Well...  Until a few minutes ago, I was feeling exhausted.  But with the Associated Press article out, and the very friendly Florida Public Radio interview I just did, my energy is ramped up pretty high!

Yesterday at about 4pm, from the motel room in Mayo, FL, I sent the press release you can see at http://www.fadp.org/pressrel.html before heading to the Courthouse.

Our headline was "Activists to Thank Governor for Not Killing During the Holiday Season."  Unfortunately, that idea was quashed when I called the Associated Press to follow up on the press release, and the reporter asked me, "Did you know that Governor Bush signed a death warrant today?"    Grrrrr....  Johnny Robinson, 51, is scheduled to be exterminated by the people of Florida at 6 p.m. on Feb. 4 in revenge for his murder of Beverly St. George in August 1985.

Well, at least we were in place to deal directly with the Governor on this matter.  I pulled out my "Time-Out on Executions" sign and a chair, and sat down on the sidewalk in front of the Lafayette County Courthouse.  I

The National Lawyers Guild announced today that it was thrilled with the decision of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Padilla v. Rumsfeld, holding that President Bush does not have the unilateral authority to hold as “enemy combatants” American citizens taken into custody on our soil. Michael Avery, the President of the National Lawyers Guild and a constitutional law professor at Suffolk Law School in Boston, said that several of President Bush’s actions in pursuit of the "War on Terrorism" suggest that the President holds the American constitutional system of checks and balances in contempt.

The last time I saw pictures of a man in need of a haircut being so memorably displayed as a trophy of the American empire it was Che Guevara, stretched out dead on a table in a schoolhouse in La Higuera, a little village in the Bolivian mountains. In those edgier days, in late 1967, the Bolivian Army wanted him dead, the quicker the better, though the CIA wanted him alive for interrogation in Panama.

After a last chat with the CIA's man, Felix Rodriguez, George Bush Sr.'s pal, a Bolivian sergeant called Jaime Terran shot him in the throat, and Rodriguez got to keep his watch. They chopped off Guevara's hands for later, checking to make sure the ID was correct. Years later, his skeleton, sans hands, was located and flown back to Havana for proper burial.

"It is better this way," Guevara told Rodriguez at the end. "I should never have been captured alive," showing that even the bravest weaken at times. At the moment of his capture by the Bolivian army unit, a wounded Guevara had identified himself, telling the soldiers he was Che and worth more to them alive than dead.

On December 3rd, President Bush signed the Healthy Forests Initiative into law, even though it fails to ensure protection from forest fires for at-risk communities, weakens environmental protections, and undermines public participation in decisions that affect America's public lands.

Now, the Bush administration appears to be on the verge of giving yet another holiday gift to the timber industry by gutting the widely popular Roadless Area Conservation Rule that protects 58.5 million acres of pristine national forests from most logging and road-building. The Bush administration has already proposed exempting Alaska's Tongass Rainforest - our largest national forest - and Alaska's Chugach National Forest from the rule, has scheduled close to 50 timber sales in roadless areas protected by the rule, and wants to let governors opt out of the rule, which would give governors decision-making power over natural treasures owned by all Americans.

Please take a moment to urge Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth to uphold the roadless rule of January 2001. Then, ask your family and friends to help as well by forwarding this e-mail to them.