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People rallying against Trump healthcare plan

Monday, May 8, 11:30am-12:30pm
1739 N High St, Columbus, OH 
Senator Portman will be speaking inside the Armstrong Space Symposium and Chair Installation at the Ohio Union at OSU this Monday. Let's take this opportunity to gather outside the building and show Senator Portman that Ohioans support quality, affordable healthcare for all Americans, including those with pre-existing conditions.

Speaker Jacob Carruthers, will share his story with the protesters to illustrate why Senator Portman has a duty to protect Ohioans with pre-existing conditions. 

Meet us with your healthcare-related signs at 11:30 on the College Rd. side of the building. The event will last about an hour. Parking can be located at meters or at the following locations:

Parking Garage Attached to the Student Union
1560 N High St. Columbus, OH 43201
75 E 11th Ave. Columbus, OH 43201

Even if you can't attend, join our social media storm by using the following hashtags:

Purple baseball cap that says Restore Sanity

Also by Lila Garrett, Bob Fitrakis, Suzanne Patzer, David Swanson, Ilene Proctor, Jan Goodman, Jerry Manpearl, Myla Reson, Alan Minsky, Linda Seeley, and many more

The unthinkable is upon us.

A president of the United States poses a clear and present danger to our global survival. He is mentally unstable, dangerously incompetent, throughly dishonest and can’t be trusted with the safety of our children or our planet.

It’s become our duty to remove him soon, beyond the electoral system, and strictly without violence. 

At primary issue are Trump’s imminent threat of nuclear war; his assault on the global ecosystems and green infrastructure on which our ecological and economic future depends; the outrageous culture of theft permeating his regime; its on-going attacks on women, and more.

Trump embodies a classic corporatist reaction against a powerful social democratic uprising. The volcanic energy generated by the Sanders, Green, Libertarian. Occupy and other campaigns for social justice and ecological sanity are at the core of American life.

Film poster with word Peace Officer and photos, one of a SWAT team and one of a cop

Sunday, May 7, 1pm
Northwood-High building, 2231 N. High St., Park in "R" spots if you park behind the building
In collaboration with SURJ we will watch the award winning film "Peace Officer" and follow up with a group discussion on the abuse of SWAT teams and how should majority white communities deal with their own experience of police violence? How can these communities find the proper way to build solidarity with other over policed and marginalized groups? 

Peace Officer is a feature documentary about the increasingly militarized state of American police as told through the story of William “Dub” Lawrence, a former sheriff who established and trained his rural state’s first SWAT team only to see that same unit kill his son-in-law in a controversial standoff 30 years later. Driven by an obsessed sense of mission, Dub uses his own investigative skills to uncover the truth in this and other recent officer-involved shootings in his community while tackling larger questions about the changing face of peace officers nationwide.

 

The Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival focuses on features, shorts and documentaries from and about Asia and the Pacific Islands. The films screened during LAAPFF in L.A. from April 27-May 4 and in Orange County from May 5-11 are all shot on location in Asia and Oceania and/or depict characters of and/or were made by talents of Asian and Pacific Islander ancestry, such as Mele Murals, a documentary about Hawaiian street artists. As such, LAAPFF provides cineastes with an invaluable window into the movies and societies of Asia and Polynesia, and of individuals from those ethnic groups living in continental North America. The L.A. venues where LAAPFF screenings and conferences took place highlight specialty cinema, such as the opening and closing night galas at Hollywood’s Egyptian Theatre and the Directors Guild of America on Sunset Strip, as well as the Downtown Independent, the arthouse where I viewed the below.

 

THAILAND: BY THE TIME IT GETS DARK

 

The reviews of Donald Trump’s first 100 days have generally focused on his failures, flip-flops and follies. We’ve heard a lot about what he’s failed to achieve, but far too little about what he is intent on doing.

Trump’s time in office so far has been a systematic and vicious assault on civil rights. The progress that was won with struggle, sacrifice and legislation is being subverted by ink and administrative actions and deregulation. Trump is intent on rolling back the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, and in his first 100 days the damage has already begun.

He appointed Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, a judge with a record of rulings undermining the rights of workers, women, LGBTQ community, and protections of the environment and democracy.

At dusk I stood on a residential street with trim lawns and watched planes approach a runaway along the other side of a chain-link fence. Just a few dozen yards away, a JetBlue airliner landed. Then a United plane followed. But the next aircraft looked different. It was a bit smaller and had no markings or taillights. A propeller whirled at the back. And instead of the high-pitched screech of a jet, the sound was more like… a drone.

During the next half-hour I saw three touch-and-go swoops by drones, their wheels scarcely reaching the runaway before climbing back above Syracuse’s commercial airport. Nearby, pilots were at the controls in front of Air Force computers, learning how to operate the MQ-9 Reaper drone that is now a key weapon of U.S. warfare from Afghanistan to the Middle East to Africa.

Since last summer the Defense Department has been using the runway and airspace at the Syracuse Hancock International Airport to train drone operators, who work at the adjoining Air National Guard base. Officials say it’s the first time that the federal government has allowed military drones to utilize a commercial airport. It won’t be the last time.

Looking down from sky at lots of smoke on ground with mountains and Japanese writing

TAKOMA PARK, MD, May 2, 2017 --A raging wildfire in the Fukushima radiation zone not far from the March 2011 Japan nuclear power plant disaster, demonstrates that a nuclear accident has long-term and on-going effects that can worsen over time, says Beyond Nuclear, a leading national anti-nuclear advocacy group.

The fire, which began on April 21 in the mountains outside Namie in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, is in an area where human entry is barred “on principle” because of high radiation levels resulting from the Fukushima nuclear triple meltdowns and explosions. The fire is being fought from the air with helicopters spraying water.

“Just as high radiation levels barred rescuers from retrieving many earthquake and tsunami victims five years ago, today firefighters are being hampered from battling the blaze in the still contaminated area,” said Paul Gunter, Director of Reactor Oversight at Beyond Nuclear. “This makes extinguishing these radioactive fires more difficult which can have far reaching effects,” he said.

Fist and state of Ohio with words March for Racial Justice
Saturday, May 6, 3pm, Franklin Park, 1755 E. Broad St.

https://actionnetwork.org/events/march-for-racial-justice

Our communities are in crisis and we don’t all share the burden equally. While wages are down for everyone, Black and Latino workers still make less than white workers. Because our neighborhoods are increasingly segregated by race and class, and because of racial disparities in policing and sentencing, Black Americans are imprisoned at nearly six times the rate of white Americans. Across the country — and right here in Ohio — Black men, women, and children are killed by police with few if any repercussions.

Ohio needs good jobs, criminal justice reform, and investment in schools and public services. On Saturday, May 6, we will march for racial justice and to demand accountability from our justice system and our elected officials.

Sponsored by a coalition of individuals and organizations across Ohio committed to rejecting racism in our state and fighting for safe, healthy, and equitable communities.

Black and white photo of black guy playing guitar with people all around dancing

I hit up Columbus Native Franz Lyons and asked him about his band Turnstile performing at the sold-out Metallica headlined Rock On the Range festival. Franz replied in regards to the size of the crowd. “I think it will make more sense when I get there…”

Franz was in Los Angeles with Turnstile for the “While We Were Young Festival.” The Baltimore, Maryland based hardcore band just played on a line-up that included Morrissey, the Descendants, A.F.I. and other bands that were too big to play the Legion, Bernie’s or the Hi-Five during Franz’s formative years.

Turnstile has also rocked stages with Sick Of It All, Madball, Wu-Tang Clan, Mobb Deep, Ignite and New Found Glory off the strength of previous releases Move Through Me, Non-Stop Feeling, Pressure to Succeed and Step To the Rhythm.

Turnstile begins recording an album for Road Runner Records, June 26th. They are recording with William Yip who has worked with Title Fight, Lauryn Hill, Braid and Schoolly D.

Black man in graduation robe and hat receiving diploma

This past April 2, 2017 marked the 10th Annual Autism Awareness Day. Organizations from around the world joined forces to bring awareness about autism and to raise much needed funding to continue research, develop educational and treatment programs, and to help support the families of people with autism.  

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2016 issued an ADDM Autism prevalence report that showed autism had risen to one in every 68 births in the United States. Of this rate, one in 54 boys had autism. More than 3.5 million Americans live with an ASD. No one seems to understand or agree on why this number has almost doubled since 2004, therefore it can’t be controlled and continues to increase.

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