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FREE '3-STRIKES' VIDEO; 2 weeks left for 'initiative to amend' to qualify

March 6th I videotaped the event commemorating the 10th anniversary of California's 3 Strikes Law at Leimart Park in Los Angeles, which included family members of some of the more than 7500 currently serving 25-to-life sentences under the law.  There were only about 100 in attendance, which is particularly shocking because the initiative to modify the law, so that it only pertains to serious crimes, has only 2 more weeks to qualify for the ballot.

I will be happy to send a copy of the 2-hour videotape of the event, together with a petition to pass, to anyone that will commit to collecting at least a few signatures and submitting them before the April 1st deadline. A donation of $3 to help with postage and materials will be requested but will not be required of those who collect signatures and mail them in before the deadline. Extra copies of the videotape sent at the same time will also be available upon request for an extra $2 each. Please specify the total number of "3-Strikes videos" you would like when you order, and send your remittance after they come. I will include an envelope for your remittance with my address on it.

CLARK to Visit Buckeye State as Keynote Speaker at Annual Democratic Dinner

General Wesley Clark to Visit Buckeye State as Keynote Speaker at Annual Democratic Dinner

Dayton, OH - While John Kerry rallies with veterans in West Virginia, General Clark will carry his message to Ohio on the challenges facing America including strengthening our national security and supporting our service men and women both at home and abroad. Clark will join Montgomery County voters in Dayton as the keynote speaker at the Annual "Frolic for Funds" Democratic Party Event.  

Since General Clark endorsed John Kerry for President just a few weeks ago he has already campaigned for him in Kansas and Georgia.  He is coming to the key swing state of Ohio to continue his conversation with Americans on bringing real change to our nation.

On his visit to Ohio, Clark said, "I look forward to meeting with voters in Ohio during this important election year.  Never before has our party been so united in how we are going to make this country even greater.  And with John Kerry, we are ready to lead this nation forward."

Good, high-payin' jobs

AUSTIN, Texas -- How much fun can one administration have? More dead GIs. New record trade deficit. Stock market plunges. Ally in Spain goes down to defeat. The new Spanish prime minister says the occupation in Iraq is a "continuing disaster" and he's pulling his troops out. Still no jobs. And then they guy who was supposed to be the new jobs czar turns out to have laid off 75 of his own workers and then built a $3 million factory in China to employ 165 Chinese people. Whoever has the aspirin concession at the White House must be making a fortune.

            The unfortunate matter of the would-be jobs czar came at a particularly awkward moment. More than six months ago, President Bush promised to appoint a "manufacturing czar" at the Commerce Department. As the Center for American Progress points out, since then we've lost another 250,000 manufacturing jobs. Bush was on his way to Ohio last week, where the economy has just been hemorrhaging jobs, to "focus on jobs." He actually claimed, "We're creating jobs -- good, high-paying jobs for the American citizen."

Freep Heroes

Freep Heroes – Kevin Phillips and Paul O’Neill

American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune And The Politics Of Deceit In The House Of Bush by Phillips and The Price of Loyalty by O’Neill verify and document in detail everything the Free Press has been telling you about the Bush family since the first Gulf War. When those with well-established Republican credentials come forward to blow the whistle on the true “Axis of Evil” – Prescott Bush, George Herbert Walker Bush and George W. Bush – the Freep sees their actions as heroic. Even more heroic and necessary would be George W.’s impeachment for war crimes and lying to the American people to make his big oil buddies rich.

The Free Press Salutes

Staughton and Alice Lynd

This couple from Niles, Ohio are saluted for their efforts to uncover what really happened during the Lucasville prison uprising of April 1993. Staughton’s new book, which is excerpted in this issue of the Free Press, painstaking reveals the horror at the heart of Ohio’s prison industrial complex. The couple’s long commitment to social justice is an inspiration to us all.

Rachel Corrie

Dear Editor,

Only a few days before she paid the ultimate price, Rachel Corrie told reporters,” I feel like what I’m witnessing is a very systematic destruction of people’s ability to survive.”

Who was Rachel Corrie anyway? Who was she talking about? And why was she killed?

Rachel was 23 years old, an Evergreen State College student from Olympia,WA.

Rachel was a member of International Sorlidarity Movement (ISM) serving in Rafah, Palestine, a city located next to Egypt.

ISM is a group of international volunteers who partake in non-violent direct action resistance to the Israeli occupation. Members of the group live in Palestinian communities and get a first-hand account of the violence to which they are subjected every day by the Israeli military.

Irony and Ivory

Even though I’m not registered to vote (I think that will be my next project – voting rights for pigs), I do have an opinion on the elections this year. It’s intense primary season as I write this, and I did some digging to see how the Democrats stack up on animal rights. We all know that Bush would be bad on this issue, that’s a given. He’s bad on the environment which affects animals, he’s bad on war which kills animals, and he’s bad on human issues like jobs, health care and education. If he doesn’t care about people, I’m sure he doesn’t care about non-humans.

I did find this fact about his animal rights record: in October 2003, the Washington Post wrote: “The Bush administration is proposing far-reaching changes to conservation policies that would allow hunters, circuses and the pet industry to kill, capture and import animals on the brink of extinction in other countries.” The rationale is that selling endangered animals to the U.S. would provide money to “developing” nations so they can have better animal conservation policies. Excuse me? The irony of that makes my tail curl (pot-bellies have straight tails, by the way).

A Democratic Socialist's perspective: Privatizing America

Bush is privatizing America. Most Americans, and their elected representatives in government believe that the free market system provides superior results in education through competition, supports the best doctors and health care in the world, and the most effective military machine on Earth. However, an analysis of the current system reveals serious flaws. Not only does the privatization of public institutions threaten the quality and accessibility of service, it allows a government to skirt responsibility, evade public scrutiny and control, and increases campaign contributions from companies benefiting from government contracts.

The current presidential occupant’s faith in the private sector surpasses many of his predecessors’. It is critical that the citizenry understand the danger of unyielding faith in the effectiveness of private, for-profit companies due to its destructive and anti-democratic nature.

The Lucasville uprising

This excerpt is from a forthcoming book by Staughton Lynd, who requested portions of his manuscript be included in issues of the Free Press. Lynd, along with his wife Alice, have a lifetime of social justice activism. Staughton directed the Freedom Schools of the Mississippi Summer Project in 1964. He was one of the first Americans to visit and write about North Vietnam during the war in the winter of 1965-66. Staughton and Alice are retired lawyers in Niles, Ohio. Temple University Press plans to publish this exposé on the Lucasville uprising in August 2004.

Prosecutors have called it “the longest prison riot in United States history.”1 More accurately, the Director of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) refers to “the longest prison siege in U.S. history where lives were lost.” A 1987 rebellion at the United States Penitentiary in Atlanta seems to have lasted a few hours longer.2

Drug War briefs

Since 1998, the Higher Education Act (HEA) has contained a provision that denies federal financial aid to student applicants who have drug-related convictions, including possession of marijuana. According to the U.S. Department of Education, this drug provision has harmed more than 128,000 students, particularly racial minorities and the underprivileged. (Please see www.mpp.org/USA/news_2471.html for one example of the damage done by the drug provision of the HEA.)

Now is the best opportunity to repeal the drug provision, as Congress is required to reauthorize the HEA this year. To that end, Students for Sensible Drug Policy, the Drug Reform Coordination Network, the Drug Policy Alliance, the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP), and other organizations are asking you to call on Congress to repeal the HEA drug provision.

Ohio EPA, Columbus: Improve planning for Darby

Under pressure from the Ohio EPA to come up with an area wide plan for sewer development and water quality, the City of Columbus designated a large area of the Darby watershed to be an Environmentally Sensitive Development Area (ESDA). To formulate special standards for development in this pristine area, Columbus agreed to create an External Advisory Group (EAG).

The Sierra Club’s position is that water quality of the Darby Creeks will be preserved only by following the best scientific guidelines available. The process currently being used to determine protection standards for the ESDA is fatally flawed for several reasons.

The process is controlled by the City of Columbus. Don Armour of Fuller, Mossbarger, Scott & May, an engineering firm working for the City of Columbus, was designated by the city as the facilitator. As facilitator, Armour has the ability to control the agenda and the discussion.

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