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Two Boston DemonstrationsJanuary 11, 2007 Featuring Veteran and Historian Howard Zinn, Guantanamo Attorney Jeffrey Gleason, Amnesty International's Josh Rubenstein and other patriotic Americans who won't sit still as our nation is attacked from within...by our Government. |
January 11 in Washington D.C. |
Stop The Troop Surge
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Shut Down Guantanamo
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Copley speakers are Introduced by Amy Hendrickson of Brookline Peace Works
492 Cafe's famous SoniKart, a self-powered mobile sound system, amplified and recorded the voices of Historian Howard Zinn, Amnesty International's Joshua Rubenstein, Guantanamo Victim Attorney Jeffrey Gleason, and lots of other folks. The recordings posted below begin at Park Street Station at around 4:30.
The demo was called by The Stop The Wars Coalition, United for Justice with Peace, Move on and other organizations in response to the Idiot Emperor's escalation. The goal has become one of lobbying Democrats to defund the escalation, and to force an order for withdrawal.
My work now includes keeping tabs on the often misguided and pooly trained MBTA Police. who have capitalized on post 9/11 politics. |
MBTA Police kept the transit access clear. Former MBTA Police Chief Tom O'Loughlin explained to me in an interview in 2000, that this is the point of their presence. However, one day, a few short years ago, Officer Brian Harer took it upon himself to forbid my photography of a demonstration. He abused his authority, committing several crimes. It's still in the courts. Read about it here ...and here. |
Marc Lipman sang his "Dear Mister President." |
This fellow has appeared at another rally on Boston Common for which 492 Cafe provided sound amplification and recording services. "Drive out The Bush Regime" The SoniKart was in police hands at the time, so we used the massive 24 channel console and recorded it in multichannel, with ProTools. Even the audience was recorded, in stereo. |
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The SoniKart microphone was offered to anyone who wished to speak. Earlier, before 492 Cafe arrived, an activist, spoke on Palestine, and his access to the sound system was challenged. The SoniKart allows for multipe microphones, facilitating debate of contentious issues appropriate for a people's movement. Domination and Censorship are the methods of our idealogical opponenets, and are to be avoided. Our technology must be ready to serve our ideals, not vice-versa. |
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Protest signs are likely to be made of recyclable materials and to bear a union printing shop's logo. Funny thing that police are unionized, yet tend to work for the ruling elite. In my experience, the most disturbing effect of police unions is to reduce accountability. Iinternal investigations, whatever they might be worth in the first place, are rendered useless in the face of union solidarity. As one who generally supports unions, I am skeptical that they are appropriate for police forces, particularly as they become more para-military in their nature. It is a crime to attempt to unionize within the US military. |
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The Stop The Wars Coalition table offered materials including flyers for upcoming demonstrations and Peacework Magazine, to which 492 Cafe's Freeman Z has contributed photographs (From demonstrations in Quebec City and Boston) as well as quotes. |
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The Militant is published by the Socialist Workers Party. Many Socialists and Communists see Capitalism as the root problem of American social ills manifested through greed and imperialism. The main point of leftist politics is the concept of class struggle. The idea is that the ruling class uses all means at their disposal, including racism sexism, and other tactics, to divide the lower classes and set them against each other. "Lefty" organizations, include (ISO) the International Socialist Organization, (WWP) the Workers World Party, (CPUSA) the Communist Party USA, (RCP) the Revolutionary Communist Party, Socialist Alternative, the (SWP) Socialist Workers Party, and even some Spartacists. Leftists seek to consolidate the struggles of the underclass and redirect their force against the ruling class. However, the Left, is largely divided into sectarian elements that have great difficulty working toward a common vision. |
Harvard Square legends George and Owen These folks are often seen in Harvard square working for the RCP. The RCP's Chairman, Bob Avakian agrees with Vice President Cheney that we are in an existential battle, but that's where the agreement ends. Avakian contends that the Bush Administration is literally destroying the planet. |
(continued) Both men advocate violence. (Or, more accurately, Avakian predicts it.) While Bush and his puppet-masters are dismantling representational Democracy and granting themselves powers forbidden to Government by the US Constitution, commiting war crimes and mass murder, Avakian envisions an enormous revolution that ends the ravages of American Capitalism which he believes threaten our planet and everyone on it. |
Call to Action- Around 500 people from 35 countries continue to be held without charge or trial as of January 2006, four years after the Bush administration began locking up detainees at Guantanamo Bay. |
The ProtestProtestors marched from the earlier event on Boston Common to Copley Square. The SoniKart was quickly prepared for service. The 20" diameter horn provided a rich, mellow sound, and two smaller speakers filled out the remainder of the protest area. Sofia Jarrin-Thomas of WMFO Radio at Tufts University, also recorded the event. We heard from Attorney Jeffrey Gleason of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who spoke on his experiences defending so-called Enemy Combatants, a term he describes as "legally fictitious." |
"I'm a litigator here in Boston and I have been working on representing six men detained in Guantanamo Bay Cuba since January 20, 2002." "I had the opportunity to go down to the base. I met with these guys. I looked into their eyes. I have spoken with them and have spoken extensively with their families" "Guantanamo represents the use of torture in dealing with detainees. It represents the unchecked usurpation of power by the executive. It represents great injustice and it needs to close..." -Attorney Jeff Gleason |
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Josh Rubenstein of Amnesty International |
"Torture is illegal, it's illegal under U.S. law, it's illegal under international law. And whoever uses torture, whoever supervises the use of torture, whoever orders the use of torture is breaking the law. And we are a country of laws and no one is above the law. And when the Bush administration decided that the prohibition against torture should be diluted, in Afghanistan, in Abu Ghraib, in Guantanamo, they were breaking the law..." "Guantanamo needs to be closed and the individuals there need to be charged or released. That's what we expect for every other individual in this country and we should expect no less for prisoners our government is holding today in Guantanamo..." -Josh Rubenstein |
(Photographer unknown)
Three hundred hooded people in orange suits marched through the streets of Washington D.C. and into the Supreme Court. At least 90 people were arrested at the Federal Court and submitted the names of Guantanamo detainees to the police instead of their own, as a symbolic and strategic move to pressure the government to re-adopt habeas corpus for Guantanamo detainees and all prisoners in the U.S. "war on terror."
In Cuba, a 15-person delegation including former prisoners and family members of Guantanamo detainees, got as close as they were able to the detention camp and demanded it be immediately shut down, asking for fair trials, the overturn the Military Commissions Act, and for government officials to restore habeas corpus. (Sofia Jarrin-Thomas for Indymedia. Read the article Here)
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Thanks to Sofia Jarrin-Thomas for transcribing the quotes provided above. Sofia also wrote the linked Indymedia article and recorded the Copley event. that recording is available as a link from the Indymedia article. |
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