from: William Hughes

On Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2009, Antiwar activists dressed all in black, with white death masks, paraded in a steady rain and in single file, past the U.S. Supreme Court, and around the U.S. Capitol, in Washington, D.C., as the new 111th Congress convened inside. The “March of the Dead” participants wore around their necks the names of those killed in conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Israeli Occupied Gaza. The U.S. Congress has
repeatedly voted hundreds of billions of dollars to support those two wars. Check out: http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home. In addition, Congress continues to subsidize, to the tune of billions of taxpayers’ dollar a year, the state of Zionist Israel. See, http://www.wrmea.com/. For background and updates on this protest action, please go to: http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/.

from: William Hughes

On Friday, Jan. 2, 2009, Human Rights activists staged a demonstration and march, in Washington, D.C., in solidarity with the beleaguered Palestinian people of Israeli-Occupied Gaza. The rally began at the Israeli Embassy. One of the speakers was Ibrahim Ramey. He is the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation’s Civil and Human Rights Director. For background, please see,
http://www.masnet.org/news.asp?id=3729
and http://masnet.org/. In his remarks, Mr. Ramey urged the large crowd of activists to “stand up” for the suffering people of Gaza and to work “by nonviolent means” for peace and justice. He directed some of his remarks to President-Elect Barack Obama. For related videos on the demonstration at the Israeli Embassy, check out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=788fxH2ccjI&feature=channel_page
and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWRX_OFOV08&feature=channel_page
and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUtMFyhqjNo&feature=channel_page
For the latest updates on the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, please see: http://www.pchrgaza.org/;
http://www.phrmg.org/; http://www.wrmea.com/;
http://justiceandaccountability.org/Home.html; and,
http://www.endtheoccupation.org/.

Fatal police shooting posted on YouTube
The footage is shaky and low quality, with chaotic shouts and protests from onlookers at a subway station in San Francisco's east bay. But it clearly shows three policeman roughly handling a group of young men – including one who is pinned to the ground by two officers and shot in the back. This shooting of 22-year-old Oscar Grant – who died later in hospital – has outraged many in California and triggered riots in Oakland in a case that many feel echoes the brutal beating of Rodney King by LA Police in 1991. www.guardian.co.uk As with all police brutality and police murders committed in the United States, the police officer in this case will not be prosecuted and will be found innocent of all wrongdoing. The police have the power to execute innocent people with total impunity and often do. The ruling corporate elite have granted this power to the police because they fear the people and want to grind them down and make them afraid.

By Remi Kanazi

At the Gaza rally in NYC yesterday. "The poem is entitled: To Exist is To Resist. Many people within the cultural realm are getting together to see what they can do to educate, inspire, and keep people engaged via artistic mediums."

from: William Hughes

On Tuesday, Dec. 30, 2008, Human Rights activists, in Baltimore, MD, staged a demonstration in solidarity with the beleaguered Palestinian people of Israeli-Occupied Gaza. The rally took place at the Memorial Plaza, opposite City Hall.

Tuesday, Dec. 30th was declared a “National Day of Action: Stop the Massacre of the Palestinians,” with protest rallies taking place across the United States. http://answer.pephost.org/site/News2?abbr=ANS_&page=NewsArticle&id=8871&news_iv_ctrl=1621

For the latest updates on this critical Human Rights matter, please see:

DR. MOUSSA EL-HADDAD: Well, I am in the middle of Gaza City, in the heart of Gaza City, and the situation is indescribable. If this is not a holocaust, I don’t know what holocaust is. According to the news, they say almost 318 people are dead. The majority of those are civilians. At least 300 of them are civilians. And they say about 1,500 are injured, but a lot of them are seriously injured. The hospitals lack a lot of the necessary staff, instruments, even gauze and medicines, and everything is lacking. Physicians and nursing staff are working around the clock. People cannot find a place in the hospitals for treatment, injuries. And I am sure there will be a lot more of the dead under the rubbles of those buildings that were attacked and demolished. Every now and then, we hear a rocket attack or two. So, there are warplanes in the sky flying all over the time. As I speak to you now, I can hear them up in the sky, the pilotless jets and the warplanes, F-16s and God knows what. The warships in the sea are also attacking from the sea. And attacking who? Hamas? They are not attacking Hamas; they are attacking the people, the civilians. The civilians—I mean, I’m looking at the street right now, the main street of Gaza, Omar al-Mukhtar, and hardly you can see anyone walking there, because every single person is afraid. democracynow.org

from: William Hughes

On Dec. 23, 2008, activists held a press conference, at 12:30 PM, along with a picket line, in front of the Baltimore City’s Sheriff’s Office, at the main Court House, near the City Hall. They requested a halt, a moratorium, to all foreclosures and evictions in the city, and that the Sheriff’s Office follow the precedents established by the Sheriff of Cook County, Illinois, and the Sheriff of Philadelphia, PA, in this regard. The rally, with the temperature hovering in the low 20s, was led by the “National Network to Stop Foreclosures and Evictions.” The demonstrators also delivered a letter to the Sheriff’s Office setting out their views on the issue. For more background on this social justice cause, see: www.stopforeclosuresandevictions.org. A longer version of this press conference can be found on Google, at: http://video.google.com.

from: William Hughes

On Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2008, activists from Code Pink staged a “Shoe-In” demonstration in front of the White House. The rally was in solidarity with Iraqi journalist, Montadhar Al-Zaydi. He recently tossed his shoes at Dubya, at a Baghdad press conference, held with the puppet Iraqi ruler, Nuri al-Maliki. Published reports indicate that Mr. Al-Zaydi, after his arrest, has been subjected to torture. For background, and updates, go to Code Pink’s web site, at: http://www.codepinkalert.org/.

Think you know who Blagojevich is? This is what he was doing just before they framed him. Blagojevich dared to speak the truth and demand justice, which in a completely corrupt system makes him the one sane man in an insane asylum.

“This is a afarewell kiss from the Iraqi people you dog! This is for the widows and orphans and those killed in Iraq!” Iraqi Journalist, Muntather Al-Zaydi yelled in Arabic as he hurled his shoes at George W. Bush on 12/14/2008, during an impromptu press conference in Baghdad.

Researchers from John Hopkins University in Baltimore and the Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad published a study in 2006, financed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Center for International Studies, that estimates the illegal Iraq war had led to the deaths of 655,000 men, women, and children. A later study In September 2007 by the top UK polling organization, ORB (Opinion Research Business) estimated that up to 1.44 million Iraqis have died violently post-invasion, see: http://www.opinion.co.uk/Newsroom_details.aspx?NewsId=78

Bush and the neocons have committed numerous war crimes and grossly violated the Geneva Conventions through the use of torture and mass murder of civilians. They have used banned weapons such as cluster bombs and white phosphorus. They have committed crimes for which there are not yet laws written, crimes against the earth and the environment. The Bush administration has spread over 1000 metric tons of the deadly U238-isotope, America’s nuclear waste, over Iraq and Afghanistan, causing childhood leukemia and spontaneous abortions to become commonplace, dooming the people of both countries to endless suffering and premature death.