You play football and basketball, but you don’t play boxing.

– the late Buster Mathis, Sr.

This July, all the boxing news of note has been in the obituaries. Death has visited the sport like a plague, shocking even the most callous observers.

On July 1, Alexis Arguello, 57, who became the mayor of his native Managua, Nicaragua, and battled depression for years allegedly shot himself through the chest.

Then, on July 11, recently retired 37-year-old brawling icon Arturo Gatti met a brutally violent end in Brazil. Gatti was choked to death by a purse strap belonging to his wife, Amanda Rodrigues. Brazilian authorities are labeling it a suicide. Virtually no one else is.

Two weeks later, on July 25, 38-year-old former WBC welterweight champion Vernon Forrest was murdered. Two men attempted to rob him. Forrest reportedly pulled a gun, gave chase and took several bullets for his efforts.

Arguello, Gatti and Forrest were the most famous boxing casualties in the boxing world of July, but there were several more.

On July 22, a 23-year-old junior welterweight named Marco Antonio Nazareth died of a brain hemorrhage four days after being knocked unconscious in the ring. That same day, Marc Leduc, the openly gay 1992 Canadian silver medalist, died of heat stroke at age 47. On July 25, 21-year-old Francisco “Pancho” Moncivais died twenty-four hours after an in-ring knockout. Also on July 25, 37-year-old Colombian boxer Nicolas Cervera committed suicide. Finally there was welterweight William Morelo, gunned down in a gym in Colombia on July 27.

Eight deaths, occurring all over the world, and on the surface entirely unrelated. Yet they are bound by an athletic endeavor that remains, as the late sportswriter Jimmy Cannon, “the red light district of sports.” Imagine eight current and former NFL players, including two Hall of Famers, being buried over one month. Or baseball. Or even fatality-familiar sports like auto racing.

If any other sport were visited by the array and diversity of death we have seen in boxing, Congressional hearings would already be in full swing. But we don’t talk about what happens in the “red light district.” It’s a Vegas mentality: What happens in boxing stays in boxing.

It starts with the metronome-like punishment to the head. The brain begins to bruise, the words start to slur, the interviews become painful and the price paid for our pleasure becomes pernicious. This was especially the case with the freewheeling Gatti, whose bouts often resembled Guernica more than a boxing match. It made him very popular, very rich and very hurt.

As Jack Todd wrote in the Montreal Gazette, “[Gatti] was what they used to call ‘punch drunk’ and he was still fighting. My father, a veteran of more than 100 fights as an amateur and pro, was also called punch drunk: prone to sudden, explosive rages and memory loss. It isn’t pretty. From what we know of Gatti’s death, it is a particular variety of tragedy that seems to follow the warriors of the ring, a shadow they are never quick enough to outbox. Violent backgrounds, a violent sport, violent deaths.”

We need to confront everything that’s rotten in boxing. Right now there is no commissioner and no governing authority. There are no unions, and there is no collective bargaining on behalf of fighters. There is no healthcare, no mental health treatment and no one watching out for those who suffer from the debilitating effects of brain damage and its conjoined twin, depression.

Furthermore, no one is charged with counseling fighters who have been unable to keep the violence of the ring out of their personal lives. Gatti’s death, no matter what the police assert, was most likely the result of a domestic dispute with his wife. This spring she had a restraining order slapped on Gatti, demanding he stay 200 meters away from her at all times. The great boxing writer Thomas Hauser wrote to me, “I don’t know a single person who believes that Arturo Gatti killed himself. That’s not denial on our part. It’s our disbelief with regard to an apparently corrupt criminal justice system in Brazil.” No one has been brought to account for the deaths of Nazareth and Moncivais either. Did they belong in the ring? Was there ringside healthcare that could have saved them? There are no inquiries, only eulogies.

So despite spirited efforts by groups like Joint Action for Boxers (JAB), boxers still have no union protections. As former light heavyweight champion Eddie Mustafa Muhammad said, “Every professional sport has a union. They have a pension, they have a medical plan, they have a chance at a life. In boxing, they don’t have anything.”

The biggest boxing fan I know, the poet Martín Espada once told me, “In this country, as a rule, boxers come from the bottom: Black, brown, immigrants, the poor, the uneducated. This society treats such human beings as contemptible and disposable, channeling them into the military, into prison, into the shadows. Our collective attitude towards boxing is nothing more or less than a reflection of our attitude towards those who become boxers.”

Those who become boxers battle more than their opponents, the industry and crooked promoters–they have to fight our indifference.

Now the man who greased the chain of command that orchestrated this great deception is prepared to assume total control of US operations in Afghanistan: Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal. It was McChrystal who approved Tillman’s posthumous Silver Star, a medal given explicitly for combat, even though he later testified that he “suspected” friendly fire.

Yet despite this, both Democrats and Republicans are rushing to heap praise on McChrystal, including Sen. John McCain. It was McCain who rushed to speak at Tillman’s funeral and then, when the cover-up became known, pledged to help the Tillman family expose the truth. McCain later turned his back on the Tillmans when they raised the volume and demanded answers. As Pat’s mother, Mary Tillman, said last year, “He definitely eased out of the situation. He didn’t blatantly say he wouldn’t help us, it’s just that it became clear that he kind of drifted away.”

And now the Tillman family, amidst bipartisan praise for Obama’s new general, must once again raise the inconvenient truth.

Pat’s father, Pat Tillman Sr., told the Associated Press, “I do believe that guy participated in a falsified homicide investigation.”

Mary Tillman, who excoriated McChrystal in her book, Boots on the Ground by Dusk: My Tribute to Pat Tillman, said, “It is imperative that Lt. Gen. McChrystal be scrutinized carefully during the Senate hearings.”

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said in response:

We feel terrible for what the Tillman family went through, but this matter has been investigated thoroughly by the Pentagon, by the Congress, by outside experts, and all of them have come to the same conclusion: that there was no wrongdoing by Gen. McChrystal.

Morrell’s statement has more spin than a washing machine powered by a V-8 engine. McChrystal has never explained why the early reports of Tillman’s death were covered up, why his clothes and field journal were burned and destroyed on the scene or why Pat’s brother Kevin, serving alongside him in the Rangers, was lied to on the spot. Even the cover-up was covered up. This should be a cause for dismissal–or indictment–not promotion.

What particularly rankles about Obama’s choice of McChrystal, whose background is in the nefarious and shadowy world of “black ops,” is that his actions in the Tillman cover-up feel emblematic instead of exceptional.

When an anonymous Army interrogator “at great personal risk” blew the whistle to Esquire in August 2006 on an extensive torture enterprise at Camp Nama, he described the then unknown McChrystal as being an overseer who knew the ugly truth. Torture at Camp Nama included using ice water to induce hypothermia. It was not a rogue operation unless we consider Generals like McChrystal “rogues.” As Esquire reported:

Once, somebody brought it up with the colonel. “Will [the Red Cross] ever be allowed in here?” And he said absolutely not. He had this directly from General McChrystal and the Pentagon that there’s no way that the Red Cross could get in–they won’t have access and they never will. This facility was completely closed off to anybody investigating, even Army investigators.

Later in the piece, when asked where the colonel was getting his orders from the interrogator said, “I believe it was a two-star general. I believe his name was General McChrystal. I saw him there a couple of times.”

Clearly President Obama is trying to “own” the war in Afghanistan: upping the troop levels, making it his “central front” in the battle against terrorism and now placing his own general in charge. But the president is also disappointing a generation of antiwar activists who voted for him expecting an end to imperial adventures and torture sanctioned by the executive branch. Now a man who should perhaps be on trial at the Hague is in charge of Afghanistan. Obama needs to know it’s not just the Tillmans who are enraged by this terrible choice.

Days before the ceasefire halted the carnage in Gaza city this month, history repeated as Sevilla (Spain) striker Fredi Kanoute raised his shirt after scoring a goal to reveal a shirt that said “Palestine” in multiple languages. Kanoute is not an obscure player. In 2007, he was named African player of the year, even though he was born in France (his family is from Mali).

After earning a £3,000 fine for his political gesture, famed Barcelona coach, Jose Guardiola stood up for him, saying: “The fine is absolutely excessive. If they always banned these type of things, then journalists would not be able to write columns. … Every war is absurd, and too many innocent people have died for us to be fining people for things like this.”

Welcome to 2009, when Israel’s offensive on Gaza, ceasefire or no, is finding expression in the sports world. It’s a development that should give supporters of Israel’s actions in Gaza a great deal of pause.

Kanoute’s actions come on the heels of an event in Ankara, Turkey when the Israeli basketball team, Bnei Hasharon, had to flee the court from what the Associated Press described as “hundreds of fist-pumping, chanting Turkish fans”.

Before the game could begin, angry chants of “Israeli killers!” came down from the crowd, as Palestinian flags appeared in their hands. Then, in a scene that would look familiar to George Bush, off came the shoes, and footwear rained down from the stands (the shoes didn’t hit any players).

A melee then began between 1,500 police officers and Turkish fans, as the fans advanced toward the court. Both Hasharon and the Turkish team Turk Telecom were hurried to the locker rooms where they remained for two hours.

Hasharon forfeited the contest. It says something that Israel found reckoning on the basketball court long before any kind of International Criminal Court.

According to sports historians, a sporting event hasn’t been actually stopped in such a manner — with fans turning the stands into a site of protest — since 25 July 1981, when South Africa’s Springbok rugby team had to cancel a game in New Zealand when fans occupied the field of play to protest apartheid.

Israel has historically been adamant that any comparisons between the Israeli state and South Africa are absolutely false and even antisemitic. Jimmy Carter provoked their outrage of course when he published his book, Palestine: Peace not Apartheid.

But this parallel, when related to sports, should not be taken lightly. One of the most effective tools against apartheid South Africa was the South African Non-Racialised Olympic Committee, which attempted to use sports as a way to highlight and broadcast the inequities of the South African government. Sports can bring a political spotlight and unwanted attention onto a society like few other forces in the international community, galvanising, attention, passion and, as we saw in Turkey, anger.

Israel hasn’t helped itself in this regard by making sports a target in the war. On 9 January, the IDF bombed Gaza’s Palestine National Stadium. The stadium was also the head of the Palestinian Football Association. The structure was built in 2005 partially with funds from Fifa. The facility will now need to be rebuilt again (in 2006 it was also bombed). It was meant to be a symbol of a Palestinian state, something that united the West Bank and Gaza as an expression of unity. Now it is rubble.

In addition, perhaps fearing a repeat of Ankara, the Israel Football Federation is preventing any club matches from being played in Palestinian towns. As Jimmy Johnson, who works in Jerusalem for the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions told me: “These are not Palestinian clubs from the West Bank, East Jerusalem or Gaza, but for Palestinian citizens of Israel, sometimes called Arab Israelis, who are almost 20% of the population, vote in Israeli elections, etc.”

This has gotten little press in the US, but in the soccer-mad Middle East, it is altogether insult on top of injury.

Sports, which we are told repeatedly represent a sacredly apolitical space, a place to flee the headaches of the real world, has now been thrust into the heart of a conflict raw with politics in a way we haven’t seen in quite some time. Protests against Israeli actions in Gaza are sure to continue in sporting events outside the US. But the ramifications could very easily be felt inside our borders, as political leaders come to the White House and tell the new administration tales of sports fans gone wild.

One could tell right away that Goldberg didn’t read a book, an article, even a fortune cookie, about the 1968 Olympics before whipping out his laptop. I know, research is hard … and who needs facts when you have dogma? — but Smith and Carlos never advocated any kind of violence. Furthermore, they saw their symbol as a sign of resistance that would connect broadly across ethnicities, not a narrow expression of “black power.”

But the title turns out to be the intellectual summit of the piece.

Goldberg writes, “The stench of self-congratulation surrounding ESPN’s decision [to honor Smith and Carlos] is thicker than the air in a locker room after double overtime. The argument that Smith’s and Carlos’ critics must dine on their denunciations rests on an inch-deep nostalgia and the triumph of celebrity culture.”

Note that Goldberg doesn’t mention a word about why Smith and Carlos made their
stand and why his intellectual forbearers “must dine on their denunciations.” Smith and Carlos wanted South Africa and Rhodesia banned from the 1968 Games because of their apartheid politics. They demanded more black coaches in sports. They sought to hold Avery Brundage, president of the International Olympic Committee, accountable for what many black athletes thought to be a barely concealed racism. They wanted Muhammad Ali to have his heavyweight boxing title restored after it was stripped because of Ali’s refusal to fight in Vietnam. Goldberg never makes clear if he even knows this history. I’m guessing no.

And yet he continues:

“In today’s culture, is it even worth trying to remind people that the black power salute was, for those who brandished it most seriously, a symbol of violence — rhetorical, political and literal — against the United States? It was the high-sign for a racist militia, the Black Panthers, which orchestrated the murder of innocents and allied itself with America’s enemies.”

This is little more than an ugly screed against the Black Panthers. They were popular in their day not because they were a “racist militia” but because they were seen as standing up to racism. They armed themselves to challenge police brutality. They set up breakfast programs and health clinics in neighborhoods dying of neglect. They were popular enough that J. Edgar Hoover called them “public enemy number 1″ and set out a plan to kill their leaders and destroy their organization. There are many reasons to raise criticisms of the Panthers but not by someone who seems to have done little more than read the David Horowitz Cliff Notes on the subject. And I have to ask, what the hell is a “high sign”? Is that Goldberg trying to be “down”? I’d love to see a reality show where he is dropped in South East DC and has to find his way home. I think he’d starve to death

Jonah continues:

“But even a more benign view of the salute shouldn’t obscure the intense contradictions of ESPN’s decision to honor Carlos and Smith. Both men were members of the Olympic Committee for Human Rights, which wanted a complete black boycott of the ‘68 Olympics. The committee considered an entire generation of heroic black athletes “including Jesse Owens and Jackie Robinson — to be Uncle Toms.”

Here we have an error followed by a lie. Their organization was called the Olympic PROJECT for Human Rights, not the “committee.” (A Google search would have cleared that up. Once again, research is hard.) And it is a lie is that they called out Jackie Robinson as an Uncle Tom. The truth is that Robinson supported OPHR.

As Robinson said, “I do support the individuals who decided to make the sacrifice by
giving up the chance to win an Olympic medal. I respect their courage. We need to understand the reason and frustration behind these protests… it was different in my day perhaps we lacked courage.”

As for Jesse Owens, they 1968 Olympians were angry with him because he worked with Avery Brundage to undermine their protest both publicly and privately. Owens came to regret his actions this, writing an entire book in 1972 called “I Have Changed.”

But let’s turn back to Jonah. It gets “better.”

“Another important distinction that should matter is that this was 1968, not 1938. By the end of the 1960s, the United States had seen two decades of steady — if too slow — racial progress. The black power vision of an irredeemably “racist Amerikkka” was all but blind to the desegregation of the military, the accomplishments of Owens and Robinson, and the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1960, 1964 and even 1968. One hopes ESPN disagrees with those views as well.”

It’s as if Dan Quayle learned how to type. Does Goldberg have even a basic knowledge of American history? Does he really think black people were feeling good about the USA in 1968? Did he hear about that guy who got shot in Memphis that year? Dr. Martin Luther Somebody? And when he was shot how there were riots in every major city in the country? Did he know that Smith and Carlos were profoundly affected by this, wondering how they could represent a country that could breed such hate? Where did Goldberg grow up? Mayberry?

Jonah concludes,

“But the question is not, and never has been, whether the Olympic ideal can be achieved but whether it should be pursued. By embracing those who spat on that idea, it seems ESPN thinks the answer is no.”

Sigh. Smith and Carlos weren’t spitting on anything. They were challenging the hypocritical ideals of an Olympics that welcomed apartheid nations, employed a paucity of African American coaches, and had an open white supremacist, Avery Brundage, at its helm. Once again, Goldberg simply makes no effort to engage with the actuality of that moment. He never mentions the flood of hatred and death threats Smith and Carlos brought upon themselves. He could care less about the toll it took on their families, their friends, and their pocket books. Jonah Goldberg, like some kind of dull-witted, dime store propagandist, can only unleash a one-dimensional hateful diatribe on a period and moment that he simply doesn’t understand.

But I have to admit there is a small part of me that took great satisfaction in seeing this column. It demonstrates that after 40 years, the audacious gesture of Tommie Smith and John Carlos still holds the power to upset the bullies, the dullards, and the scoundrels. It still holds the power to upset all the right people.

In classified reports compiled by the Maryland State Police and the Department of Homeland Security, I am “Dave Z.” This nickname was given by an undercover agent known to us as “Lucy.” She sat in our meetings of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, smiling and engaged, taking copious notes about actions deemed threatening by the then-governor of Maryland, Robert Ehrlich.

Our seditious crimes, as Lucy reported, involved such acts as planning to set up a table at the local farmer’s market and writing up a petition. Adding a dash of farce to this outrage, she was monitoring us in the liberal enclave of Takoma Park, Maryland, a place known more for vegans than violence, more for tie-dyeing than terrorism.

Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act and the ACLU, we now know that “Lucy” was only one part of a vast, insidious project. The Maryland State Police’s Department of Homeland Security devoted nearly 300 hours and thousands of taxpayer dollars from 2005 and 2006 to harassing people whose only crime was dissenting on the question of the war in Iraq and Maryland’s use of death row.

My dear friend Mike Stark, a board member of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty is at times referred to in “Lucy’s” report as a “socialist” and an “anarchist.” One can only assume this is the pathetic time-honored tradition of reducing people to simple caricatures, all the better to garner Homeland Security grant money.

Veteran peace activist in Baltimore, Max Obuszewski, who initiated the suit, was also consistently shadowed as he walked down the streets. His “primary crime” (their lingo) was entered into the homeland security database as “terrorism–anti govern(ment).” His “secondary crime” was listed as “terrorism–anti-war protestors.” The database is known as the Washington-Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, or HIDTA.

Yes, a respected peace organizer of many decades standing is checked as a terrorist, his actions listed as criminal, for doing nothing more than exercising his rights. It boggles the mind.

Former police superintendent Tim Hutchins defended these totalitarian practices by saying, “You do what you think is best to protect the general populace of the state.” (The article mentioned that Hutchins is now a federal defense contractor. I guess the global war on terror is just the gift that keeps on giving for the Hutchins family.)

But “protect the general populace” from what? The surveillance continued even after it was determined that we were planning nothing more dangerous that carrying clipboards in a public place. Hutchins and the Ehrlich administration have undertaken an ugly violation of our civil rights, manipulating fears of terrorism to stamp out dissent.

This is COINTELPRO pure and simple. Like the infamous counter-intelligence program, whose heyday many assume was a relic of the 1950s and 1960s, it’s an effort to harass the innocent and breed paranoia, all for daring to question power.

Governor Ehrlich and Tim Hutchins stand in the legacy of those who hounded Martin Luther King and facilitated the death of Malcolm X. They stand in the tradition of those who drove the great actor, college football superstar and activist Paul Robeson toward the mental breakdown that claimed his life. When Robeson’s files were opened under the Freedom of Information Act, the results were terrifying.

As his son, Paul Robeson Jr. has written, “From the files I received, it was obvious that there were agents who did nothing but follow every public event of my father, or even of me…It took on a life of its own…Over time, even for someone as powerful and with as many resources as my dad had…the attrition got to him.”

Now Robeson is on a postage stamp. The moral midgets who destroyed him went unpunished. That’s what has to change.

The ACLU, to their credit, is going on the offensive. As ACLU lawyer David Rocah said at a news conference in Baltimore on Thursday, “To invest this many hours investigating the most all-American of activities without any scintilla of evidence there is anything criminal going on is shocking. It’s Kafkaesque.”

Unfortunately, it is also “the most All-American of activities” for people like Gov. Ehrlich to take the Constitution and use it as their personal hand-wipe.

As the great political philosopher Ice T wrote, “Freedom of Speech…just watch what you say.”

Well, now is exactly the time not to watch what we say. I’m angry. I’m angry for my friends, who trusted “Lucy” and others. I’m angry that my tax dollars went to paying the salaries of people who spy and intimidate those exercising their rights. I’m angry that Barack Obama just voted to increase the power of the Federal government to disrupt people’s lives. And I’m angry enough that I’m joining a lawsuit initiated by the ACLU.

“Homeland Security” picked on the wrong sports writer. They also picked on the wrong group of activists. We will not be silenced.

David Zirin:When did you become a sports fan?

Ralph Nader: I was really taken by Lou Gehrig when I was a little boy because of his demeanor and his stamina. Remember, he played in over 2,000 consecutive games at that time, which was since eclipsed by Cal Ripken. But you know how everyone has a sports hero when they’re a boy? This one really stayed with me. The concept of stamina and persistence. And it turned me into a Yankees fan.

DZ: Persistence is a word that a lot of people associate with you in your public life. Is Gehrig an inspiration in this regard?

RN: Oh, most definitely. There’s only one picture in my office on the wall, only one: Lou Gehrig.

DZ: When did you realize that League of Fans was a project you wanted to be involved in?

RN: Well, actually there’s a precursor. We had a fans’ group in the 1970s that put out a very probing newsletter. The idea then was how fans are being ripped off; they had no voice; they had no organized role. They were being overcharged. They were being subjected to blackouts in their hometown for example, if the stadium didn’t sell out. This was also the beginning of a move for tax-funded stadiums and ballparks. There were really quite a lot of issues. We had 1,000 dues-paying members, but we couldn’t get it beyond that. But my desire was to have fans organize–because after all, they’re consumers. They’re consumers at the service of mammoth sports enterprises that have antitrust exemptions, that have all sorts of tax-depreciating rights for their players.

I mean, it’s almost a mint to produce money. They gouged the fans as consumers; parking, food, tickets, and they gouged them as taxpayers too. So it was really a composite situation that is replayed throughout the economy between large corporations and consumers. Since, as sports fans, we’re very, very clever and understanding of the rules of the game, the strategies and the players, and…know the history of the players and teams and [are] loyal to the teams, I said, “Imagine if voters did their homework, and imagine if voters had that kind of tactical and strategic sense. Imagine voters who rooted for rookies–if voters wanted to give new candidates a chance to play on the field. So we started leagueoffans.org, and once again we came up with all kinds of needs to organize fans–especially to oppose tax-funded stadiums while clinics, libraries and schools were crumbling in the same cities for lack of public investment.

There was over $600 million dollars spent to build the new Washington Nationals’ baseball stadium, but if you look around Washington, DC, you see schools crumbling, clinics–the usual urban deterioration. And not enough recreational facilities for youngsters so they can engage in participatory sports, not just spectator sports.

DZ: That’s one thing that sticks in my craw too: the sports industry loves to create passive consumers, when in theory, sports is about active participation.

RN: That’s why the sports pages in the newspaper should be called the spectator sports pages. Because they don’t cover participatory sports: amateur sports, amateur leagues, what’s going on at the local playgrounds or any effort to promote activity and competition.

DZ: Presidential candidates frequently talk of a “patients’ bill of rights” or “passengers’ bill of rights.” What would a fans’ bill of rights include? What items would you include in relation to this often abusive relationship between sports owners and fans?

RN: One is in any tax-supported sports facility, the fans should become shareholders. Because they’re tax payers. The stadium and ballpark should be called “Taxpayer Stadium,” not some sold-off brand name, or some bank, or computer company…

DZ: Like [the former home of the Houston Astros] “Enron Field”?

RN: Yeah, right! But more important than that, there should be organized fans’ groups that can sit at the table. Anything that intersects public policy with the sports teams, the fans have got to have representatives at the table. Yankee Stadium is now going to be demolished. Imagine demolishing Carnegie Hall! The new Yankee Stadium is going to be built with heavy–not total–taxpayer money, although the Yankees want another $350 million in tax-free bonds to be issued, and the mayor is apparently supporting that.

Anyway, they took over a twenty-acre park, a very important park in the neighborhood, with beautiful trees. The trees have all been cut down and the stadium is going to be built in that park. The residents were promised four or five little parks in the neighborhood that would be refurbished. Well, now there’s a two-year delay, and it’s not clear that there’s enough money, that the city has enough money to do it. There’s enough money to build the stadium; that part of the deal was secure, but not the trade-off. The fans and the neighborhood were never there. The fans were never consulted and the taxpayers were never consulted. So a fans’ bill of rights really means that there are players at the table. If the food and tickets and parking are going sky-high, the fans should be in on this. The moment a tax dollar touches a stadium, the fans, the taxpayers, the neighborhood, they’ve got to be given a voice; and that includes the right to take the city and the sports team to court intending to sue.

DZ: You’ve actually been in the sports pages a lot recently in regard to a 2002 playoff game between the Sacramento Kings and the Los Angeles Lakers. Something occurred during the game that really troubled you. What was it?

RN: The worst performance by referees I’ve ever seen! The Kings were up three to one–here’s this upstart, small-market team against the giant Lakers big-market, Lakers were favored three-to-one. They were in the sixth game, they could have won the championship. The referees called something like twenty-seven fouls in the fourth quarter against the Sacramento Kings and didn’t call fouls–egregious fouls–against the Lakers. For example, Kobe Bryant elbowed Mike Bibby in the face, Bibby fell, was bleeding, went to the sidelines. Everyone saw it; no foul against Kobe. So the suspicion arose of the referees being company referees–after all, they were selected by David Stern, the commissioner of the NBA to officiate in the playoff games. Basically, it was really good for the league financially to throw it into the seventh game. Well, the seventh game went to the Lakers, and the Lakers won the championship.

Now, nobody could prove this–there was no directive, no secret e-mail, no wink by David Stern. There didn’t have to be. So is it just a case of massive, sudden incompetence, that favored one team, or is it something else to earn more revenue for the league by throwing it into the seventh game? Well, maybe we’ll never know, but it was massive incompetence. Why didn’t David Stern–who I spoke to on the phone after I sent him this objecting letter… he’s cordial but very imperious if you can believe the combination. He spoke like he was head of a corporate dictatorship.

The NBA is a corporate dictatorship. Once the contracts, however lucrative, are signed with the players it’s dictatorship-land. There is a provision in the contracts with the players called the “antidisparagement provision” where they give up their free-speech rights. So if they complain publicly or criticize a referee or David Stern, they can be fined five-thousand, ten, fifty, a hundred thousand dollars! Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks has already paid $1.5-plus million in fees, in penalties. Now, the government can’t fine you for free speech. Most corporations can’t fine you–they can fire you, but they can’t fine you if you speak your mind. So my recommendation is the following: I understand that it’s very disruptive while the teams are actually playing each other during the season to have people spouting off about managers, coaches, players against players and so on. But the anti-disparagement clause should stop after the season, and there should be a free speech period in the off-season so that any potential cover-ups can be exposed.

DZ: With all of the other problems in the world right now, why focus on the world of sports?

RN: There are much more serious problems affecting people in our country, in our community and in our world, to be sure. But people deserve a sanctuary where they can trust what’s going on is going to be based on the merits and not influence-peddling or shenanigans of various sorts, and that’s sports. One reason people are attracted to sports is because things happen on the merits. Teams win or lose on the merits of their players and coaches and managers. When that trust is betrayed, you can see that there’s a real letdown among the fans.

It’s more than just a psychological letdown. It’s like, “Oh no! This stuff is happening here too? Where will it all end?” If we want to build trust, sports is a good place to do it. But with the commercialization of giant sports conglomerates, you’re not going to see that any time soon without strong fan organizations, like the League of Fans, to inspire around the country.

Woods is a trailblazer and already a legend for his ability to perform when the spotlight is at its hottest. But he has also established a reputation for reticence when confronted with the real world off the greens. For all his cultural capital, Woods has refused to take stands on issues that should hit close to home, such as restricted golf courses, or even when the Golf Channel’s Kelly Tilghman suggested young PGA players “lynch him in a back alley” in a “joke” about how they might overcome his dominance. Tiger has largely maintained the tight-lipped silence of a Benedictine monk.

After the lynching comment, ESPN’s Scoop Jackson became so frustrated with this disciplined quietude he wrote, “Because of who he is, Tiger Woods has the power to make people listen. Not just hear his words–but embrace what he has to say…. It’s a stand he needs to take because people who change the world eventually have to take stands. Whether strong or silent, good or evil, they take stands not to prove their beliefs, but to rectify a situation or condition.”

His defenders have always said that behind the scenes Woods has been an agent for change, and that he shouldn’t be criticized just because he does his good deeds without media fanfare. They say he wields that influence through his nonprofit Tiger Woods Foundation. Go to the website, and a virtual Woods walks right onto your screen and welcomes you to a place where “kids can achieve anything.” The site boasts: “more than 10 million young people have benefited from the Tiger Woods Foundation since its inception in 1996. What started out with limited access throughout America, now reaches out to young people around the world.”

Yet now the Foundation is “reaching around the world” in a way that has human rights activists concerned about a business partnership that smells like sulfur.

The Tiger Woods Foundation has entered into an extensive five-year partnership with Chevron Corporation, with the oil and energy giant becoming the title sponsor of the Tiger Woods Foundation World Challenge Golf Tournament.

“Chevron has a track record and a commitment to bettering the communities where they operate,” Woods said in a press release on April 3. And Chevron’s executive vice president chimed in, “Chevron, Tiger and the Tiger Woods Foundation share similar values…as well as a deep commitment to make a difference in local communities.”

They have certainly “made a difference in local communities,” but it’s nothing they should be bragging about, and certainly nothing with which Woods should want his name attached. Chevron is in full partnership with the Burmese military regime on the Yadana gas pipeline project, the single greatest source of revenue for the military, estimated at nearly $1 billion in 2007, nearly half of all the country’s revenue. These are the same people who are blocking international aid workers from assisting the victims of Cyclone Nargis. The death toll has been estimated at 78,000, but this number can explode as disease spreads and help isn’t allowed through the military lines. Even the US State Department has called the actions of the government “appalling.”

Ka Hsaw Wa, co-founder and executive director of EarthRights International, wrote in an open letter to Woods, “I myself have spoken to victims of forced labor, rape, and torture on Chevron’s pipeline–if you heard what they said to me, you too would understand how their tragic stories stand in stark contrast to Chevron’s rhetoric about helping communities.” ERI’s request to meet with Woods or someone from the foundation has been met with silence

But while the Burmese junta’s crimes are localized in Southeast Asia, Chevron is global. Lawsuits have been issued against Chevron’s toxic waste dumping in Alaska, Canada, Angola, California. Then there’s the matter of 18 billion gallons of toxic waste the company has been accused of dumping in the Amazon.

In a US District Court in San Francisco, the case of Bowoto v. Chevron, Nigerian plaintiffs have accused Chevron of actually arming and outfitting Nigerian oil security forces to shoot and kill protesters. Judge Susan Illston has refused to dismiss the case because, as Democracy Now! recently reported, “evidence show[s] direct links to Chevron officials.”

When pressed for comment, Tiger Woods Foundation President Greg McLaughlin issued this statement to me: “The Foundation’s vision is to help young people reach their full potential. All our partners share in this vision, allowing us to make a positive impact in millions of young lives.” That response, to very serious and very direct charges, is the golf equivalent of a triple bogey.

President McLaughlin should think more seriously about what Chevron is and what they do: they pollute, they destroy, they conspire with dictators, and heaven help anyone who gets in their way. Now they want to burnish their “brand” by partnering with Tiger Woods. Tiger’s late father Earl, once said of his son, “He will transcend this game… and bring to the world… a humanitarianism… which has never been known before. The world will be a better place to live in… by virtue of his existence… and his presence.”

The partnership with Chevron makes a mockery of Earl Woods’s hopes.

To use an analogy from a different sport, the ball is now in Tiger’s court. Will he allow himself to be tamed by corporate interests, or will he roar?

Instead, the journey has been a public relations apocalypse, and an obstacle course for unsuspecting athletes and dignitaries, confronted by an international gauntlet of agitators. In France, police alongside Chinese security officers had to use tear gas to keep protesters at bay and officials had to extinguish the torch five separate times. In London, 37 people were arrested trying to impede the torch. In San Francisco last Wednesday, thousands turned out to demonstrate, which led to a bizarre situation where the torchbearers ran a few yards, disappeared into a warehouse, and then reappeared on a city bus. This isn’t the esteemed expedition of the torch. This is Planes, Trains, and Automobiles go to the Olympics.

China has blamed the protests on “a few Tibetan separatists.” That would be news to the protester Charles Altekruse, who as a member of the U.S. Olympic rowing team, was forced to sit out the 1980 Moscow Games because of the U.S. boycott. “Today, my voice is the voice for thousands of people whose voices cannot be heard,” said Altekruse, who lives not in Lhasa, but Berkeley.

China’s recent crackdown on Tibet has opened a view on a host of abuses throughout the Chinese mainland, as well as the complicity of the International Olympic Committee and the West embedded in every abuse: the 2 million people displaced for Olympic facilities, the violation of labor standards so Western nations have an endless army of cheap labor, mass jailing of dissidents who dare to complain, and the environmental degradation of the country.

But the protests have been also aimed at the IOC and their efforts to shamelessly promote China’s titanic economy. Juliana Barbassa of the Associated Press could not have been clearer writing, “The torch’s global journey was supposed to highlight China’s growing economic and political power.”

IOC president Jacques Rogge lamented the protests, saying that the journey of the torch was supposed to be “a Journey of Harmony, bringing the message of peace to the people of different nationalities, cultures and creeds.” Would that it were.

The first torch run was actually the brainchild of Dr. Carl Diem, the organizer of Adolf Hitler’s 1936 Olympics in Berlin. He convinced Hitler’s propaganda chief, Joseph Goebbels, that 3,422 young Aryan runners should carry burning torches along the 3,422 km route from the Temple of Hera on Mount Olympus to the stadium in Berlin. The event would be captured by the regime’s filmmaking prodigy, Leni Riefenstahl, and broadcast over radio.

In fact, Rogge’s dream that the torch be a symbol of “peace, harmony and global unity” is reminiscent of Hitler’s own words in 1936. “Sporting chivalrous contest,” Hitler proclaimed before the torch’s inaugural lighting, “helps knit the bonds of peace between nations. Therefore, may the Olympic flame never expire.”

As Chris Bowlby wrote for BBC News, “…it was planned with immense care by the Nazi leadership to project the image of the Third Reich as a modern, economically dynamic state with growing international influence.”

China today, with the IOC’s backing, wanted the torch to travel through the nations of Western Europe and the United States, as well as Tibet, as a way to spread the gospel of China’s global reach. In 1936, Diem also planned the route with political considerations in mind. The torch was carried exclusively through European areas where the Third Reich wanted to extend its reach.

When the flame made its way through Vienna, it was accompanied by mammoth pro-Nazi demonstrations. Two years later, Austria would be annexed.

Today, without question, there are people with dubious motives calling for a boycott of the Summer Games. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has hedged on attending even though Britain’s Olympic Committee has already laid down the law that its athletes are forbidden from any political acts on Chinese soil. The reptilian Sen. Hillary Clinton has said President Bush should boycott, even though she and her husband in the 1990s fought to make China a part of the World Trade Organization, and repeatedly granted China Most Favored Nation trade status. Barack Obama just joined Clinton in the “me too” chorus to see who can blame China for the ecoomic maladies facing the U.S. Republican Rep. Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan lamented in a commentary that President Bush and the Republican Party is “coddl[ing] Communist China.”

None of these critics existed before people started protesting. And none of them will refrain from doing business with China in the future.

Protesters have held a light to the present hypocrisy of the Olympic torch. In expressing concern about the San Francisco protests, USOC President Peter Ueberroth said, “The only concern is our reputation as a country.” Perhaps, as this debacle runs its course, Ueberroth should be more concerned with the reputation of the International Olympic Committee and the quadrennial orgy of sporting nationalism and corporate greed.

The DOJ’s entire case hinges on the ridiculous question of whether Bonds “knowingly” was on the juice, or lied on the witness stand when he said he took such substances “unknowingly.” The actual indictment parses in language what would shame a Clinton. It reads, “During the criminal investigation, evidence was obtained including positive tests for the presence of anabolic steroids and other performance enhancing substances for Bonds and other athletes.”

This is idiocy raised to the level of law. It makes me wonder what they’re teaching at Jesus-land Legal Academy these days. Did Bonds actually test positive for steroids or were pharmaceuticals only found in these mysterious un-indicted “other athletes”? And what is a “performance enhancer”? That’s not even a legal or medical term; it’s sports radio shorthand. The cortisone shot into Curt Schilling’s ankle in the 2005 playoffs was a performance enhancer. The Viagra coursing through Bob Dole’s veins is a performance enhancer. Whatever keeps that smile glued to Laura Bush’s face is a performance enhancer. It’s a colloquial phrase tells us nothing. It only raises the question whether the indictment was written by Mike or the Mad Dog.

Most of the media has focused on the prison release of Bonds’ trainer and childhood friend Greg Anderson. Anderson has spent the last four months in jail for refusing to testify against his friend. The press is atwitter with speculation that Anderson may have finally turned. But his attorney Mark Geragos says that this is absolutely and unequivocally not the case.

It’s far more likely that Anderson was released because now that the indictment has been served there is no legal basis for holding him. The media, however, has their eye on the wrong ball. The timing that’s important here is not Greg Anderson’s release but the ascension your brand spanking new Attorney General, Mike Mukasey, and his desire for a cheap hit.

Mukasey believes that the pillars of these United States are Mom, apple pie, and protracted torture. As the New York Times wrote on November 1st, “Mukasey, a well-respected trial judge in New York … has stunned us during the confirmation process by saying he believes the president has the power to negate laws and by not committing himself to enforcing Congressional subpoenas. He also has suggested that he will not uphold standards of decency during wartime recognized by the civilized world for generations.”

The fact is that Bonds is under attack from a collection of torture-loving, Habeas Corpus shredding, illegal wire tapping, political operatives. The idea that a Barry Bonds indictment becomes the first act of Mike Mukasey’s Justice Department only exposes Sens. Diane Feinstein and Chuck Schumer, and the other Democratic pols who backed his confirmation. They called him “a man of character” as well as “a strong leader, committed to depoliticizing the agency’s operations.” There is no evidence of character and leadership in this indictment; only the tawdry political desire for headlines.

Mukasey and friends may have worked themselves into a lather over the thought of their “Capone” behind bars. But they shouldn’t be picking out his orange jumpsuit just yet. The indictment comes on the heels of the resignation of San Francisco US Attorney Kevin Ryan. Ryan was by all counts a Bush loyalist but he had earned the ire of the DOJ for, among other things, not indicting Bonds. He apparently didn’t relish the thought of prosecuting the local hero in a San Francisco courtroom. Prosecutors will have that same hurdle of convicting Bonds on his home turf with, apparantly no fresh evidence.

Because it appears that the DOJ has nothing new to say, the plan will be to scorch the jury pool by raising the temperature on the story. Already in the wake of the indictment, the White House felt the need to weigh in saying, among other insipid platitudes, “Clearly this is a sad day for baseball.” You would never know that there are wars and occupations going on that might require some attention. This is like FDR delivering a fireside chat on the death of Fatty Arbuckle. It’s also yet another sign that the justice system has more holes than the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

Tomorrow (Friday) I will be demonstrating in front of Mukasey’s Department of Justice along with thousands of my closest friends. We will march because they refuse to indict people for hanging nooses, or see the rape and torture of Megan Williams as a hate crime, or do anything to change the perception that justice means “just-us.” But my vocal chords might be a little more raw than usual at days end. The idea that they have no time for Megan Williams, but invest years in the prosecution of Barry Bonds should make any good person of conscience utterly enraged.

Think about it: Barry Bonds joining Marion Jones in prison. Feel any safer yet?

You may have thought that the Chief was banned last year after the NCAA called Illiniwek a “hostile or abusive” mascot and prevented the school from hosting postseason games as long as it paraded him about. You may have thought Illinois had joined dozens of other schools from Stanford to St. John’s in putting Native American caricatures to bed. You thought wrong.

A victory 20 years in the making was overturned when Illinois chancellor Richard Herman declared that the Homecoming ban violated the U.S. constitution saying, “The University values free speech and free expression and considers Homecoming floats, decorations, costumes and related signage all representations of such personal expression.”

Yes, our forefathers fought and died to protect the right to display caricatures of the conquered at public institutions of higher learning. The word Illiniwek means “tribe of superior men.” In making the decision to allow Chief Illiniwek to return, Herman acted in a manner of the inferior, following instead of leading.

Those whose heart is with the dancing chief were thrilled, calling Homecoming “a victory parade.” The organization Students for Chief Illini issued a statement saying that the original policy was a “slap in the face to people in the community to say you can’t support your symbol.” In an irony that could only be found in the bizarre lexicon of university political correctness, the group uses the world “symbol” instead of “mascot” because the term “mascot” is offensive to Chief Illiniwek.

Keep in mind, that there never was a Chief Illiniwek. No one with that name ever existed. His costume is not in keeping with anything the Illini tribe ever wore and the dance at halftime was created in 1926 by the Boy Scouts. But by all means support such a noble symbol.

The Chief was certainly celebrated at Homecoming. No counter protestors were reported and thousands of attendees wore Chief regalia. Although no Native American organizations support the Chief, he was celebrated lustily.

The same students and alumni that clamor for the Chief as a symbol of Native American nobility, put far more time and energy into a fictional chief than aiding actual Native Americans. Students of Native American descent are a mere 0.2% of the overall student population, and 0.1% of the faculty. “Honoring” Native Americans is confined to a white guy in buckskin pants and feathers (only whites have portrayed the Chief throughout it’s 81-year history).

There was little said about the fact that while Chief Illiniwek never existed, the Illini tribe did. They were torn apart, forcibly removed so schools like Illinois could take root. Chief Ron Froman of the Peoria tribe once said of the Chief, “I don’t think it was to honor us, because, hell, they ran our (butts) out of Illinois.”

Since there is nothing honorable about resurrecting the Chief, is it then an issue of freedom of speech? In a letter to Chancellor Herman, professor Antonia Darder wrote, “If a float maker wants to use KKK imagery or a noose hanging from a tree on a homecoming float, is this now also acceptable under the auspices of ‘free expression?’ Or if a float maker wants to use images of people copulating or nude participants on a float, would this also be accepted as the freedom of personal expression? And if not, why not? Certainly if public nudity is considered immoral or at least inappropriate, why not public racism?”

This is the climate in which Herman resurrects the Chief. The latest in this marathon battle of memory, history, and the role of sports in this process comes two weeks after the death of Native American activist and longtime leader of the American Indian Movement, Vernon Bellecourt.

Bellecourt spent years as a thorn in the side of organizations like the Washington Redskins and Cleveland Indians, demanding that they change their mascots. He once said, “Our detractors always say, ‘We are honoring you.’ It’s not an honor. In whose honor, we have to ask. Beginning with the pilgrims at Plymouth Rock, about 16 million of us were wiped out, including whole villages in Washington.”

To other teams with Indian nicknames and to their fans, he said, “No more chicken feathers … No more paint on faces. The chop stops here.”

Maybe the University of Illinois should step up and honor Bellecourt by putting Chief Illiniwek to rest — for good..

The UWA, a human rights group founded by homeless day laborers in Baltimore, represents 800 low-wage workers who make up the pool of the 100-120 people who keep Camden Yards clean. Stadium workers — the people who clean out the bathroom stalls, sweep up the small mountains of cigarette butts and make the Camden Yards experience as pristine as promised — make poverty wages, just $7 an hour.

Work schedules for stadium workers can vary as well. Some workweeks can be well over forty hours; in other weeks, if the Orioles are on the road, the laborers don’t work at all. Take-home pay varies accordingly, depending on the number of home games in a week and how long the games last. The windfall earned from a game that goes into extra innings can make a real difference in the way a family eats in a given week.

Because they are doing “day labor,” members of the UWA who show up to work are sent home if they’re not needed. The wages are so low, and the job so “flexible,” that some workers live in homeless shelters. One worker was kicked out of public housing because her pay that month couldn’t match the monthly rent.

For three years, stadium workers have been demanding to be paid Baltimore’s official living wage of $9.62 an hour. They soon could even make a claim to more: On October 1 the state’s newly passed living wage law will require state government contractors to pay their employees $11.30 an hour. Both of the city’s stadiums — Camden Yards and M&T Bank Stadium, where the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens play — were paid for on the public dime.

In this solidly blue state, paying stadium workers a living wage should be common sense, but it is not. The MSA contends that stadium workers are not eligible because they are temporary workers. And what makes them temporary? That they don’t have to work “away” games.

The response by UWA members has been to raise public awareness and ask that most basic question to the city of Baltimore: Is this just? They’re conducting panel discussions, protests and concerts, and have even threatened a hunger strike. Along the way they have garnered the support of heavyweights like Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley and Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon. It’s the kind of grassroots labor organizing that doesn’t make the nightly news shows. But now the UWA and the stadium workers appear close to reaching a settlement.

On Labor Day, the UWA called off the planned hunger strike after hearing that a meeting of the MSA on Thursday could end with very positive results. Frederick Puddester, chairman of the MSA, even remarked to the Baltimore Sun, “[Living wage is] the policy of the state. Can the Stadium Authority argue that they’re exempt on a technicality? Yes, they could. But I don’t plan to take that approach.”

As Carl Johnson, a former stadium cleaner and striker, told me: “On Friday the governor and the MSA chairman came out publicly in favor of living wages. We considered their public comments to be an indication of a good-faith effort at figuring out how to end poverty wages at Camden Yards. We’re postponing the start date [of the hunger strike] to give the MSA some breathing room so that they can turn words into actions…. After three years of organizing and fighting for a living wage, we want to make sure that a living wage is actually won in the end. We’d prefer to call off the hunger strike altogether once a binding living-wage solution is in place, and we’re hopeful that the breathing room will help get the MSA to the needed solution.”

The progress made on a living wage for day laborers in a hard-edged, damaged metropolis, which locals lovingly call Charm City, could open a new chapter in grassroots labor organizing not seen since the early days of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Poor People’s Campaigns, a model that puts the poor in charge of movements to fight poverty. “The United Workers Association was founded to try and start a ‘human rights’ model of organizing led by low-wage workers themselves,” Greg Rosenthal, a UWA organizer, told me. “It’s all about leadership development from the ranks of the poor, a movement to end poverty led by the poor.”

Three of the six paid organizers for the UWA come from the ranks of workers. Of the 800 that the UWA represents, according to Rosenthal, as many as 100 are active worker/organizers. Whenever there is a reporter who needs to be talked to, a home visit that needs to be made, a speech that needs to be given, the workers themselves are front and center. Also of note is that the UWA is largely composed of African-American and Latino workers. In an era when communities of color are often pitched against one another, their solidarity inspires hope.

It’s interesting that the UWA will win or lose without a lick of help from Orioles owner Peter Angelos. The UWA claims that in 2004 Angelos promised to make up the difference in a living wage out of his own deep pockets. It’s a promise he has failed to keep. Angelos loves to tout his credentials as a union-supporting, lifelong Democrat. He made his fortune as an attorney representing trade unions in class-action suits against the ill effects of asbestos. He further burnished his credentials as the “worker boss” when he was the only owner to publicly support the players’ union in the 1994 strike.

But since 2004 he’s done little for the people scraping the crud off his stadium. The Baltimore Orioles, once one of baseball’s proudest franchises, has withered under his watch. What makes Marylanders smile about Angelos these days is the rumor that he is considering selling the team to a group led by Orioles icon Cal Ripken Jr. A victory for the UWA would be a victory for all Baltimore workers — and a nice slap back at Angelos, who apparently won’t unload the team soon enough for either the workers of the UWA or the residents of Charm City.

Info for Concert

CONCERT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Living Wages at Camden Yards!
Free show, 16 Performers!

Saturday, September 8th
2:00 PM – 8:00 PM
FREE & OUTDOORS!

@ AFSCME
(1410 Bush St., behind the AFSCME offices, just 10 blocks from CamdenYards)

17 performers featuring…
-ETAN THOMAS (Washington Wizards center, author and political poet)
-LAS KRUDAS (feminism, justice & immigrant rights to an afro-cuban beat,
tx)
-PONYTAIL (experimental punk from bmore)
-SHODEKEH (bmore’s human beat-box)
-SEAN TOURE (bmore political hiphop)
-NUEVA COSECHA (11-piece revolutionary folk songs from el salvador)
-SON OF NUN (socialist hiphop/bmore)
-RYAN HARVEY (riot-folk from bmore)
-SMOKE EYES & QUEEN LUNATIC (bmore brother and sister soul/hiphop duo)
-WAX & WANE (experimental folk from bmore)
-EXTRANJERO (dc youth hiphop/reggaeton)
-HEAD-ROC (the mayor of dc hiphop)
-WAHHT (3-piece lgbtqq hiphop, soul, poetry from bmore)
-CHOPTEETH (14-piece afro-beat/rumba from dc)
-Plus break dancers, speakers, tablers and more.

The workers who clean Camden Yards have demanded for 3 years to be paid a living wage. All we have received are broken promises. We are fed up. We have planned a hunger strike originally scheduled to start on Monday September 3rd. Because of recent developments, we have decided to postpone the hunger strike to begin during the concert.

Though we will not celebrate until a living wage is in the pockets of the cleaners, we are hopeful that a meeting of MSA directors this week will produce the results we want: A living wage for all cleaners at Baltimore’s stadiums.

WE WILL EITHER CELEBRATE OR ESCALATE!

www.unitedworkers.org | Call 410-522-1053 to volunteer
Low-wage workers leading the way to poverty’s end.

For folks who haven’t heard, Kenneth Foster’s death sentence was struck down yesterday by Texas Gov. Rick Perry after a 6-1 recommendation by the Perry appointed Board of Parolees. This is just a tremendous victory for those of us around the world who fought to make sure yesterday wasn’t the day Kenneth was put to death. We must take the time to remember Michael LaHood who lost his life 10 years ago at the hands of Mauricio Brown who was driving in Kenneth’s car. But we also remember the words of Sean Paul Kelly, Michael’s closest friend who opposed Kenneth’s execution. Kelly told the press:

…the execution of a young man who didn’t even kill Mike? That’s not justice. It’s senseless vengeance, a barbarism cloaked in the black robes of justice.

When victories like this occur, every link in the chain matters. Without question, the strongest links in this chain was Kenneth and his family. Kenneth said from the outset, “It’s my belief that if this does not become a political issue then I have no chance.”

That was the plan of action laid out for the DRIVE movement on death row, the Campaign to End the Death Penalty and other organizations that worked on his case. We made it political, asking the question over and over why Kenneth should be put to death for driving a car?

It was also the inspiration for a group of athletes and even a couple of sports writers, to stand together and demand that this man not be put to death. I want to take a moment and thank Etan Thomas, Dr. John Carlos, Lee Evans, Toni Smith, Dave Meggyesy, Jeff “Snowman” Monson, Dennis Brutus, William Gerena–Rochet, Neil DeMause, Doug Harris, Lester Rodney, Rus Bradburd and the INIMITABLE Scoop Jackson.

Below is a letter I received from Kenneth a couple weeks back with some of his thoughts on sports and society. I thought when I would eventually publish it, it would be a kind of eulogy. Instead it is a celebration of the struggle so desperately needed to see any kind of progress. It’s also a testament to his spirit. So good people, meet Mr. Kenneth Foster.

In struggle and sports,
Dave Zirin

———————

Dear Dave,

Let me say that I grew up like most youths playing sports. I started off playing pee-wee football and went all the way up to high school giving it 6 years. I went to high school and hung out with guys that are now NFL football players (Priest Holmes, ND Kalu and have a cousin that was in the NFL as well- Tony Brackens). I indulged in basketball and track and field as well. But for me sports never took hold of me the way it did other youths. I had a pretty active mind, so from year to year I wanted to be/do something new. My last year in sports was my Freshman year in high school (around 1992). By then the streets encompassed my mind.

So, coming into prison I entered with a little bit of love for sports. But, I had a different personal legend to unfold, so I slowly began to drift from that interest. As I began to become politically and culturally conscious the more recidivistic aspects of prison began to heavily reflect off of me. A strong contrast comes to light when a man steps outside of the prison molds.

Facing an injustice the only thing that I began to get obsessive about was how to get heard and be free, and as the saying goes- you cant serve 2 gods. Sports, as you know, becomes a way of life. You monitor it, you almost come to breathe it. It’s not just about watching a game, but knowing the stats, knowing the colleges they came from, knowing their proneness to injuries, etc.. All of this becomes relevant due to the fact that 9 times out of 10 there’s money on these games.

Sports becomes a way of life in prison, because it becomes a way of survival. For men that don’t have family or friends to help them financially this becomes an income, and at the same time it becomes a way to occupy your time. That’s another sad story in itself, but it’s the root to many men’s obsession with sports.

I also began to observe the way sports is used as a crutch for a sense of pseudo-pride. In prison, due to being stripped of your humanity, man cling to anything they can to give them a sense of identity. The spectrum varied intensely- it could be keeping a pet snake in your cell, it could be wearing an earring you’re not supposed to, keeping your hair trimmed a certain way when you’re not supposed to, and then there’s the more intense levels of rolling with the gangs or becoming interested in religion, politics, etc.. More times than not sports becomes a crutch.

Seeing this, sports became something that I avoided. It was just another weapon in the arsenal of ignorance and mental oppression. It was another part of the term we call- penitentiary ‘poli-tricks’. These are tricky games, rules and concepts whose function only dilute and separate prisoner
power. Therefore, I began a self-induced process to undergo sports amnesia. I didn’t watch it, I didn’t even listen to it, I didn’t gamble on it and didn’t entertain conversation about it. I even extended that to the city I was from. Not wanting to be belligerent in conversation if a person asked me where I was from I would tell them. I didn’t mind the casual conversation. But, I made sure to keep the lines drawn.

There’s a comfort zone that rises and while interacting with each other and joking ones, while playing the dozens on each other, will way things like- ‘Aww, that fool must be from Dallas talking like that. You know how them fools from Dallas is’, or ‘that sounds like a Knick’s fan over there, you know them dudes is throwed off anyway’. The cities and teams become protracting devices often-times for subliminal feelings and thoughts. This really becomes so when someone has lost a gambling bet and what often comes out as- ‘Man, them damn Spurs ain’t shit. To hell with them Spurs’- usually translates to ‘Man, fuck you’. And this has been the cause of numerous
prison riots across the kountry.

This is why when I’m approached with the city pride thing I let an individual know straight from the outset- I don’t represent cities, I represent ideologies. I don’t care about any city or State in this kountry, because the only thing they’ve done is railroad me and ain’t none of these teams donating to my Defense Fund, so they don’t exist in my world- That’s a truth that cant be rebuttled. But for many, who are hopeless and still lost in their lower-selves, sports is a mighty ruler in their lives.

In 2000 Texas death row was moved to a new unit due to a death row prison escape in 1998. As a result Texas officials stripped us of everything we had- work program, group rec, arts and crafts and TVs. That has lasted up until today and those continued conditions were the spark for the creation
of DRIVE (drivemovement.org) which was a protest coalition I helped create. But, having no TVs doesn’t stop the sports lovers. They go into their radios and find ways to wire it up and catch TV stations by radio, so the love of the game continues.

For a prisoner who has become politicalized I have a very hardline mentality- so things like sports, gambling, drinking, fooling with guards (in friendly manners) don’t exist for me. Because this goes against the grain of the norm, I become a target not only for guards, but for inmates as well. From years of repression and humiliation (just like slavery) there
is an enjoyed monotony.

I wanted to say that my favorite part of the book was the interview with Mumia. Mumia just has this way of taking the most complex of issues and making it seem so simple and understandable. I was even drawing my own parallels throughout your book- for example I saw the censoring of the 2 Live Crew in what David Stern is doing to his NBA Players. And if we wanted to stretch it, what Stern is doing is on the edges of old Apartheid/Jim Crow laws where you can’t do this, you can’t do that, you can’t go here or there. Everyday in this kountry we see things that we thought was Rights being rolled back.

Even my case is an example of where they’re trying to execute me, because they say I should anticipate something and now they’ve passed laws to make repeat sex offenders eligible for the death penalty. Pretty soon we’ll be back to the old Emmitt Till days where you get murdered for looking at the wrong person (system wise).

And so, all of this ties into a deeper issue. For those of us in these movements we have strong allies in the athletic field. You did a great job highlighting Roberto Clemente and Etan Thomas. I have even tried to reach out to Etan. I think for those of us in the movement we have to start making demands from athletes (and rappers too). Athletes have the money and platforms. I’m sure that many fear going through what Carlos Delgado went through, but in this day and age stances must be made. It’s never easy to make them, but we, as a people, must stop feeling uncomfortable to stand on what we know is right. We must not feel uncomfortable to ask for things back from persons that benefit from us so much. We have to find more Etans and create coalitions. They must become serious and passionate like CEDP members. And when one try to silence them, like they did Delgado, we will let their bias and racist be reflected on their own.

Athletes, Artist and Activist: from solidarity to power is the next book you should work on. We have to connect the Glovers, Etans, dead prezs and Fred Hampton Jrs; also the Delgados, Welfare Poets, and other Latin movements. And then we have to take that internationally building with ones like Chavez and other countries open for progressive change. We have to put challenges up like Dennis Brutus did with SANROC.

Speaking of such, though I don’t know where it was initiated from, I have a great feeling that you probably had your hands in it, and that was the Jocks for Justice petition done on my behalf. That touched me greatly and whomever is responsible I’d like to thank them from the bottom of my heart.

I’ve read Dennis Brutus work and I was always enchanted by the photo of Tommie Smith and John Carlos. It’s time to bring this new generation out.

You wield power, because you have vision and like Baldwin said- ‘Where there is no vision the people perish’. I only wanted to share a piece of my journey with you and want to continue to be a pebble in the pond. Though I wanted to save your book as a collectors item since you signed it, I’m going to try to circulate it around here and see what I can spark in these dry prairies.

Brother, I wish you much success in all that you do and will pray that your work opens more eyes and empowers even more minds. It’s been a great blessing for me to have met you, even in this limited fashion.

Revolutionary Love to you!

In Spirit/Strength/&Struggle

Haramia Ki Nassar
(Kenneth Foster Jr.)

The egg-shaped man in Milwaukee’s Miller Park, who looked like he would be sitting behind a desk by morning, continued the arrhythmic chant as those around him chimed in. They were all pleading to see a 95-mph fastball hit a man in the temple, and felt that their demand was righteous. The player they wanted to see put down was, of course, San Francisco baseball star Barry Bonds, and it is hard to say what was more shocking: the call for his beheading or the near-collective rapture at the thought. One guy yelled, “Hit his knee! End his career! Please! I will name my kid after you!”

This may have happened in Milwaukee, but it’s not the story of one city and one set of fans. It’s a continual happenstance in almost every baseball stadium not named AT&T Park. As Bonds marches undeterred toward that 756th homer, and title of home run king, the volume on the vitriol is being raised to disturbing heights.

Much of the ‘white noise’ that follows Bonds from park to park has the feel of something uglier than the typical, something akin to racism.

Some say they can’t stand Bonds because, even in the absence of a positive drug test, they are beyond certain that he has used steroids. Others say it is his “surly attitude,” or “bad sportsmanship.” Of course, legions of athletes have been suspected of using performance enhancers. And if you want to find a “surly athlete,” well, just visit your nearest locker room.

But Bonds has become a peculiar kind of lightning rod, the weight of an entire statistically dubious era resting on his shoulders. And much of the reaction, much of the “white noise” that follows him from park to park has the feel of something uglier than the typical, something akin to racism.

There is an almost stubborn insistence that this is utter nonsense – as if our dual national obsessions (racism and sports) somehow live in isolation from one another. The anti-Bonds furies speak with the self-righteousness of a bizarre social movement, and claim to be unsullied by the lowbrow emotions of bigotry.

But my argument is not that everyone who is against Bonds is a racist or anyone who believes in harsh penalties for steroid use is a racist. A person can hate Bonds, and spend weekends performing in a James Brown cover band, with all proceeds going to the United Negro College Fund. But those who wish harm on the man, who cheer at the thought of a grisly, career-ending injury, should ask themselves what is driving the seething rage that accompanies far too many of the boos.

Those who wish harm on the man should ask themselves what is driving the seething rage.

I was on a talk show recently where I raised the issue that racism remains a factor in the Bonds brouhaha. The response took me off guard. I was asked whether I had ever measured the man’s head. Please ponder the question for a moment. I was asked whether I had physically taken a tape measure and wrapped it around Barry Bonds’ head. When I assured the host that I was neither Bonds’ personal haberdasher nor someone who approached athletes with tape measures, he grew belligerent.

“His head! His head! Why won’t you talk about measuring his head? It’s the proof he’s used steroids! The size of his head is the smoking gun!”

It was hard to tell whether this was sports radio or an insane asylum. Admittedly the difference is often slender, but the quickest way to send a member of the Get Barry Brigade over the edge is to raise the specter of bigotry.

There is a useful historical comparison to Bonds in Jack Johnson, the first African American heavyweight boxing champion. Like Bonds, Johnson was a dominator of his chosen profession, a person whose skills threatened to master and even overwhelm the sport. Like Bonds, Johnson was not a political person but became a figure of enormous political symbolism.

Like Bonds, heavyweight champion Jack Johnson faced a divide in perceptions, where much of white America wanted him vanquished and much of black America wanted him to get his due.

Like Bonds, Johnson never tired of telling those who doubted him that there was a certain part of his anatomy they could smooch. Like Bonds, Johnson faced a divide in perceptions, where much of white America wanted him vanquished and much of black America wanted him to get his due.

Consider an ESPN/ABC News poll released in May. Black fans are more than twice as likely as their white counterparts to want Bonds to break Hank Aaron’s record of 755 homers (74 percent versus 28 percent) and nearly twice as likely to think that the slugger has been treated unfairly (46 percent versus 25 percent). And the press — still stubbornly white — holds Bonds, like Johnson, to a standard far different than his non-black contemporaries.

The towering African American intellectual W.E.B. DuBois attempted to analyze exactly why Johnson was the repository for so many rivers of revulsion. His words hold an almost humbling contemporary echo:

“Why then this thrill of national disgust? Because Johnson is Black. Of course some pretend to object to Mr. Johnson’s character. But we have yet to hear, in the case of white America, that marital troubles have disqualified prize fighters or ballplayers or even statesmen. It comes down, then, after all, to this unforgivable blackness.”

The question we need to pose is why so much anger, so much visceral, throbbing fury is directed at Barry Bonds, and why do we in the bleachers or at the bar so casually accept it? If we ask the question, we will begin to get at some less than comfortable answers.

* This article originally appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle.