Energy and global warming were at the top of the agenda when President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Stephen Harper met in Ottawa on Thursday. The two leaders emerged from their meeting saying they agreed to establish a “clean-energy dialogue” to cut greenhouses gas emissions and fight climate change. The use of such ambiguous language allows both Barack Obama and Stephen Harper to side step any concrete obligations to deal with the issue of tar sands and global warming. However, whatever ‘clean-energy dialogue’ the leaders do have, will continually be tested by internal U.S. politics concerning climate change and new environmental regulations. Developments surrounding tar sands and climate change in the United States including; low carbon fuel standards, a cap and trade system (climate change legislation), and targets for greenhouse gas reductions all pose serious threats to the importation of dirty tar sands oil from Canada, and the ‘clean energy dialogue’ that both leaders promised to on Thursday.

As Greenpeace Canada pointed out,

In January 2007 California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger established a Low-Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) by Executive Order. This unprecedented greenhouse gas (GHG) standard for transportation fuels requires fuel providers to ensure that fuel sold in California reduces GHG emissions measured on a “full fuel cycle” basis (i.e. upstream feedstock extraction, fuel refining, and transport to market). This will clearly discourage the use of tar sands oil. Schwarzenegger has also called for the U.S. to implement a national Low Carbon Fuel Standard. (http://www.energy.ca.gov) [In addition,] in June 2008, 1,000 mayors at the U.S. Conference of Mayors supported a “High Carbon Fuels” resolution which called on mayors across the U.S. “to track and reduce the lifecycle carbon dioxide emissions from their municipal vehicles by preventing or discontinuing the purchase of higher-carbon unconventional or synthetic fuels. (http://www.mass.gov)

These strong environmental regulations continue to move from the state level to the federal level, and will face fierce domestic and foreign opposition from an array of special interest groups ranging from the Canadian government, to global warming deniers, to major oil companies that have huge investments in the tar sands. The tar sands remains the most capital intensive project on the planet, and continues to expand production even in the midst of a global recession and falling oil prices — thanks to the United States unrelenting demand for oil.

Since 1999, Canada has been the largest supplier of oil to the United States, providing 2.4 million barrels per day, with approximately 75% coming from the tar sands (1.8 million barrels per day). The tar sands hold an estimated 1.7 trillion barrels of oil (bitumen), the second largest deposit of oil reserves in the world (the size of Florida), trailing only Saudi Arabia. The problem embroiling the tar sands, President Obama, and the Canadian government lies within the production of tar sands oil and its effects on global warming.

The extraction and production of oil from the tar sands is incredibly energy intensive; generating three to five times as much greenhouse gas pollution as conventional oil production, and it has single handedly made Canada’s Kyoto protocol targets for greenhouse gas emissions impossible to attain. Whole ecosystems, including the Boreal Forest and the Athabasca River Delta are threatened by tar sands oil production through practices such as clear cutting and water depletion. For instance, it takes 3-5 barrels of water to produce one barrel of oil. In addition, the extraction and upgrading of this synthetic crude oil also releases dangerous toxins into the air and water, greatly affecting air quality, and jeopardizing the health of indigenous communities downstream and downwind from tar sands operations.

The major effects of oil imported into the U.S. from the tar sands, on the climate and environment in general, continues to create a major fault line between what the Obama administration says it wants to achieve in regards to stopping global warming, and what is actually possible. Mitigating climate change in both Canada and the United States will be impossible unless U.S. fossil fuel consumption levels fall.

Moreover, the argument that an increased reliance on oil derived from the tar sands is self-evident under the guise of national security, is a shallow argument at best. Considering that the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA), a Pentagon-funded think tank, issued a report last year calling climate change a “serious national security threat,” and that Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Lawrence Farrel recently stated in the Washington Times that climate change “is not just a foreign policy issue …it is a national security issue” should raise eyebrows among those who advocate continued development and importation of oil from the tar sands.

If the Obama administration decides to increasingly rely on oil from the tar sands to fulfill our energy needs; they’ll be sidestepping his commitment to wean America off its addition to oil, to address global warming, and to work towards achieving world stability while protecting America’s national security. The road we must take in order to achieve all three of those goals will take courage, dedication, and sacrifice from all Americans combined with unprecedented leadership from Washington.

62% who favor some type of investigation into the possible use of torture when interrogating terrorism suspects, 63% who do so with respect to the possible use of telephone wiretaps without obtaining a warrant, and 71% who support investigating possible attempts to use the Justice Department for political purposes.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill the pressure continues to mount on the Obama administration to move away from the spineless notion of ‘looking forward and not backward’ and instead, move toward Obama’s repeated claim that “nobody’s above the law, and if there are clear instances of wrong doing, that people should be prosecuted just like any ordinary citizen.”

Importantly, the calls to investigate the Bush Administration are coming from the leadership of Obama’s very own party; starting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Nancy Pelosi has openly expressed support for House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers calls for continued committee investigation, a blue ribbon commission to fully investigate administration activities, and independent criminal probes into the Bush administration. After releasing a nearly 500-page report documenting numerous abuses and excesses of the Bush administration Conyers put it like this, “Even after scores of hearings, investigations, and reports, we still do not have answers to some of the most fundamental questions left in the wake of Bush’s Imperial Presidency.”

On January 21st—the first official working day of the Obama administration – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he would support funding and staff for additional investigations by the Senate Armed Services Committee; which released a scathing report back in December linking top Bush Administration officials, including Donald H. Rumsfeld, the former defense secretary, to the abuses committed by American troops at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; Abu Ghraib in Iraq; and other military detentions centers around the world. The Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, who issued the report, reaffirmed Reid’s position by saying that there needs to be an “accounting of torture in this country.”

In addition to the over 60% of Americans, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, John Conyers, and Carl Levin, the Senate Judiciary Committee chair Patrick Leahy declared on Monday, February 9th, that he too was keen on investigating the Bush administration. Patrick Leahy explained that he wanted to find a ‘middle ground’ between leading Democrats, Republicans, and the Obama administration in order to ‘find the truth’. Leahy said, “We need to get to the bottom of what

happened—and why—so we make sure it never happens again.” He proposed a “Reconciliation and Truth Commission.” Just how effective such a commission would be in extrapolating the truth about what happened during the eight dark years of the Bush administration is up for debate. Another issue up for debate is whether or not a ‘Reconciliation and Truth Commission’ would have a long-term deterrence or accountability effect on future politicians who come to power in the executive branch.

History shows that the proposed ‘truth commission’ model has indeed failed to stop the very executive branch abuses that such a commission was established to prevent. As the debate rages on and pro-investigation positions continue to gain force in the halls of Congress and popularity in the streets; the decision of whether or not such an investigation comes into fruition and has any teeth to it, is ultimately up to President Obama. Will he proceed with moral courage and take the constitutional responsibility he was elected to uphold, or will he retreat into cowardly opportunism and hypocrisy, allowing the first opportunity in his self proclaimed ‘new era of responsibility’ to wither and dissipate in the winds of political convenience.

Then-State Senator Hilda Solis demonstrating with members of UNITE HERE to protect prevailing wage standards for state government contracts, which was vetoed by Governor Pete Wilson

With the economic crisis becoming more dire every day and President Obama’s having recently appointed Hilda Solis as Labor Secretary, Frances Perkins is more relevant than ever. Both Hilda Solis and Frances Perkins were appointed to serve as Secretary of Labor during a time of economic crisis at critical moments in American History and share similar qualities in their character, background, and politics. The opportunity, as well as the peril, that this economic crisis presents the working men and women of America with is significant and must be recognized by all of us, most importantly, Hilda Solis. As a people’s advocate in the new cabinet, Solis could seize the moment and aggressively push for bold, progressive responses to the mounting crisis. However, before we look towards the future, it’s worth taking a look back to the past to Frances Perkins and the lessons we can learn from her time as Secretary of Labor.

Frances Perkins was appointed to Secretary of Labor in 1933 by President Roosevelt, becoming the first woman to hold a cabinet level position in American history. Perkin’s came to the position of Secretary of Labor with an impressive record of protecting workers rights, women’s rights, and fighting to eradicate poverty. Her work on behalf of women and the working class of America began in 1910 when she moved to New York City and became the head of the National Consumers League, an NGO whose mission is to “protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad.” In 1911 she witnessed the Triangle Factory Fire, a seminal moment in her political development. Working conditions in the Triangle Factory were deplorable, resulting in a fire which took the lives of 146 young immigrant women, many jumping to their deaths trying to escape the fire because the exits were locked and there were no fire escapes. The factory fire had a profound effect on Frances Perkins and cemented her commitment to women’s and workers rights. She explained that the fire “seared on my mind as well as my heart-a never-to-be-forgotten reminder of why I had to spend my life fighting conditions that could permit such a tragedy.” Perkins served on the subsequent commissions assigned to investigate the fire and make sure similar incidents never happened again. She was instrumental in instituting reforms such as the use of fire alarms, fire drills, and fire escapes. In her pursuit of reform, Perkins was appointed to the New York State Industrial Commission in 1918, by Governor Al Smith, becoming the first woman ever to serve on the commission. She went on to become chairman of the commission in 1926.

- Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins shakes hands with Carnegie Steel Workers during a tour of Homestead, Pennsylvania, July 1933.

After Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected as the governor of New York in 1929, he promoted Frances Perkins to be the Industrial Commissioner of New York, the chief post in the state labor department. Her appointment by FDR to commissioner began the relationship between the two that would become critical during FDR’s presidency and especially during his first hundred days in getting progressive New Deal legislation written and passed. She gained the respect of FDR during his time as governor, and was constantly at his side calling for public works projects, social security, and the need to protect the poor. Perkins said that, “poverty was preventable, destructive, wasteful and demoralizing. In the midst of potential plenty, it is morally unacceptable in a Christian and democratic society. Because the ‘poor’ are people, with hopes, fears, virtues, vices and are fellow citizens.” As Industrial Commissioner she helped put New York in the forefront of progressive reform, increased working conditions, factory investigations, and reduced the workweek to 48 hours for women. In 1933, amidst the Great Depression, Perkins was tapped by Franklin Roosevelt, the newly elected President of the United States, to be the Secretary of Labor.

During her tenure as Labor Secretary Frances Perkins turned the traditional role of the Labor Department on its head. As Adam Cohen, author of Nothing to Fear: FDR’s Inner Circle and the Hundred Days that Created Modern America explained, “It was the last [appointment] that FDR made. And even in Frances Perkins’s time, labor was a backwater. It was the last department created. She was the last person sworn in, because it was the lowliest department. But she turned it into something very powerful. And she was a huge voice at these cabinet meetings for public works and for caring for poor people.” Perkins was the longest serving Secretary of Labor in history and accomplished an incredible amount for working-class Americans while holding the cabinet position. As secretary, she played a key role in writing New Deal legislation. She immediately proposed federal aid to the states for direct unemployment relief, an extensive program of public works, unemployment and old-age insurance (Social Security Act), abolition of child labor, the establishment by federal law of minimum wages and maximum hours, and the creation of a federal employment service. Because of her diligence and vision, the National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act, 1935) was passed which gave workers the right to collective bargaining and created the National Labor Relations Board.¹

In July 1933 as the Secretary of Labor, Perkins famously visited Homestead, P.A. to look into working conditions at the steel mills and to talk to the workers about their rights to organize and collective bargaining guaranteed under the National Industrial Recovery Act. When she arrived, the town authorities refused to let her talk with a group of steelworkers. The mayor and local police refused her entry into the town meeting hall, but she defied the mayor and local authorities and found an alternative site where she informed the workers directly about their rights. Frances Perkins’ devotion to the poor and to the working-class of America wasn’t popular among many people in high places in and out of government. In fact, Perkins’ work brought her directly into the cross hairs of red-baiting conservatives in the Congress. In 1939 the House Un-American Activities Committee brought an impeachment resolution against her after she refused to deport Harry Bridges, the head of the West Coast longshore union; but the impeachment proceedings were eventually dropped for lack of evidence.²

It’s important to recognize that all the achievements, progressive policies, and precedents Frances Perkins helped institutionalize throughout her life were not the work of her alone, even though she was a major force behind the many successes. Without the militancy of organized labor and everyday working women and men who organized themselves around the various initiatives she brought into government, things would have been quite different, and her power not nearly as substantial as it was. As Hilda Solis takes the helm as Labor Secretary, her role in determining whether this economic crisis bears any fruit for the working class of America is critical, and should not be underestimated.

Like Frances Perkins, Hilda Solis is also a very passionate, serious, and courageous leader and also happens to be the most progressive appointee in the cabinet of the new administration. She has deep ties to organized labor, the immigrant community, and movements for environmental justice. With the right amount of grassroots support and pressure, Solis could make a serious contribution to the formulation of progressive legislation that would greatly impact and improve the daily lives of the majority of Americans long into the future. The financial crisis the Obama administration has inherited is the greatest of our time. It presents the same opportunities that were there in 1933 when Frances Perkins and FDR took over the White House and created the modern welfare state, bringing the US out of the Great Depression and into the 20th century socially and economically. It is our duty to make sure Hilda Solis understands the power of her position and the immense opportunity sitting before her during this critical moment in American history. As Howard Zinn, one of this country’s most celebrated historians put it, “The innovations of the New Deal were fueled by the militant demands for change that swept the country as FDR began his presidency: the tenants’ groups; the Unemployed Councils; the millions on strike on the West Coast, in the Midwest and the South; the disruptive actions of desperate people seeking food, housing, jobs — the turmoil threatening the foundations of American capitalism. We will need a similar mobilization of citizens today, to unmoor from corporate control whoever becomes President. To match the New Deal, to go beyond it, is an idea whose time has come.”³ We need Hilda Solis to have the courage to stand up for the average working American and once again make the cabinet position of Secretary of Labor one of the most powerful positions in the United States government. At this critical juncture in American history, let’s not hope Hilda Solis is the Frances Perkins of our time; let’s make her the Frances Perkins of our time.

1. http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1603.html
2. http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/history/history/perkins.cfm
3. www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/03/21/7820

The location of Franklin Shelter plays a major role for both sides in this particular struggle. In fact, the location of the shelter is the main reason why Franklin finds itself under siege by Mayor Fenty, and for the same reason, why its closing has roused such a strong resistance by the downtown homeless community.

The price tag on the building is around $12 million dollars, making it quite a valuable asset to the city. Similarly, its prime location in the heart of D.C.’s downtown business (lobby) district makes it a very enticing, albeit pricey, piece of real estate for developers. Franklin’s location is also of huge strategic value to the homeless community, who rely on it to survive the winter, and use it as a focal point in the everyday struggle to better their lives. The majority of the other shelters, and more specifically, the shelters that Mayor Fenty is forcing the residents from Franklin to go to, are located almost six miles away, on the other side of the river, in Anacostia.

The distance of these fallback shelters from downtown is a huge issue for the people who are being dumped onto the street from Franklin and forced to try (all shelters are at capacity) to get a bed in Southeast D.C. Not only are those shelters located in dangerous and drug-filled areas, they are also four to six miles away from most of the soup kitchens, medical centers, and other vital social services located downtown, which most of the homeless community relies upon on a day to day basis.

Given this, the four to six mile trek they will be forced to make, without money for public transportation, will have an undeniable crippling effect on their ability to get back on their feet, and get medical attention. Perhaps even worse than this is the obvious impediment of the trek on those who have managed to find work: it will become difficult to make it to work on time, let alone have food in their stomachs once they reach their job.

One of the residents of Franklin talked about this very issue, saying that they have park and recreation buses that go to the shelters but they are “never reliable, so people end up sleeping outside on the street downtown so they can get to their jobs on time, rather then stay in a shelter [across the river] and loose it.”

Another resident at Franklin, Mike Coleman, 66, a retired construction worker unable to hold down a job due to physical aliments, lives off social security, and talked about the reality of being forced out of Franklin. “They put us in a dangerous neighborhood, if it impairs your health or well being — hell your not going to go. I spent the night in the park.” He went on to say that the most important issue concerning the closure of Franklin is its centralized location, stating “we gotta come into town to eat, they [the city] are trying to stick everybody in ward 6,7,8. You got eight wards and your only using three. If you’re going to give someone housing you need to give everybody housing.”

The five-mile trek also creates a higher risk to those who must walk the distance everyday. Issues concerning residents range from walking across bridges that have no sidewalks, which forces them to walk in the road at night, to having to walk from the medical center to the shelter, which creates an anxious situation for them in regards to their safety. For instance, according to Franklin resident Lewy Cannao, 66, a single percocet (the heavily-abused painkiller) on the street goes for “$30 dollars, so if your walking with a prescription full, you’ll get hit — and that’s it, your done. It makes you scared to walk the streets.”

As it stands, the reality of the policy Mayor Fenty is pursuing has thrown 300 people out onto the street as winter, and with it, hypothermia season, quickly approaches. Fortunately, the resistance spearheaded by Franklin residents, with the help their supporters, has borne some fruit in the form of a piece of legislation called the “Franklin Shelter Closing Requirements Emergency Act.” It is described on Franklin’s website as follows:

On September 16, 2008, the D.C. City Council passed emergency legislation requiring the Mayor to certify to the Council that no fewer than 300 men have been placed into housing before the closure of Franklin Shelter could take place, and that Franklin continue its operations as a 300 person shelter in the meantime. The legislation also requires the Mayor to provide the Council “with a report on any proposed closing of the Franklin Shelter that includes a description of the current capacity, current availability, and location of replacement shelter space, and the ability to seasonally increase capacity to reduce incidences of hypothermia among the homeless population prior to closing the Franklin Shelter.” (Franklin Shelter Closing Requirements Emergency Act)

The D.C. city council voted unanimously (12 to 1) in favor of the bill. The overwhelming support for the bill came as a result of the many rallies, protests vigils, and volunteering (for council person’s campaigns) that both D.C. and Franklin residents participated in over the past 2 years. Since the bill won a majority, Mayor Fenty has 2 weeks (the deadline being September 30th) to either sign the bill or veto it. If he chooses to veto the bill, then the bill will go back to the council for a re-vote. Nine votes from the council would override the veto and keep Franklin open. At the end of a letter to the “Honorable” Mayor Fenty, concerning the report, chairman Vincent Gray wrote, “I look forward to your response, recognizing that the goal we share is permanent housing for all, but until that is achieved, we cannot imperil homeless people by removing immediate shelter options.” Regardless of the possibilities the bill leaves open, or the overwhelming support by the D.C. city council for Franklin residents, Mayor Fenty continues to push forward on every legal leg he has left, to kick those same residents out.

Mayor Fenty has decided to exercise his legal right, with all its callous consequences, of dismantling the shelter bed by bed during this two-week period (the waiting period between the passing of the legislation and the veto). Bed’s started disappearing at the end of July, and more and more of the homeless who rely on Franklin shelter began to be rejected from it. As of August 1st, there were only 270 beds out of the original 300, and by September 25th there were only 50. On Friday, September 26th, the city closed Franklin down and is not allowing any residents back, not even to get some of there possessions that may be left inside. Mr. Coleman noted “we left Thursday and came back Friday and they said they don’t have any beds…people got stuff in there and can’t get it.”

As the struggle to preserve affordable and accessible public housing at Franklin comes to a climax, and as the deadline of September 30th approaches, the power of the resistance of the homeless community and their supporters to stop this gross injustice has been on display. The Franklin residents have received a lot of support from D.C. residents and activists in this struggle. On September 25th, Anise Jenkins, a native D.C. resident, attended the last protest at Franklin Shelter before it was closed down. When asked why she was there she replied: “I’m here to keep the shelter open; I’m tired of seeing my city being sold off and I’m here to stop it.” People attending the rally were making the connection to the $700 billion dollar bail-out plan for Wall Street and the continued assault on public housing in D.C. and around the country with chants like “No Bail-Outs-No-Kick-Outs.” The goal of this organized resistance is to set a precedent that public housing is a right. It seems only right that units be made available before the shelter has been decommissioned, but this has not happened at Franklin, even though in 2006, when Fenty chaired the council’s human services committee, he offered a budget amendment prohibiting Franklin’s closure until downtown replacements were opened.

Earlier this month, Mafara Hobson, Fenty’s spokeswoman, said Franklin’s current condition is “deplorable, and we cannot have residents living in those conditions.” Mayor Fenty has been using this same rhetoric to try and justify the closing of Franklin Shelter under the guise that it’s unfit for human habitation. However, this idea is highly contested by the very people who live there, and for good reason. Over the past two years, the city has poured $2 million dollars into renovating the Franklin School building. The bathrooms and the caseworker’s office have both been renovated: a brand new A/C unit, two new water heaters, and a new fire alarm system have also recently been replaced and installed. Franklin provides residents with hot water, air conditioning, and heat — something that has been missing periodically at some of the other shelters for various lengths of time, making Franklin not only inhabitable as it stands, but better then some of the other shelters, and certainly not more “deplorable” then the act of throwing human being’s into the street as hypothermia season approaches.

Another main argument Fenty puts forth is that he wants to close Franklin as part of a move away from large shelters. It just so happens that the Franklin shelter is the fourth largest shelter in D.C. Eric Sheptock, a resident of Franklin, put it like this: “While he [Fenty] claims to want to move away from large shelters and away from warehousing the homeless, he wants to add 100 beds a piece to two shelters that are each already larger than Franklin.” He goes on to say “What is the REAL reason for focusing on Franklin? Profit for private developers? Removing an eyesore from Downtown?” I’ll be the first to say that the Franklin shelter isn’t in perfect condition, but until there is a solid plan in action that provides downtown public housing units that are refurbished, affordable, and ready to be occupied immediately, then the arguments and actions by Mayor Fenty are simply not justified.

Mayor Fenty came out with his “housing first” plan on April 2, 2008. The plan included the closure of Franklin School Shelter, the creation of 400 units of permanent supportive housing by October 1st 2008 (which has not, as of yet, materialized), and another 1600 units of permanent supportive housing by October 1st 2014. He says that he wants to close the building with no sale or lease. Right… If that is the case, it sure seems odd and even irresponsible that the city has poured $2 million dollars of tax payers money (when the city is already cutting funding to social services and stressed with a diminishing budget) into a building just to leave it unoccupied and dormant.

Fenty’s plan, which was supposed to provide 400 units of permanent supportive housing by October 1st, 2008 hasn’t come to fruition, yet he still is trying to close Franklin, and throw 300 people on the street. It’s important to note that the struggle to keep Franklin open, is just one example of the many battles being fought all over America to keep public housing both functional and alive. A similar battle took place just this year, in New Orleans, when the city began demolishing 4,500 public housing units that were deemed structurally sound. Like Franklin, the residents of the public housing units there tried everything they could to keep their homes. Ultimately, however, the demolition went forward, even though New Orleans was experiencing an acute housing crisis, and a severe rise in the rate of homelessness post Katrina. When looking at the facts, it’s hard to come to any conclusion other than the city’s actions are a direct assault against the working poor and all disenfranchised Americans, and their right to affordable public housing.

In fact, the working poor and disenfranchised living in America have been under attack for the last thirty years, resulting in the largest gap between the super-rich and the poor since the Great Depression of 1929. It doesn’t take much research to find out that a bulk of the money that could be allocated to the public sector and social services, is in fact being used to fund both the prison and military industrial complex. Amazingly, the United States spends more money on our military then the whole industrial world combined, including China, the Middle East and North Africa. We spend three times more money per person on incarceration (2.2 million people are incarcerated in the U.S. — the most in the world) than on public education per pupil, and believe it or not, the U.S. spends nearly four times more money ($7 billion dollars annually) to arrest and imprison marijuana offenders then on homelessness and affordable housing initiatives ($1.92 billion dollars)!

Meanwhile, the United States has over 50 million Americans without healthcare, 200,000 homeless veterans on the street any given night, between 1 and 1.5 million teenagers experiencing at least one episode of homelessness each year, and nearly 13 million children living below the poverty line, with an additional 28 million living in abject poverty. Moreover, 600,000 families with 1.35 million children experience homelessness in the United States each year, making up about 50 percent of the homeless population. As you can see, there is a clear crisis in this country, and the assault we’re seeing on both the middle and working class in America is intrinsically tied to the rise in homelessness and with it, the dismantling of affordable housing in America. This grotesque trend must be stopped.

As the D.C. homeless and their supporters fight to save Franklin School

Shelter and with it, the lives that will be lost this winter, Barack Obama and John Mccain were at the White House coming up with the best way to sell a $700 Billion dollar bail-out to the American people. That $700 billion dollars will go to the richest among us while the disenfranchised in this country continue to suffer from the same economic system and policies the rich have created. As economist and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research Dean Baker put it: “So the idea that the administration is proposing is that the people who were engaged in incredibly reckless behavior, who made out like bandits, getting tens of millions of dollars in salary and compensation over the last few years are now going to get this $700 billion blank check from the American taxpayer. It’s just unbelievable.” Economist Nouriel Roubini, who has served in various roles at the Treasury Department, and was a Senior Economist on the Staff of the Presidents Council of Economic Advisors, described the Treasury plan in a recent blog as “a disgrace: a bailout of reckless bankers, lenders and investors that provides little direct debt relief to borrowers and financially stressed households and that will come at a very high cost to the US taxpayer. And the plan does nothing to resolve the severe stress in money markets and interbank markets that are now close to a systemic meltdown.”

While Wall Street works with their buddy Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson a.k.a. “Mr. Risk” (ex-CEO of Goldman Sachs–who holds $540 million in GS stock) to save themselves, and their net worth, working and middle class families continue to loose their homes, equity, and overall livelihood. Something needs to be done in this time of economic crisis, but the people who really need the $700 billion aren’t the one’s who already made tens of millions of dollars. The $700 billion dollar bail out should be going to the over two million homeowners that are going to loose their house this year, the millions of families living off $20,000 a year, the fifty million Americans who are without healthcare, and the residents of Franklin Shelter who now find themselves back on the street.

Sadly, its seems that those in power, including both our presidential candidates, are willing to give pennies to the people, and with smiles on their faces, hand billions to the banksters. It’s up to us to take back and defend what is rightfully ours.

The Rally began on the West-Lawn of the Capital where several speakers and a hip-hop performance engaged the crowd before demonstrators started to march. Emotions ran high when the anti-occupation protestors were confronted by a hundred or so Zionists holding signs such as, “Israel We Stand With You” and “Israel is on the map to Stay.” Passionate exchanges took place on both sides, but no major confrontations occurred. Now to the news, or shall we say, the lack there of.

If anyone had any doubts as to the stifling of information by the corporate media on this contentious issue, you should doubt no longer. For those of you, like myself, who expected to see some coverage regardless of its nature or bias, it seems our expectations were unfounded. Obviously, there are many important stories to cover on a Sunday afternoon; I mean, Paris Hilton is in jail for Christ sake! What does it take to get a blurb in a local newspaper these days? The Washington Post‘s headquarters is in Washington, D.C., right? Well, you couldn’t tell by reading their Monday addition. I searched the entire paper for a sentence, a mention, anything at all about the rally. What did I find? You guessed it, nothing. So then I figured I’d try a little harder to find some coverage of the rally; I mean, just because the Post didn’t cover the demonstration didn’t mean it wasn’t adequately covered somewhere else in the depths of our diverse media, right? Wrong. Well … somewhat right. After many hours of searching, I decided to go to The US Campaign to End Israeli Occupation’s website. Once there, under the “in the news” category, I found their reported press hits. Guess how many hits they found nationwide? Four. Guess how many hits were in mainstream media outlets? Zero. The rally got coverage in a whopping three local newspaper publications nation-wide: the Austin-American Statesman, the Buffalo News, and the Detroit News; The Huffington Post, which is a blog, and the Jerusalem Post based out of Israel, were also noted.

The U.S. Campaign to End Israeli Occupation claims the rally was a “huge success,” but for whom? Not for those of us who were at the rally protesting against the illegal occupation, that’s for sure. If our goal was to raise awareness and dialogue about the illegal occupation and the U.S. government’s direct economic and military support of the occupation, then it was a failure. To be fair, it should be mentioned that the failure of the event was not a result of the organizations involved; they were, after all, successful in leading a peaceful and populous rally, march, and subsequent lobby day on Capital Hill. Failure came in the form of our media and its refusal to give the march any airtime, which begs the question, why didn’t the demonstration get any mainstream coverage, even from the Washington Post? I don’t have the answer.

Perhaps at least one major factor in the lack of media coverage was the zionist community’s decision to not protest or partake in, but largely ignore the demonstration. As the director for the Jewish Council For Public Affairs, Hadar Susskind, put it, “We didn’t feel the need to bring it more attention.” Seems like their strategy may have worked better than they could have hoped.³

Not too long after the march I spoke with a representative from the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation; the representative stated that a discussion was on-going as to how they could gain greater coverage in the future. I also tried to contact the Washington Post about their blackout of the demonstration, but received no response. By writing this piece, I hope to give a voice to a rally and march for justice that went unheard.

1. US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
2. www.nkusa.org
3. June 11th, 2007. Jerusalem Post-online, Hilary Leila Krieger