5 posts tagged “human rights”

“As Joseph Lowery, a civil rights icon said, ‘White will embrace what is right.’ I hope so. I am embracing Obama. I don’t fear any longer. I, too, have seen the glory,” Karla Paniagua said in the Jan. 4 news story, “Now a citizen, now proud of America.”

Sometimes one person’s glory is another person’s fear.

During the inauguration ceremony, the reverend got smiles and applause from Obama for a future when “white would embrace the right.”
An economic advisor to the president says he is concerned, as many of you are, that no money from the stimulus package will go to “white male construction workers.”

It is as though the marches of Martin Luther King Jr. never happened. The Underground Railroad was never on track.  Frederick Douglass never lived. The Quakers never existed. Abraham Lincoln never spoke. D-Day was just a child’s story. Our history of sacrifice to end injustice only began with the election of President Obama.

It is acceptable in the politics of today just to give lip service to the liberal concepts of tolerance and natural rights. And then continue the policies and words of the past, that separate us along racial, cultural and economic lines.

One has to wonder if those who risked their fortune, honor and life was all in vain. Especially, from those among us who have no history nor do they remember the past.
Those of the past who embraced what was right are forgotten. Those of the past laid the foundations of the nation that allows Paniagua to enjoy the benefits of which some do not know.

There is “change” but it is not the kind of progressive change I hoped for. I had hoped for progressive change that would rescind all federal laws and programs and policies that reward or punish citizens based on race, culture, language or religion, in the likeness of King, not the Klan or La Raza.

Commentary by Lightfoot  Published inpart-whole Jan. 29 - LA Times/Daily Pilot, Feb 6 - Sacramento Bee,   Feb. 9 Greta Wire Fox News, Post-Fax-eMail White House Feb. 14,  Sacramento Union Feb. 23.

Alfred the Ordinary wrote: Feb 2  Discrimination, positive or negative, is very dangerous territory, IMO. Often it achieves the opposite of that intended. It is probably too early to tell, in the life of Obama's administration, but the signs are worrying.       Auntyfemenist wrote: Apparently, Eliza, it will be true soon since Obama's economic advisor said the government will make sure they don't get a break. Racism only bothers you when it is against your pet class or what?   Silverthorn wrote on Feb 4, 2009 5:24 PM: " Been on a job site lately? You won't find it filled with "white workers". Targeting any group is still racism. But if Obama wants to surround himself with racists, tax cheats, etc, he has that right. I hope the economy/country survives his "redistribution of wealth" and pork laden so called stimulus package. I hope I'm wrong about the direction I see this heading. It's still too early to tell but the signs so far aren't encouraging. It looks like another Jimmy Carter era. And we all know how that turned out. Time will tell. I hope you're right.   JohnP wrote on Feb 4, 2009 4:43 PM: " It seems we are getting the spin of the Obamanoids here. First, James Young has to put Rush Limbaugh's name into the discussion. Apparently that should convince everyone that that should be the end of the discussion. Then, Eliza writes, "Reich said that he didn't want jobs going ONLY to white male workers." I don't know where that qualifier "only" came from. It wasn't in Reich's little speech. Are we to assume that that is what Reich MEANT to say. The Obama spin machine spins on.   Jbillwarmington wrote on Feb 4, 2009 4:02 PM: " Those who have followed Robert Riech, have been subject to a class act: called "how to go down the spiral stairs" in politics. This individual has a goal to be on some news bite every day, even if the subject is of no value. From his first days on the hill, he has been involved in the promotion of himself and his abilities. Sadly for the hungry press, they give him a paragraph here and there. In any particular subject that he participates in, the substance is lacking and mostly non existant.Kinda reminds me of a few city council individuals"   JOANNKENTON wrote on Feb 4, 2009 2:56 PM: " FOR JAMES YOUNG: APPARENTLY YOU DO NOT WATCH MUCH TV OR YOU WOULD HAVE SEEN ROBERT REICH GIVE THIS OPINION. BUT THE PREVIOUS REPLIES HAVE GIVEN THE YOUTUBE. LINK THAT HE CAN SEE. I HAVE BEEN MOST IMPRESSED WITH  LIGHTFOOT'S ARTCLES AND LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING MORE OF THEM. "   Rob Dickson wrote on Feb 4, 2009 7:34 AM: " Mr. Young, you are right - it has begun! President Obama's administration has openly promoted policies that will intentionally discriminate against white Americans. The blatantly racist and highly indicative remark Mr. Lightfoot referred to was made by Obama economic advisor Robert Reich, as seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opxuUj6vFa4 It will be truly fascinating to watch the usual Daily Pilot Obamapologists try to explain this one away. " James Young wrote on Feb. 3:  The commentary published Thursday by  Lightfoot was blatantly prejudiced and alarmist about what Obama is doing. “Change not as progressive as hoped”). It is to be expected that when one’s ideology is challenged, one needs to strike back no matter how ridiculous the argument. Lightfoot was more subtle in that he appeared to champion equality, but his statement “An economic advisor to the president says he is concerned as many of you are, that no money from the stimulus package will go to ‘white male construction workers.’” It is disingenuous for someone to put a statement in quotes without naming the speaker.   Eliza wrote on Jan 30, 2009 10:13 PM: " Silverthorn, I wasn't talking about your comment; I was referring to Lightfoot's melodramatic letter, which deserved exactly as much seriousness as I accorded it. As Upton points out, Lightfoot seems to labor under the misconception that the initiative in question would deny assistance to ANY white male. Obviously that's not the case. That Reich's attempt to ensure that the program is NOT racist has reflexively been labeled 'reverse racist' is no accident; it's a function of long-established and oft-unearned privilege that suddenly doesn't feel so secure anymore. That's not punishment---it's equality. "   Silverthorn wrote on Jan 30, 2009 6:58 PM: " I'm not obliquely implying anything. I'm just tired of reverse racism by closet bigots that think it's ok to make cute racist comments as long as it's toward the politically correct target. Spin it however you want, you made the oh so funny remark. Yes whites have had an advantage for a very long time. And progress is being made to fix that. But trying to punish people for past wrongs based on their race is still wrong. So "snort" all you want. Your comment wasn't cute, it was racist. Equality means everyone, even whites. Rambling enough for you? "   Upton wrote on Jan 30, 2009 6:02 PM: " Reich's advocating for stimulus that has the highest social return and believes the stimulus package is large enough to include high-skilled tech and construction workers (regardless of color) and a boost for those in greatest need. Targeting more people with the stimulus will be better for the country because it will create more consumer spending which is one of the major problems we're experiencing right now. It also may help arrest the debilitating cycle of poverty that minorities and women experience in greater percentages than white males. "   Upton wrote on Jan 30, 2009 5:59 PM: " Reich (the economic advisor) never promoted the idea that no money should go to white male construction workers, which is what I think Lightfoot was trying to state. Reich is concerned that the stimulus will bypass people in greatest need, i.e., the poor and the long-time unemployed. They tend to be minorities and women in greater percentages than white males. Also, he is not advocating hiring low-skilled workers for high-skill jobs, as Stratton seeems to imply. http://mediamatters.org/items/200901230015?f=h_latest " Eliza wote on Jan. 30  " No, Silverthorn, I'm not 'OK with racism' of any stripe. I'm also not OK with rambling, high-toned letters that imply obliquely that straight white men are the REAL victims in today's world. It's an idea that is as ludicrous as it is offensive. "   Silverthorn wrote on Jan 29 " So I guess you're OK with racism as long as it's white people getting discriminated against? All the talk about "it's not about race or color" goes out the window when you target any group. Closet racists make me sick. If that's the change you want you're no better than the people you look down on. I just hope America survives the hypocrites. "   Eliza wrote on Jan 29  " It's true, isn't it? White guys just can't catch a break in this country.

AND TODAY - Jan. 29, 2009......Nothing has changed....
 
  In the early 1900's, most educational leaders, as well as the rank and file of teachers argued that the unionization of teachers was prompted by selfish devotion to self interest.  The affiliation with the A.F. and L. was the prostitution of the well-being of all children. The main assertion was NO WORTHY TEACHER would ever feel justified in going ON STRIKE.
 

 Today we hear; Our new budget is only 193 million over last years budget of 56.6 billion. "We have to be out here (picketing) for the kids." LAUSD teacher the day of the mini-strike. 30,000 teachers stayed-out, on the picket line. That's 30,000 hours times approximately 700, 000 students lost time that will never be regained, never returned.  Again,  "we have to be out here for the kids." Just what kids are they talking about.  

 
 And, the LAUSD and The California Teachers Union wonder why some of us think the public schools are failing and set a bad example for all our kids, grandkids and future generations. Don't be surprised the next time you hear close the public schools for a year and just start over. A good time to start over might be 1904.  I do not think those teachers would pick D-Day to hit the picket line! 
 
Then again,  I wonder if  these students or teachers even know it's D-DAY.
 
  Not to be less corrupt than the LAUSD, the Nevada Teachers Union's threatened to use of the initiative process to increase taxes on casinos by approximately (44%)forty four percent. That's right forty four percent! If passed all the new taxes would only be used for teachers salaries. 

 
  And then, with the help of Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley (D) a secret meeting was held between the Public Teachers Union and the casinos resulting in a bizarre plan that almost as corrupt as the original initiative. Nevada counties are to put the question of tax increases on the November ballot. 

 
Threats, blackmail and secret back room deals of the past have become the present for teachers unions. To use the initiative process to for a personal tax grab, not improve education, is corrupt  to the core. An act  only worthy of self serving selfish greedy individuals, but not public employees...especially teachers!

Not to be outdone by Nevada Teachers. The District Attorney charged Capistrano School Board (CUSD) held closed door meetings in violation of the Brown Act. While, voting the CUSD Super a 58 thousand per year pay raise. I'm sure it was all for the little kids.

Again, just what kids are they talking about?

Brian Gilbert wrote; "The teachers union, tenure and promotion, out of the classroom, who should be fired, represents everything that is wrong with America."

Additional Notes: Sept. 6 -  In all areas of academic ability, half of the children are below average. This fact has implications for education and public policy, and yet it's something most politicians and public intellectuals would rather not talk about. It amounts to educational romanticism. At its heart is a glib presumption that every child can be anything he or she wants to be if only the schools do their job properly. No one really believes it, but we approach education's problems as if we did. We are phobic about saying out loud that children differ in their ability to learn the things schools teach. Not only do we hate to say it, we get angry with people who do. We insist that the emperor is wearing clothes, beautiful clothes, and that those who say otherwise are bad people.”

Dr. Charles Murray

 

Dec. 5 -  Our public education system is a slow-motion car crash, driven the same union special interests that brought the auto companies to the brink of bankruptcy. Townhall

 

 

Jan. 29 2009 - Maldonado-12 grade, concluded by calling on students to actively support the teachers' struggle: "The only way we are truly going to see change is for the students and teachers to come together and organize to build power and demand quality education. We must unite our voices and see that the change we deserve becomes reality: more opportunities for students to go to college, lower classroom sizes and better pay for teachers and a strong student, parent and teacher voice. All power to the teachers!"  Voiced byThousands of Los Angeles Unified School District public teachers in a demonstration in central Los Angeles. WSWS

 

 
ref: LA Times,  ABC News 2008,  School and Society 1918, 1956, Sac. Union, Tahoe Bonanza, World Socialist Web Site, KABC News

 
Photo - Sacramento Union

Letter to Editor by Lightfoot Published in part June 29 -  Sacramento Union,  Jan 31 - OC Register 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

orig. post Sept. 2008

 

NEWS STORY - LA Times - Daily Pilot    Gay-rights activists plan to picket the Mormon temple in Newport Beach on Sunday to protest Mormon support for Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California. Another protest is planned Saturday at South Coast Plaza.

“I think it is a registering of how upset we are about it,” said Sandra Hartness, a member of the board of directors for the Human Rights Campaign, a national group that lobbies for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender rights. Hartness is one of the organizers of the Sunday protest planned at the Newport temple.

“It reinforces that we are not going to go away, and we’re going to continue to seek equal rights,” she said.

Hartness said she and other opponents of Proposition 8 are angered at claims by the Proposition 8 campaign that homosexuality would be taught in public schools if gay marriage were to remain legal.

“It’s not so much the fact that they donated but the manner that the campaign was conducted and the misinformation that was spread,” Hartness said. “To not expect people to be upset when you take away a right from a group of people is probably naive.”

Protesters have swarmed Mormon churches and temples across the state after the passage of Proposition 8 last week. Opponents of the ballot measure claim members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints bankrolled the Proposition 8 campaign. A website created by gay-rights activists tracked campaign finance records during the course of the Proposition 8 campaign and claimed Mormons donated more than $20 million in support of the ballot measure.

Another anti-Proposition 8 protest also is planned for 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Bear Street and South Coast Drive near South Coast Plaza as part of a nationwide day of protest against Proposition 8.

Many Mormons feel they are being singled out from the numerous churches in the state that supported Proposition 8, said Joseph Bentley, Orange County director of public affairs for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Church leaders encouraged Mormons in California to donate to the Proposition 8 campaign on a voluntary basis, he said.

“We’re shocked,” Bentley said. “Everyone I know is really quite surprised, and we find it quite deplorable that these are more than peaceful protests.”

                                                          Michigan Protests

Church members across the state have been subjected to vandalism and threats after the passage of Proposition 8, Bentley said.

“We have gay friends we love and care about and support in every way, but we don’t understand why there has been such a horrific backlash,” Bentley said.

The protest is planned for 10 a.m. Sunday, but the Newport Beach temple, 2300 Bonita Canyon Drive, is usually closed on Sundays, Bentley said.

“We usually try to keep the gates open so people can walk peacefully through the grounds,” Bentley said. “We try to keep it beautiful and inviting, but whether they will be able to do that this weekend, I don’t know.”

Notable Quotes for the Times:  "Conflicts rage between the Shiite and Sunni; between Iranian and Arab; there are clashes among nationalities, sects, tribes and classes, as well as the gathering revolt of traditional Islam against the modernity. Conserving the best of traditional Islam while satisfying the needs of the Twenty-First Century will challenge the wisest reformers." President Richard Nixon - 1979 - from 'The Real War'. 

What makes this quote interesting is the idea that no one in the US government knew of these concerns before the invasion of Iraq. It could not have been said much more precise or to the point. Not unlike the warnings and concerns regarding the current financial failure many of us listen with deaf ears. If we as a people do not get accurate information, then comprehend, interpret and apply we are sure to make the same erros over and over again. Especially if we disregard the source and lose the idea. 

IMMIGRATION IS A PROBLEM - LEGAL and MORAL

Note:  I  only post letters that I have written.  I do not aree with some implied political views contained herein. However, I felt this letter from a friend of mine was very compelling because it  illustrates the  conflict between moral duty and legal duty.

May 8, 2008 

Dear friends,

Long time since I wrote a group mail but the after the events of the last few days I had to write something. Please read it all.

Please forgive me for my english

This story actual starts last September when I started to be involved with refuges and migrants that got to Tel Aviv, I joined a group volunteers that start to work with African refugees that arrived in Tel aviv.
I was responsible for the cloths and equipment donations, I didn't have a warehouse and in some point I was invited to use a big space in a squat which was occupied by activists and young people.  Shortly after being part of the community I was introduced to Mamadu, 16 years old young boy from Guinea in west Africa, he left his home there few years earlier and after traveling through Morocco and Egypt he found himself in Israel.
Here started to go to school and to work.

Around October the squat got an eviction warren and we decided to find Mamadu a better place to be. I introduced him to my parents and they invited him to say with them for while. They found that Mamadu is a very modest, smart and gentle boy. He became part of the family.
In late February the Israeli government decided to start to "fight" against the waves of refuges arriving is Israel and started to arrest People randomly in the streets of Tel aviv, their only way decide who to arrest was the color of his skin, after being arrested and detained in police station they checked if the person has a permit to be in Israel.

One day in the middle of March on his way to school Mamadu was arrested, From this moment on my mom tried to convince the judge that he can stay under my parents custody or even got adopted but the only thing the state lawyer tried to do is to prove the Mamadu is in not a minor, all his documents saying that he is 16 years old. To prove that he is not a minor they did a wrist check that said that he is 16 years old; this wasn't good enough for them so they did another examination which is more offensive and humiliating. They doing all these examination to deported him from Israel.
Israel doesn't have any relationships with Guinea so they will be deport him to The Ivory coast where he has nobody and it might be dangers for him to be alone there.
Every Monday we went with his friends to visit him in jail we had only half and hour a week to see him. Mamadu made many friends here and every time we could take only ten of them with us.

All this time when we visited him in jail they asked my mom to bring his passport, without it they can't deport him.
My mom decided that without a judge warn and through a lawyer she won't give it to them.
Last Sunday the judge decided according to second medical examination that Mamadu he is not minor.
Yesterday morning  (Tuesday 29.4.2008) at 06:35am few minutes after my father left home to work 5 policemen, four bullies and girl knocked on the door and ask my mom to open the door and asked for the passport, she asked to see a warren but they didn't have one, so she refused to give them anything from the house. They have arrested her because of it, some how she succeed to tell my father and he came back quick and where he found out that they are taking her to the immigration police station.
My father, a friend and myself arrived at the station where they refused to tell if she is there, what she is being arrested for. We became more vocal so they threat to arrest us as well. I called a friend which is a lawyer and they refused to give him any detail without him coming to the police station. After two ours an investigator called me and told me my mom require a lawyer.

An hour later we accidentally saw that they taking her away, my father succeed to ask her where they are taking her and we found out that they taking her home to search the home for the passport.
We arrived home after the cops left and my mom said that they got a search warren so she had to give it to them.

Now we are trying to find a way to stop his deportation that will take place somewhere in the near future.
This might be his only chance for a "normal" future.
We as family will do the same thing if another boy as him will arrive again and need help.
Our family was saved by Russians when the Germans invade, they didn't care what the risk they take is, we our committed as human beings to treat everyone who ask asylum or freedom to help him.
Humanitarian support is not a crime is our duty.

i have to say as well that I am not surprised at all for this behavior, a state that depresses other people for more than 40 years, a state where only money talks and you can die if you don't have, a state where human rights is a fictional idea and only if where born to right mother (Jewish) you might be treated well.
A state like this has no compassion and doesn't care for the voiced that can't be heard.

I was raised by parents the told me that everyone is equal and has the right equal human rights and descent way if life.
Even if they take us to jail we will continue to help people like Mamadu, and we do it again and again.

Shachaf Polakow