>streets in the capital are narrower and therefore easier to
>block.
>
>During discussion about the resolution, one audience
>member argued against adding wording that notes the
>additional impact of globalization on "colonized and
>oppressed peoples," saying this was "communist" language.
>
>In the debate that followed, Moorehead argued that in
>order to broaden this movement to include more Black,
>Latino, Asian and Native people, its demands must
>demonstrate recognition of national oppression and extend
>solidarity to the most oppressed.
>
>An overwhelming majority voted to add the wording to the
>resolution.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <008c01bf8577$e91b8300$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Foes of sanctions on Iraq take arrests at airbase
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:21:04 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>PILOTS GET "BRIEFED":
>FOES OF SANCTIONS ON IRAQ TAKE ARRESTS AT AIRBASE
>
>By Tom Scahill
>Buffalo, N.Y.
>
>Monica Moorehead, the 2000 presidential candidate for
>Workers World Party, talked to a Feb. 26 Workers World
>public forum here about the need to organize against the
>prison-industrial complex and the racist use of the death
>penalty.
>
>Moorehead noted that by the end of the year 2000, an
>estimated 2.07 million people will be in jail in the United
>States. She detailed who makes up that huge population.
>Sixty percent of federal prisoners are in jail for drug
>use, she said. And 84 percent of women in federal prisons
>are mothers. More and more youth, mentally disabled people,
>women and those from nationally oppressed communities are
>going to jail.
>
>Moorehead explained that the labor of this prisoner
>population is super-exploited.
>
>The prison-industrial complex is the second-largest
>employer in the U.S. Prison labor is a $41-billion
>industry, producing goods and services for such companies
>as Victoria's Secret, Microsoft and Best Western. The
>Federal Prison Corp. pays inmates 23 cents to $1.15 per
>hour.
>
>She said that as the movement grows against corporate
>globalization, the demand to stop slave labor in U.S.
>prisons must be heard loud and clear.
>
>Racism is the tool used by the capitalists that enables
>them to imprison people from the nationally oppressed
>communities, to super-exploit their labor and to put them
>to death.
>
>Moorehead talked about the struggle to end the death
>penalty. She said that the state of Texas alone sometimes
>executes three to four people a week.
>
>The death penalty is a terror tactic to suppress and
>terrorize nationally oppressed communities. And it is in
>the interests of poor and working people everywhere to
>fight the racist death penalty and to eventually tear down
>the prison walls.
>
>Moorehead stressed the urgency of building the struggle to
>free death-row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal.
>
>Abu-Jamal is a revolutionary whose solidarity with the
>fight of all those battling injustice and inequality has
>won him support from diverse sectors of the progressive
>movement.
>
>Moorehead concluded that the struggle to stop the
>execution of Abu-Jamal and win him a new trial is one of
>the most important battles facing the movement today.
>
>The efforts to save Abu-Jamal's life also advance the
>movement on behalf of all prisoners because Abu-Jamal is a
>leader who has spoken out and explained how the prison-
>industrial complex works in the interests of capitalism.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <009201bf8577$fd6a0750$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Socialist hits prisons for profit
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:21:38 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>MOOREHEAD/LA RIVA CAMPAIGN:
>SOCIALIST HITS PRISONS FOR PROFIT
>
>By Tom Scahill
>Buffalo, N.Y.
>
>Monica Moorehead, the 2000 presidential candidate for
>Workers World Party, talked to a Feb. 26 Workers World
>public forum here about the need to organize against the
>prison-industrial complex and the racist use of the death
>penalty.
>
>Moorehead noted that by the end of the year 2000, an
>estimated 2.07 million people will be in jail in the United
>States. She detailed who makes up that huge population.
>Sixty percent of federal prisoners are in jail for drug
>use, she said. And 84 percent of women in federal prisons
>are mothers. More and more youth, mentally disabled people,
>women and those from nationally oppressed communities are
>going to jail.
>
>Moorehead explained that the labor of this prisoner
>population is super-exploited.
>
>The prison-industrial complex is the second-largest
>employer in the U.S., after General Motors. Prison labor
>is a $41-billion industry, producing goods and services for
>such companies as Victoria's Secret, Microsoft and Best
>Western. The Federal Prison Corp. pays inmates 23 cents to
>$1.15 per hour.
>
>She said that as the movement grows against corporate
>globalization, the demand to stop slave labor in U.S.
>prisons must be heard loud and clear.
>
>Racism is the tool used by the capitalists that enables
>them to imprison people from the nationally oppressed
>communities, to super-exploit their labor and to put them
>to death.
>
>Moorehead talked about the struggle to end the death
>penalty. She said that the state of Texas alone sometimes
>executes three to four people a week.
>
>The death penalty is a terror tactic to suppress and
>terrorize nationally oppressed communities. And it is in
>the interests of poor and working people everywhere to
>fight the racist death penalty and to eventually tear down
>the prison walls.
>
>Moorehead stressed the urgency of building the struggle to
>free death-row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal.
>
>Abu-Jamal is a revolutionary whose solidarity with the
>fight of all those battling injustice and inequality has
>won him support from diverse sectors of the progressive
>movement.
>
>Moorehead concluded that the struggle to stop the
>execution of Abu-Jamal and win him a new trial is one of
>the most important battles facing the movement today.
>
>The efforts to save Abu-Jamal's life also advance the
>movement on behalf of all prisoners because Abu-Jamal is a
>leader who has spoken out and explained how the prison-
>industrial complex works in the interests of capitalism.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <009801bf8578$17ca8020$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Texas death row prisoners escalate struggle
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:22:23 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>TEXAS DEATH ROW:
>REVOLUTIONARY PRISONERS ESCALATE STRUGGLE
>
>By Gloria Rubac
>Houston
>
>Two Texas death-row activists dramatically raised the
>level of struggle in their fight for humane living
>conditions and a moratorium on executions by taking a
>prison guard hostage on Feb. 21. Ponchai Kamau Wilkerson
>and Howard Guidry took this step to insure that the prison
>system and Texas Gov. George W. Bush heard their demands.
>
>Ten hours later, three Houston activists went to the
>prison to represent the two brothers and all 460 men and
>women on death row in negotiations with Texas prison
>officials. Njeri Shakur of the Texas Death Penalty
>Abolition Movement, Deloyd Parker, executive director of
>SHAPE Center, and Kofi Taharka, chair of the National Black
>United Front, Houston Chapter, were asked by Guidry and
>Wilkerson to represent them.
>
>"It was heroic what they did going in there," said members
>of the Abolition Movement. The activists were surrounded by
>prison guards, a special unit of Black Texas Rangers called
>in by Bush, and Texas State Troopers. The halls of the
>prison were filled with cops in riot gear. The situation
>was so tense that several times the three comrades
>threatened to leave the prison if state officials didn't
>negotiate fairly.
>
>After they articulated the prisoners' demands and
>requested to see that the prisoners were okay, Shakur said,
>the guard was released unharmed. Shakur, Parker and Takara
>then met with Wilkerson and Guidry for over an hour.
>
>Both men had participated in a 21-day hunger strike on
>death row in January that highlighted the demand for
>stopping the isolation on death row. The men spend 23 to 24
>hours a day alone in their cells. They eat alone and are
>taken to shower or to recreation alone. They are entombed
>in a six- by-10-foot cell that does not have bars but
>instead a solid steel door.
>
>The absence of human contact leads to depression and
>mental illness.
>
>Other demands made by Wilkerson and Guidry included some
>form of contact during visits with their families and loved
>ones.
>
>Above all, they demanded a moratorium on state killing.
>
>Both Wilkerson and Guidry are young African American men.
>Both men have become politicized during their years on
>death row and, like Malcolm X, have learned why they wound
>up in prison and the nature of this system that affords
>young Black people few opportunities besides the military,
>prisons or minimum-wage survival.
>
>Kamau Wilkerson is scheduled to be executed March 14.
>During the last five years he has been a leader of Panthers
>United for Revolutionary Education. He was instrumental in
>setting up a lending library on one of the wings on death
>row that included hundreds of progressive and revolutionary
>books. He was also part of a PURE Necessities Project that
>collected toothpaste, postage stamps and other items that
>prisoners who are new or have no money in their commissary
>funds can't get. As a writer and poet, he is inspiring many
>of the very young prisoners toward revolutionary theory and
>struggle.
>
>"He has developed relationships with revolutionary
>activists in Houston and around the world, which inspires
>those of us struggling for change out here," said
>Abolitionist Diana Shorthouse.
>
>Since their revolutionary act, Guidry and Wilkerson have
>been kept in extreme isolation. No one has been able to see
>or speak with them. Abolitionists are demanding that they
>be allowed to visit with a doctor, attorney or clergy
>person to guarantee their well-being.
>
>MORATORIUM BUILDS STEAM
>
>The movement for a moratorium is building steam around the
>U.S.
>
>Texas is no exception. As a state that has executed 208
>people since 1982, Texas is the leader in legal lynching.
>Gov. George W. Bush has presided over 121 executions during
>his six years in office--more than any other governor in
>U.S. history.
>
>Last week Bush returned from the California campaign trail
>to okay the execution of Betty Lou Beets, a 62-year-old
>battered woman who killed her husband in self-defense.
>Despite 16,000 letters asking him to spare Beets's life
>versus only 37 calling for her death, Bush denied her a
>stay of execution.
>
>Odell Barnes is scheduled for lethal injection on March 1.
>Barnes is an African American who can't get a court to
>listen to new evidence exonerating him that was recently
>found by investigators. In February, the Houston Press, an
>alternative weekly newspaper with a large circulation, did
>an extensive page-one story outlining recently uncovered
>DNA evidence of Barnes's innocence. Yet the execution is
>going forward.
>
>A newly formed Texas Death Penalty Moratorium Committee
>has been busy reaching out to the community and gathering
>petitions for a moratorium. On March 4, the Houston
>activists will join the Campaign to End the Death Penalty
>and others in Austin, Texas, to surround the governor's
>mansion and demand an immediate halt to executions.
>
>On March 6, Njeri Shakur has been ordered to appear in
>court for possible contempt of court charges stemming from
>an incident in early February when Wilkerson received his
>death date. "This whole contempt issue is ludicrous," said
>Shakur. "We plan to mobilize for this court date and fill
>the courtroom. I do not intend to spend six months in jail
>and pay $500 to any court."
>
>To inquire about the health and safety of Guidry and
>Wilkerson, please phone prison system Executive Director
>Wayne Scott at (409) 295-6371.
>
>Send letters of solidarity to either Ponchai Wilkerson
>#999011 or Howard Guidry #999226 at Terrell Unit, 12002 FM
>350 South, Livingston, TX 77351.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <009e01bf8578$2b2f40b0$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Pelican Bay prison explosion of anger
>Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:22:55 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Mar. 9, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>PELICAN BAY:
>PRISON POLICIES LEAD TO EXPLOSION OF INMATE ANGER
>
>By Saul Kanowitz
>San Francisco
>
>On Feb. 23 guards at Pelican Bay State Prison used deadly
>force against prisoners who were fighting in the B yard
>facility of the prison. According to the prison
>administration, one prisoner was killed, 15 were injured by
>gunshots and 32 injured in the fighting.
>
>Community groups have called for an independent
>investigation into the use of deadly force. At a news
>conference held on the steps of the new State Office
>Building in San Francisco, Richard Becker of the National
>Peoples Campaign charged that the community cannot trust
>the prison system to investigate itself.
>
>Becker recalled the 1971 Attica Rebellion when inmates in
>that New York State prison took it over. During the
>takeover a number of guards were held by prisoners to
>insure their safety and to force the prison administration
>to listen to their demands.
>
>When State Troopers, on the orders of Gov. Nelson
>Rockefeller, stormed Attica and took back control of the
>prison, they killed 43 inmates and guards. To justify the
>violence used to retake the prison, phony stories of guards
>being castrated and killed by prisoners were released to
>the media. After an independent investigation led by
>prisoner advocates and other community organizations, it
>was revealed that all the guards who had died during the
>takeover had been killed by the state.
>
>At the press conference here, former Pelican Bay prisoner
>Dorsey Nunn of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children
>said it was not a coincidence that the day the riot took
>place, two guards from Pelican Bay were being indicted for
>arranging assaults on prisoners by other prisoners. Nunn
>suggested the fights were facilitated by the prison system
>as an effort to deflect attention from these indictments.
>
>Nunn reminded the media of the well-documented gladiator
>fights between prisoners set up by guards at Corcoran state
>prison.
>
>
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