African-American community very angry and it did. However, Zimmerman ended up suing NBC for altering this phone call which had originally sounded like this: Zimmerman: This guy Andrew Marczak was a looks like he's up to no good. summer intern at TMC.
Knock, Knock. Who’s There? Pittsburgh for Trayvon, Defending Black Bodies by K. Briar Somerville
of all charges, that the City of Pittsburgh denounce Pennsylvania’s version of the Stand Your Ground law, that the Pittsburgh legal system begin in-depth investigation of its own verdicts and systemic criminalization, abduction, abuse and murder of Black people, demonstrated by countless cases of injustice including Jordan Miles, Avis Lee and Terrell Johnson, the halt to any development in historically Black neighborhoods that does not include community consensus, that all development in Black neighborhoods directly benefit that community and be decided upon with meaningful neighborhood consent, participation and leadership, that the City of Pittsburgh actively support the creation of Black economic initiatives through policy, funding and other resources, a coalition of wellness professionals, agencies, and activists to address the extreme disparities in the physical well-being of Black people as compared to whites in Pittsburgh, which is demonstrated in part by the current Black infant mortality rate and the abysmal life expectancy of Black women, that Pittsburgh institutions attend organizational anti-racist training and are held accountable for demonstrations of white privilege and supremacy, culturally-relevant emotional support for Black communities in response to trauma, that the City of Pittsburgh create a Human Rights Bill as an active demonstration of the inalienable right for all to be, the immeasurable value of the lives, bodies and minds of all oppressed people and a commitment to true physical and emotional justice for oppressed people within the City of Pittsburgh, that the City of Pittsburgh hold the tragic death of Trayvon Martin as a wake up call to the culture of white supremacy that produces, protects and inflicts emotional, institutional, legal, economic violence on Black lives and bodies. Pursuing further accountability “in response to the economic violence inflicted on black communities,” Pittsburgh for Trayvon delivered a “love letter” to the Urban Redevelopment Authority on August 8, asking, “What does it mean to design a neighborhood where Black people feel safe?” Knock, knock. Who’s next? “In response to the legal violence towards and brutalization of black people,” Pittsburgh for Trayvon plans to bring further anti-racist demands to the Pittsburgh Police this fall. Stay tuned at www.trayvonpgh.wordpress.com.
On July 14, the day after the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the murder of Trayvon Martin, about 200 protesters gathered on Freedom Corner in the Hill District for a speakout and collective action, some wearing hoodies in solidarity with Trayvon, who was wearing a hoodie when he was killed and is widely regarded as a victim of racial profiling. At Freedom Corner, artist/activist Paradise Gray read an original poem about the injustices of the case in the form of a grim knockknock joke, which has since been adapted by the group Pittsburgh for Trayvon as a call-andresponse chant. During the speakout, leaders from the National Black United Front called for law-abiding gun clubs and youth self defense trainings for the black community. Two college graduates spoke in favor of black empowerment through education. The next speaker responded, “It shouldn’t matter if I went to college! . . . Teach your children to value themselves and their lives.” La’Tasha Mayes, director of New Voices Pittsburgh: Women of Color for Reproductive Justice, spoke in favor of a diversity of tactics against institutionalized racism. Mayes was one of several names who signed to a statement from the participants of a sit-in on the road following the speakout. Four police cars blockaded the street around the civilly disobedient activists, and after some negotiation, the Pittsburgh Police decided not to arrest anyone. Late that night, the protesters stood in a circle and held hands in solidarity before peacefully disbanding, issuing the statement which formed the basis of the new anti-racist group Pittsburgh For Trayvon: “We recognize that Trayvon Martin’s murder is not an isolated incident. Pittsburgh is home to the same systemic injustice, racism, white supremacy and brutalization of black people. In response, we are formally delivering a set of demands to the mayor and city council following the rally.” Later that week at the City County Building, Pittsburgh For Trayvon gave a press conference and led a singing sit-in outside the office of the Mayor, who refused to meet with them. Pittsburgh For Trayvon delivered their demands to the mayor’s house the next day. Pittsburgh For Trayvon demands the following: an official public step forward against injustice denouncing the inequitibly enforced laws and judicial system that allowed George ZimK. Briar Somerville is a member of the merman to be found NOT GUILTY editorial collective. September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 15
Religious Activism Solidarity with the Nun’s Justice Movement by Joyce Rothermel
as brief handwritten or typed letters from individuals. Volume matters. The Apostolic Nuncio is basically a hotline to the Pope. In some troubled dioceses, a high volume of letters to the Nuncio resulted in Vatican intervention. Be sure to indicate the name of your parish (if you attend one).
Sr. Janet Mock
Source: new ways ministry blog
Janet Mock, a Sister of St. Joseph from Baden, Pennsylvania, and executive director of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) will be the first speaker in the Association of Pittsburgh Priests Fall Speakers Series to be held on Monday, September 16 at seven p.m. at the Kearns Spirituality Center in Allison Park (next to LaRoche College behind the Motherhouse of the Sisters of Divine Providence). LCWR, which represents more than 300 orders of Catholic sisters, 80 percent of U.S. women religious in the United States, received a mandate from the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to reform its programs and publications. In her talk, “Sense of the Faithful: A View from the Leadership Conference of Women Religious,” Sister Janet will speak about the experience and what LCWR is learning in the process. Last month, 800 LCWR members and associates met in Orlando in assembly. There they continued to discern their response to the doctrinal assessment of LCWR mandated by the Vatican and overseen by Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain. Many LCWR supporters gathered in prayer around the country in solidarity during this national meeting and Sister Janet’s presentation will provide updates from her leadership perspective. The Nun Justice Project has been organized to continue support to the sisters. It invites those who want to join in solidarity to write letters (see sample below), pledge collection money and hold vigils. When writing letters please be respectful, brief, and clear. Give personal examples and adapt language below to suit your own style. Form letters or letters with multiple signatures are not as effective 16 - NEWPEOPLE
Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano Apostolic Nuncio, Apostolic Nunciature, 3339 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington, DC 2008 Dear Archbishop Vigano, I/We write to ask you to intervene in Rome on behalf of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious and the tens of thousands of U.S. nuns whom they serve. Specifically, I/we request that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith revoke its mandate to control all of the internal orations of the Leadership Conference. I/We are appalled by the Congregation’s demeaning treatment of these faithful leaders of women religious who are so widely respected throughout the United States. I/We are deeply ashamed that our Church would choose to exercise authority in the sisters’ regard in a way that can only be described as abusive. It is hard enough for women and those who love them to remain Catholic in a Church that neither values their ministerial gifts nor permits them to participate in governance. For our Church to persecute women whose only crime is to speak truthfully about real problems and challenges in the Church and in the world, is completely intolerable. I/We realize that you are the Pope’s eyes and ears in the United States. Please assure the Holy Father that I/ we draw this egregious mistake to his attention out of great love for the Catholic Church in the United States. Women religious have made U.S. Catholicism what it is today. They deserve the Vatican’s praise and support, not castigation. I/We trust you will register our concerns with the appropriate authorities in Rome. Sincerely yours, p.s. The courtesy of your reply is greatly appreciated.
September 2013
Cc: Archbishop J. Peter Sartain Timothy Cardinal Dolan Archbishop J. Peter Sartain, 710 9th Ave. Seattle, WA 98104 (206) 382-4560 Timothy Cardinal Dolan Cardinal of New York Pres., US Conf. of Catholic Bishops 3211 Fourth Street, N.E. Washington, D.C. 20017 The speakers series will continue on Thursday, October 24 with Brother Louis DeThomas is lecture, “A Hope Filled Future for the Church”. A Christian Brother, educator and former President of St. Mary’s University of Minnesota from 1984 to 2005, Brother Louis will present an environmental scan of religion around the world and its effect on the Catholic Church. He will explore the realm of the Christian imagination and its role in creating a church for the future of the People of God in the third millennium. Louis seeks to integrate a “covenant-centric” understanding of the church through the inspiration of the Medieval Jewish “Kabbalah” tradition. He will also present his assessment of the beginnings of Pope Francis’ leadership as he sees it from his work and residence in Rome. On Tuesday, November 19, Denise Holtz will speak on “Human Trafficking”. Most Americans are not aware that this evil and tragic practice continues into the 21st century. FBI Special Agent Denise Holtz has five years experience working Human Trafficking investigations and is cofacilitator of the Western Pennsylvania Human Trafficking Coalition. Donations requested are $15 per presentation and $40 for the series. For more information, contact Fr. John Oesterle at (412) 232-7512. Joyce Rothermel is Chair of the Church Renewal Committee of the Association of Pittsburgh Priests.
The Pope Says “Gay” by R/B Mertz “Homosexual persons,” “persons with deepseated homosexual tendencies,” “persons with a homosexual inclination,” “persons with same-sex attraction disorder”; these are the words that the Catholic Church, in all official statements and documents, and Catholic clergy acting in any official capacity, have used to refer to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. On a flight from Brazil to Rome, Pope Francis gave an hourlong interview, available online, which updated the Church’s vocabulary and revolutionized the ongoing conversation about the place of LGBT Catholics in the Church. In the 1986 document On the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons, Cardinal Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XIV, argues that the Church is doing “homosexual persons” a favor by refusing to call anyone “homosexual” or “heterosexual,” because these words cannot encompass human nature and identity. Most LGBT people would make the same argument, but it becomes more problematic in the context of the continual insistence that homosexuality is inherently immoral. In this context, the refusal to call us by the name we call ourselves equates with labelling my wife as my friend. This is called a “micro-aggression,” although it would be called insanity if I said, “This is my friend, Frank,” and my audience said, “Hi, Jim.” Clearly it is disrespectful to call Frank “Jim.” Likewise, it’s been clear for many years that the Church does not respect the psychological or cultural significance of the terms “gay,” “lesbian,” or “bisexual”. This refusal to engage with LGBT people on their own terms (literally and figuratively) has resulted in a one-way conversation about sexual morality which has only served to exclude many Catholics from practicing their faith. In the interview last month, Pope Francis addressed a variety of topics, including the so-called “gay lobby,” rumored to be a powerful force in Vatican politics. It’s important to note that this group is not lobbying to change Church teachings on gays. The “Gay Lobby” is made up of mostly conservative folk who manipulate Church politics by dirtdigging and blackmail. The name, perhaps, derives from the content of the blackmail. Go figure. When asked about this gay lobby, Pope Francis was quick to explain that he was against any type of “lobby”—he went on to elaborate about the moral problematics of lobbies. Where his predecessors would have likely taken the opportunity to reinforce the strict Catholic teaching on homosexuality, Francis made a different choice. He said, among other things: “If a priest is gay - if anyone is gay - and seeks the Lord, who am I to judge him?” Then he quoted one other Church teaching—that the catechism teaches that gay people should never be discriminated against and that we should be integrated into society. This is the needle in the haystack of Church teachings he could have quoted at that moment. He could have said things like “intrinsically disordered” or “destruction of the family” or “the end of Western civilization.” The only disorder that Francis seemed concerned with was the political disorder of the Vatican; the Pope had only good things to say about gay people. R/B Mertz teaches at Penn State New Kensington and Duquesne University. She publishes poems online at mylyriccompany.tumblr.com.
Youth Activism The Plight of the Student by Daniel R. Wilder
into, and education remains one of the few viable means of class On OccupyStudentDebt.com, an mobility. Race also impacts one's anonymous blogger testifies: "I owe opportunities. Higher education is about $80,000 in student loans debt least accessible to African to the federal government, Chase Americans and most accessible to Bank, and Wells Fargo. My student whites. Michelle Alexander explains loans bills exceed $2,000 a month. I in her book The New Jim Crow that have no money to start a family, no the defunding of American money to keep my work wardrobe education is part of a program which professional, and barely any money marginalizes black people by for groceries ($100/month)." funneling them into a “school-toIt is the same with millions of prison pipeline.” Already their Americans who find themselves parents were denied the resources of unable to move on from their college American society, now they receive debt. According to the nonprofit poor education because of the organization American Student continued segregation of Assistance, 48% of 25-34 year olds opportunities, are unable to find jobs, are unemployed or underemployed. and sometimes turn to illegal Seventy per cent in the same age business in order to survive. In cities range concur that it has become around the country, schools at all harder to make ends meet in the last levels are being privatized and four years. demolished so jails can be built on From Democracy Now, Amy their ruins. All Americans suffer Goodman reports that American from the destruction of our student debt recently surpassed one educational institutions, but people trillion dollars after quadrupling in of color suffer this the last ten years. $864 billion of that disproportionately so. debt is outstanding loans from the We need to make paying for federal government, whereas about college a fair and reasonable $150 billion is private debt. The endeavor for all. The demands of the average student loan balance is Occupy Student Debt Campaign are $24,000, and a majority of people a model for future progress: are still repaying their student debt well into their 30s and beyond. - Free public education, through Dan Newman of fool.com notes federal coverage of tuition fees. that bankruptcy isn't an option for - Zero-interest student loans, so student debt holders. "The that no one can profit from them. government can garnish wages and - Fiscal transparency at all hold onto tax refunds. And the universities, public as well as Department of Education hires private. collection agencies and pays them up - The elimination of current to 20% of the collection amount student debt, through a single recovered." Massachusetts state act of relief. senator Elizabeth Warren, speaking at a recent student conference, said Affordable education and the federal government will be dignified employment are not making $51 billion from student luxuries, they are rights. Every loans this year, adding that profiting working person deserves as much off of students "is wrong. It is education as they want, without the morally wrong. That is obscene." threat of unemployment or crippling We should not be afraid to debt. We refuse to accept the lie that acknowledge that education is about student debt is the fault of students more than just the training of and that poverty is the fault of the workers. Education is about enabling poor. people to reach their potential as Students of the world unite; you human beings, to live fulfilling lives, have nothing to lose but your debt! and to allow them to contribute to Daniel R. Wilder is a student of society so that others can benefit philosophy at UMass Boston, an from their successes. Occupy Wall Street activist, and a Most of us recognize the member of the International limitations of the class we are born Socialist Organization.
Why Voting Is Important by Paul Butler
uphold the ID requirement for the future. Attorneys for the state and prosecution finished their closing arguments in the landmark trial on August 1st, leaving both sides to wait for the verdict from Judge Bernard McGinley. What remains abundantly clear is that the nationwide assault against voting rights will not be going away anytime soon. In Shelby County v. Holder, five justices on the Supreme Court dismissed the idea that our country’s ugly racial history is still relevant to voter suppression today. The Court invalidated Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, a key provision that contains the formula to decide which jurisdictions are subjected to federal preclearance of election law changes. Justice Roberts based his ruling on the premise that the covered jurisdictions had overcome their troubled roots and no longer deserved to be singled out for federal oversight. Essentially, in the majority’s view, the sheer effectiveness of the preclearance requirement warranted its demise. Justice Ginsburg lambasted the decision in a blistering dissent, comparing the logic of dismantling preclearance to “throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.” In reaction to the verdict, many of the same individuals who regularly bash “judicial activism” celebrated the Supreme Court’s rejection of the overwhelming will of Congress to protect the right to vote. Texas attorney general Greg Abbott announced — on the day of the ruling, no less — that state voter ID and redistricting laws that had been previously been blocked in federal court as discriminatory would immediately be implemented. Mississippi and Alabama eagerly followed suit, beginning enforcement of ID laws without federal approval. Meanwhile, on August 12th, North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory signed H.B. 589, compelling voters to present certain types of governmentissued IDs, among which college identification is not valid, while decreasing early voting and eliminating same day registration. Clearly, our Supreme Court and state governments are failing in their Constitutional duty to protect the right to vote. Pennsylvania is merely one of the numerous states whose voting systems are under assault, but the fight here is no less important. Perhaps the best way to respond is to do precisely what ID-loving legislators fear the most, namely vote.
Across the nation, conservatives aren’t letting the fact that voter fraud is virtually nonexistent to get in the way of using the issue as Paul Butler an excuse to engage in widespread voter suppression. As Stephen Colbert has mockingly expressed with regard to voter fraud, “Our democracy is under siege from an enemy so small it could be hiding anywhere.” Conservatives point to imaginary votes from dead people, noncitizens, and children that have supposedly swung an untold number of elections, despite the complete lack of evidence for any of their claims. In reality, the objective is not to crack down on voter fraud but rather to crack down on the act of voting itself for those deemed unworthy of our most basic of constitutional rights. The voter ID laws introduced in many states, largely passed by rightwing legislatures, represent a serious threat to voting rights for millions of Americans. Several organizations, including the ACLU and NAACP, have exposed the suspicious intent of the photo identification requirement and have launched court cases to stop its enforcement, with varied levels of success. Pennsylvania’s ID legislation is one of the country’s most egregious examples of voter suppression. The law was enacted a mere 8 months before the 2012 election and had the potential to disenfranchise up to 9 percent of Pennsylvania’s eligible voters. Conservatives didn’t take long to admit that eliminating fraud was never the real goal, with Speaker of the PA House Mike Turzai bragging that his legislation would “allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.” Unbelievably, the state signed a stipulation agreement submitted to the Commonwealth Court stating that “there have been no investigations or prosecutions of inperson voter fraud in Pennsylvania.” Judge Robert Simpson ultimately postponed implementation of the law until after the 2012 election, noting that the state had done far less than promised to distribute IDs to prospective voters. This July the case returned to the Commonwealth Court, and regardless of the outcome, it will almost certainly be appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. The Paul Butler recently graduated high prosecution summoned a variety of school and am taking a gap year experts to reveal the full extent of the prior to college. He is a social media voter suppression, including intern with TMC for the summer and statistician Bernard Siskin, who will be backpacking and argued that over 500,000 voters could volunteering in China, Cambodia, be disenfranchised by the legislation. and Laos in the fall. .Paul was also In response, the Corbett also the blog writer for the Three administration has agreed to not Rivers Community Foundation this enforce the law in the November 5th August. election but is asking the court to September 2013 NEWPEOPLE - 17
International Uprising Religious Freedom in China by Grease
First Run/Icarus Films
Salvador Allende
The Original 9/11 by Paul Butler
President Nixon then initiated an unrelenting covert effort to create turmoil so that Chileans would come to the conclusion that, in Nixon’s words, “military coup is the only answer.” He began by instructing the CIA to place propaganda in newspapers, radio, TV, and within the military. To implement a virtual economic blockade, the Nixon administration pressured U.S. representatives of the World Bank to manipulate the country’s loan qualifications, placed a political pawn as head of Inter-American Development Bank to reject monetary assistance to Chile, banned the U.S. Agency for International Development from loaning money to the nation, and forced the Exim Bank to hand Chile an unwarranted ‘D’ credit rating. Allende had little power to stand up to the concerted might of the United States, and the targeted campaign against the country inevitably led to economic catastrophe and political chaos. Many of the Chileans who took to the streets to protest the economic conditions blamed their president for their troubles without realizing that the U.S. was the real culprit. On September 11, 1973, using the country’s newfound turmoil as an excuse for action, the Chilean armed forces, led by Augusto Pinochet, surrounded the Chilean presidential palace La Moneda. As the president issued a radio address to the country, military aerial bombers and tanks assailed his palace. Salvador Allende was later discovered dead after shooting himself in his office. In the days following the coup, the new military leadership arrested tens of thousands of civilians, many of whom were tortured and executed, and began implementing a neoliberal economic agenda with the full support of Nixon and his allies. As we approach the 40th anniversary of the coup, we should recognize that the U.S. actions in Chile were anything but an anomaly. Our country’s repeated willingness to cast aside our ideals in favor of far less admirable goals represents an alarming trend that directly contributes to distrust abroad of our motives as a superpower. Unwarranted foreign involvement has only served to worsen our national security by engendering the type of sheer hatred involved in attacks such as the better-known 9/11 of 2001. Until we are willing to apply our founding principles to our foreign policy, we will continue to be treated as an enemy rather than a friend of freedom.
Most Americans subscribe to a core set of ideals and values including democracy, liberty, and equality. We point to the Declaration of Independence as a daring experiment to mold a country that could serve as a beacon of hope for millions who desired a new chance at success, and we strive to carry forward these ideals into the modern world. All too often, however, we watch our government act on behalf of corporate interests, oil resources, and “stability” on the world stage instead of the principles that we claim to cherish. One of the best examples of our leaders leaving behind American ideals to actively enforce their misguided will on other countries is “the other 9/11”: the Chilean coup of September 11, 1973 that deposed President Salvador Allende and installed Augusto Pinochet as leader of Chile. As the United States continues to weigh the merits of involvement in the affairs of other nations, it is important to look to the events in Chile to remember that we are capable of acting as a destructive force on the world stage -- in opposition to democracy, human rights, and everything we stand for as Americans. The 1970 democratic election of Salvador Allende came in spite of a sustained covert CIA operation, dating back for more than a decade and involving extensive propaganda and intimidation, to prevent his rise to the presidency. Almost immediately following Allende’s victory, President Nixon and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger launched a joint, renewed effort to undermine the Chilean leader in any way possible. The Nixon administration believed that a weak response to Allende’s election as president would embolden third-world efforts to challenge American economic domination and would put a dent in U.S. credibility as a superpower. Entirely absent from this calculation was any respect for the democratic values that underlie our nation. Nixon, Kissinger, and the CIA threw everything they had into the effort to disrupt the democratic foundation of Chile, including bribing Chilean congressmen, funneling untraceable machine guns to violent individuals, and directly encouraging and providing funds to men involved in the assassination of the pro-Allende commander of the armed forces, General René Schneider. The Chilean people responded by rallying behind their president in the face of an assault Paul Butler recently graduated high school and is taking a gap year prior to college. Paul on their constitution and democracy from is a media intern with TMC for the summer. outside forces. Internship and volunteer opportunities are available at the Thomas Merton Center. Help assist Pittsburgh’s leading peace and social justice efforts by supporting the work of the center and its dedicated projects (more info on page 2). Call (412) 361-3022 or email office@thomasmertoncenter.org.
18 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
http://america.aljazeera.com/ Watch Live at: Tweet @AJAM
I’ve been working in a city local Religious Affairs Department (RAD) in China for almost two years, but I prepare to leave, since I can’t tolerate the management ideas and the corruption. All levels of Religious Affairs Departments belong to the corresponding governments, keeping the records of religious groups (Buddhism, Taoism, Islamism, Protestantism, and Catholicism) regarding activity places and religious workers. Sometimes RADs make enquiries into the financial standing of the groups. Besides, what is more important is ensuring that these groups don’t take advantage of religion to subvert the Communist Party and the Government. In my two years here, I found that it is not religious groups, but RAD itself that debilitates the relationship between believers and the government. Their autocratic management put each religious group and religious leader under their strict control. Firstly, the staff in RAD often don’t have a basic knowledge of the religions they oversee. Veterans are occupying all the officer positions (at least in my city), and few college graduate students who have special knowledge of religious studies are ever employed. I, graduated from a fairly prestigious university with a degree of philosophy majoring in religious studies, but I am not a formal official. In China, excellent high school students with high GPA often choose to enter colleges run by The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to get undergraduate degree, while those with low GPA will join PLA before high school graduation. When the latter ones are close to forty, they have little promotion room in the Army compared with the former ones, so they are resettled in all levels of governments according to the rules of Chinese government, which reduces the number of college graduates entering government. For Veterans the study of religious traditions and practices is an entirely optional matter. In my work place, some veteran officials consider religion as superstition, and think believers have something wrong with their minds. The reason is that they were brainwashed in the Army by a version of the thought of Marx, Lenin and Mao Zedong, which emphasizes historical materialism, dialectical philosophy, autocratic ruling, and they transplant it in the local government from the Army. For instance, two of the veteran staff in RAD said that it is necessary to give religious workers military training to clear their minds. In China, the leaders of temples or churches are actually appointed by the RAD. According to Regulations on Religious Affairs, leaders should be elected by religious adherents, and RAD should only put these appointees on record. But now RAD controls everything. That means these religious leaders become appendages to the government. In order to maintain their leadership and get protection from the government, they have to bribe the RAD. For example, this year RAD plans to build a staff restaurant that needs 16 thousand dollars to improve the accommodation of officials, and they want to get the money from temples and churches. The money is from believers’ donations that should be used to help victims fight against disasters or be given to those who really need aid. It would hurt the believers’ religious faith and conviction if they know the whole story of what their money is used for. The existence of RAD and Regulations on Religious Affairs (not law) violates the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China which says: “Citizens of the People’s Republic of China enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, public organization or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion” (Article 36). Actually, when Christians gather in large numbers in a place that hasn’t been put on RAD’s record, RAD will call the police to disperse them. If they refuse to obey the police, they are taken away. Thus it seems that the government, the police, and the Regulation of Religious Affairs are more powerful than The Constitution, and they think that they are the law. Society should be structured and regulated according to the law, and not according to the will of The Party, the government, and the police. A novel that debunks the corruption I saw in RAD over these two years is on my agenda, and I hope to use my knowledge and experience to protect the freedom of religion in my country. The author, Grease, is an advocate for freedom and human rights.
Community Activist Perspective Meet New Board Member Kitoko Chargois
The Pittsburgh contingent arrives in D.C. on August 24, 2013 for the 50th Anniversary of the MLK March for Jobs, Freedom and Justice to reinvigorate the struggle for economic justice and freedom.
In Photo Above—From Left to Right: Front Row: Michael Drohan (TMC Board), Xinpei He (Past TMC Intern and now Member) Jingjie Chen (Past TMC Intern and now Member), Yiqun Sun (Past TMC Intern and now Member), Shernell Smith (TMC Board Member), Millard McElwee (CMU Student), Jaili Li (friend of TMC) Back Row: Monroe Johnston, Amber Norris, Richard Nero, James Lucius (TMC member). Family from San Francisco that travelled to the MLK March
DON ANTONIO --by Gil Fagiani Cojutepeque, El Salvador Don Antonio sits on a bench under a royal palm tree by the ranch house of his neighbor Don Meme. He wears a chalk-white panamá that shades his face brown and lined as an old oak floor. On his lap is a short machete in a leather sheath with flower-like tassels. He talks about working in a firework factory for twenty-five years and operating a machine with a spinning steel ball that ground charcoal and blended it into gunpowder. The pay was three dollars a day. Sometimes the ball overheated and Don Antonio said to the boss: Está muy caliente and asked if it was OK to shut down the machine to let it cool off for a while. But the boss always shook his head no ordering him to grind on. Over the years, Don Antonio saw workers with their clothes on fire their hair on fire their skin melted like candle wax. He’s retired now and his daughter has taken his place in the firework plant. An accident just put her in the hospital. She’s only 17, he says, gripping the handle on his machete. I hope the burns on her face don't ruin her chance for a husband. Gil Fagiani is a translator, essayist, short story writer, and poet. His latest book is: Serfs of Psychiatry (Finishing Line Press). Gil co-curates the Italian American Writers’ Association’s readings at the Cornelia Street Café in N.Y.C. Special thanks to Mike Stout for his contribution of posters to the March on Washington! It was a great witness for the group from Pittsburgh!
Our youngest board member, Kitoko Chargois is a senior at Chatham University where she is studying journalism and photography and serves as editor and chief for the University paper, The Communique. She was first introduced to the Merton Center last year when she did a summer internship at the Center’s Penn Avenue location. There she wrote and distributed the Center’s weekly e-blast, wrote articles and took pictures for The New People. Kitoko was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo. When she turned six, she and her family moved to the United States. They have lived in several cities from Toledo to Detroit, before coming to Pennsylvania nine years ago. Prior to Kitoko’s encounter with the Merton Center, she knew about the social issues around her and would sometimes think about them. She found the Merton Center to be a jumping-off point in doing more than thinking about social issues to discussing them, figuring out the root causes, and her place within them. She believes she is in the learning stage and is doing a lot of listening and observing. Earlier this year, Kitoko got involved with the newly formed group in Pittsburgh raising consciousness about sexual abuse in the military. She hosted a screening of the documentary on the issue called “The Invisible War.” She plans to arrange another showing this school year to get more students involved in the organizing group. Regarding her work with the Board, Kitoko says, “It is great to be surrounded by involved people and learn what is going on today. I believe I can be a part of it.” Although new to social activism, she is learning and talking with her friends about it. She would encourage others to get involved with the Center because “the Center has a handle on a lot of issues that young people face and if they want to take action, they can find a way to do that with support.” Kitoko has just completed a summer internship at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, writing articles in the magazine, outdoor, and health sections of the paper. After graduation next spring, she hopes to start a career in news reporting where she can link with social activism and through the news educate and inform her readers/listeners. Kitoko confessed at the end of the interview for this profile about her that she prefers writing about others than being asked about herself! We are grateful to Kitoko for her service on the TMC Board. Look for her at TMC events over the coming year. Joyce Rothermel is chair of the membership committee, board member and an editorial collective member building the community spirit of the Thomas Merton Center.
September 2013
NEWPEOPLE - 19
September Activism Weekly Meetings: Tuesday
Sun 1
Mon
Tue
2
3
Wed 4
Thu 5
Labor Day Parade 10am Downtown
8
9
10
11
12
W.O.M.I.N. Meeting 18 Schubert St. Pittsburgh 7:30pm
Israel/USA History Course 4th floor Cathedral of Learning 10am
Latin America Solidarity Committee Meeting
Fri
Sat
6
7
Policy Discussion/ Lunch 325 Sixth Ave Pittsburgh 12pm
TMC Picnic Noon-2pm at East Liberty Presbyterian Church (116 S Highland Ave.)
First Friday Action Post Office Grant St. and
TMC General Membership Meeting 2-4pm following
13
14 Haiti Solidarity 11 am-1 pm at TMC Project To End Human Trafficking Carlow University Campus at 10am
7pm, location tba
International Socialist Organization Meets weekly at the Thomas Merton Center 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.
Wednesday Fed-Up! Write letters for prisoner’s rights at the Thomas Merton Center, 7 p.m.
Thursday TMC Potlucks! Thursday evenings. Interested in having one on an issue that’s important to you or your organization? Contact: mcmahond@thomasmertoncenter.org
Saturday Black Voices for Peace Vigil to End War, 1 p.m., Penn Ave. and Highland Ave., East Liberty Citizens for Peace Vigil noon to 1 p.m., Forbes Ave. and Braddock Ave.
Sunday Anti-War Committee on Drones Third Sunday of the Month Environmental Justice Committee Meets at various times. Contact: wanda.guthrie@gmail.com
Monthly Meetings:
First and Third Wednesdays Darfur Coalition Meeting 7 to 9 p.m., 2121 Murray Avenue, *The Ongoing Fight TMC APP Fall The Politics of for Voter’s rights The Second Floor, Squirrel Hill, Divestment Speakers at Jesus at Contact: 412-784-0256 Pump House from Fossil Waterfront Drive, Second Mondays Kearns 6 Allegheny Fuels Potluck Munhall, 1:30pm — Assn. of Pgh. Priests Spirituality Square East *Celebrating the 10th 5129 Penn Meeting 7 to 9 p.m., anniversary of Fight Center at 7pm Pittsburgh at Ave Garfield Epiphany Administration Center For Lifers—West 6:30 pm 6pm Second Sundays *Rally Against Violence at St Mary’s Women In Black Church 7pm Monthly Peace Vigil, 10 to 11 a.m., Ginger Hill Unitarian Universalist Church, Slippery Rock 27 28 22 23 24 25 26 First Thursdays Green Party Meeting New Economy “Soldiers NH International Talk on Pelican 7 to 9 p.m., 2121 Murray Ave, 2nd floor, Squirrel Working Group Day of Peace Bay by Jules Heart” Hill Festival at Point Lobel Unconference Grove, North Pitt Law School Third Saturdays 1-4 pm Point Park Park, McCandless 7:00 pm First UM Church, Fight for Lifers West Theater 10 a.m. to noon, New Life Ministries, TMC Board Shadyside Anti-war/Drone 325 N. Highland Ave., East Liberty Meets 6:30pm at Committee Mtg. 7-9 pm Second Saturdays TMC 1:30 pm TMC Project to End Human Trafficking (PEHT) Carlow University, Antonian Rm #502 Volunteer Sign-up—10am-12pm 29 30 Training Seminar—12pm-1pm TMC participates in the Pittsburgh Foundation's annual DAY OF GIVING! On OctoSecond Tuesdays ber 3, 2013, please visit http://www.pittsburghgives.org and select Thomas Merton W.O.M.I.N., 7:30-8:30pm, St. Peter’s United Center as one of your charities and we will receive a partial match for your donation. Church of Christ, 18 Schubert St.
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
Only individual donations given through http://www.pittsburghgives.org will qualify for the match. Donations must be made with either a Visa or MasterCard. The minimum donation is $25. Donations over $1,000 are accepted; however, only the first $1,000 is eligible for the matching funds. Your donation must be made between 12:00 AM and 11:59:59 PM WEST on October 3 to qualify for matching funds.
Become a Member of TMC Today! __$15 __$15 __$50 __$100 __$75 __$125
Low Income Membership Student Membership Individual Membership Family Membership Organization (below 25 members) Organization (above 25 members)
ONCE YOU BECOME A MEMBER, YOU WILL RECEIVE THE NEWPEOPLE !
Join at thomasmertoncenter.org/join-donate or fill out this box and mail it in.
Name(s):________________________________ Organization (if applicable):__________________________ Address:________________________________ City: __________________ State: __________ Zip Code:_______________________________ Home Phone:____________________________ Cell Phone: _____________________________
TMC membership benefits include monthly mailings of The New People to your home or email account, weekly eblasts focusing on peace and justice events in Pittsburgh, and special invitations to membership activities. Become an active member of our community! 20 - NEWPEOPLE
September 2013
Email:_________________________________ Mail form and donation to: Thomas Merton Center 5129 Penn Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15224
Mark your calendar
Thomas Merton Center Annual Membership Potluck Picnic Saturday, September 7 Noon to 2 PM—in the courtyard of East Liberty Presbyterian Church. All TMC members, families and project members are invited. Please bring something to share. Beverages will be provided. The annual membership potluck meeting will follow in the ELPC social hall from 2 to 4 PM (also the back up space for the picnic if it rains). This is a time to get updated on the Center’s strategic plan, its organizational health, and activities and to hear from you, our members! We need to learn what you are most passionate about and have the opportunity to respond to any questions and feedback you may have. The more of our membership that gathers, the more fun and meaningful the day will be! If you would like to help with the planning of either or both events, please call Joyce Rothermel at the Thomas Merton Center: 412-361-3022.