FALLING SHORT

I have a tremendous amount of respect for Cornel West , public intellectual and principled religious man that he is, but currently I am reading his book "Democracy Matters", and certain things in it I have to completely disagree with. 
  There are several occasions in the book in which he talks about "america's deep democratic tradition", while acknowledging slavery and jim crow . Now, I understand that there were always people fighting against slavery and jim crow laws, but the fact remains that the very foundation of the country, and empire for that matter, rests on the bones of the genocide of the Native people of this continent, and the labour of the slaves. This is amerikkka's real tradition, without which it would not exist.


Another point he mentions on more than one occasion, perhaps in an effort to give "equal time" to both sides, is the "horrifying suicide bombings in israel killing civilians", and comparing that to the u.s. sponsored israeli state terror against the Palestinian population. Again, he does talk about the 3 billion dollars a year that the u.s. government gives to the state of israel, but to equate the suicide bombers with the fighter jets raining death upon children living in refugee camps is ludicrous. But I suppose it is the same as saying that children throwing rocks is the equivalent of men shooting at them from tanks. Since the year 2000, 1,196 israeli citizens had been killed, vs. 9,136 Palestinians. Stats take from here . And no, I don't believe the rhetoric about the israeli army trying to avoid civilian casualties. Complete and utter bullshit. 
   Despite all of these criticisms, I will finish the book , and continue to listen to Mr. Cornel West.  He is worthy of our respect. And watch this video . It is well worth your time. 

YOUR HEROES

And these are the assholes who are in charge of protecting your "freedom"......

Chief: Miami Beach police sent hundreds of racist, pornographic emails

Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle (L) listens as Miami Beach Police Chief Daniel Oates speaks during a news conference to announce that sixteen Miami Beach Police officers exchanged numerous racist and pornographic emails on May 14, 2015 in Miami, Florida.  JOE RAEDLE, GETTY IMAGES

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Last Updated May 15, 2015 1:01 PM EDT

MIAMI -- A handful of Miami Beach police officers sent hundreds of racially offensive and pornographic emails, including about President Barack Obama, and possibly jeopardized dozens of criminal cases in which they are witnesses, the department's chief said.

An internal investigation revealed that two of the 16 officers were high-ranking within the Miami Beach Police Department and were the main instigators, Chief Daniel Oates told reporters Thursday. One has retired, and the other was fired Thursday.

Oates identified them as Former Major Angel Vazquez and Former Captain Alex Carulo, CBS Miami reports.

"They were the primary purveyors of pornography and high volume of it. I was shocked and angry," Oates told the assembled press.

Vazquez has since retired, but could face a potential criminal charge for his alleged role in circulating an autopsy photograph of Raymond Herisse who was shot by police in 2011 during Memorial Day, Oates said.

Oates said the probe revealed about 230 emails demeaning to African-Americans and women or pornographic in nature. Many were depictions of crude racial jokes involving Obama or black celebrities such as golfer Tiger Woods. One shows a woman with a black eye and the caption, "Domestic violence. Because sometimes, you have to tell her more than once."

One of the racially offensive emails depicted a board game called "Black Monopoly" in which every square says "go to jail."

Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said about 540 cases in which the officers were witnesses are being reviewed to determine if they are tainted racially. Some charges could be dropped as a result, or prisoners could be freed from jail.

"These activities are a breach of trust. They are disgusting," Rundle said.

Rundle added that criminal charges are possible if any minors are depicted in the pornographic images. One officer also emailed an autopsy photo of a man fatally shot by police in 2011, possibly in violation of Florida law.

Oates said the emails came to light in an unrelated 2013 internal affairs probe. Most of the emails spanned the years 2010 to mid-2012, and many of the officers involved apparently just received the offensive ones rather than forwarding them.

Oates, who took over the department last year, said the investigation shows these types of offensive actions and attitudes are no longer tolerated.

"I can't tell you how angry we are," Oates said. "We want to send a message to our officers and our employees that this kind of behavior is over."

The case comes in the wake of another scandal in the San Francisco Police Department involving officers exchanging racist and homophobic text messages.

It also comes amid a national debate about issues of race and law enforcement, including several instances of unarmed black men killed by police.

© 2015 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

THIS FUCKED UP WORLD

Two nights ago I watched the documentary Hot Girls Wanted , and even though I feel jaded at times, it opened my eyes to shit I wasn't completely aware of. All of the coercion and horribly abusive shit that goes on in pornography is utterly loathesome. I know that a lot of people will just say that it's a matter of "personal choice", but I really doubt that most of these young girls who get involved in the business really know what's going to happen, and also the fact that so many people get turned on by scenes involving forced sexual acts is fucking worthy of burning everything down. Everything. I am convinced now more than ever of the need for Revolution. Watch this clip of Bob Avakian . This is the truth about this fucked up society.

CHILD KILLERS

No, I'm not talking about u.s. and western troops invading other lands to kill civilians and steal, although that applies too. I'm talking about the way cleveland pigs killed twelve year old Tamir Rice, and the response to that. Fuck the pigs.

Ongoing and Growing Outrage and Protest in Cleveland

Updated June 1, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

Police attack protesters Saturday, May 23 outside Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland after a judge let the only cop charged in the police murder of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams go free. Photo: special to revcom.us.

From the moment Michael Brelo, a Cleveland cop, was pronounced not guilty on May 23 there have been outbreaks of protest in Cleveland. Brelo was one of about 100 Cleveland area cops who, on November 29, 2012, chased and fired 137 shots into a car murdering two unarmed Black people—Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams (See “137 Shots—The Whole Damned System Is Guilty! Cleveland Judge Lets Cop Involved in Murder of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams Walk!” a statement by Carl Dix).

Saturday…

Protesting outside the NBA playoffs, Cleveland, May 24, 2015

Immediately after the verdict was announced, there were angry confrontations between protesters and police at the courthouse, and several protesters were arrested. Also, shortly after the verdict, protesters blocked traffic on a major freeway.

Two hundred people gathered at the recreation center where 12-year-old Tamir Rice was murdered by police six months ago speaking outrage and chanting “No justice, no peace.”

In the evening, protesters marching in Cleveland were repeatedly attacked by police in riot gear in Cleveland’s upscale district near the baseball stadium – Quicken Loans Arena (see video atCleveland.com).

There were over 70 arrests throughout the first day of protests. Most of those arrested have been arraigned, and many pled not guilty.

Sunday 5/24…

On Sunday, May 24, over a dozen protesters marched in front of the playoff game between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Atlanta Hawks chanting “Indict, convict, send the killer cops to jail/The whole damn system is guilty as hell.”  Hundreds of people going to the game took notice, many giving thumbs up or fists in the air, and a few joined the protest. 

Then people blocked the intersection in front of the arena for 2 hours. A couple young Black women who joined the action and said, “We been looking for the protest, this verdict is so wrong, they think they can kill Black people and get away with it.”   

Monday 5/25…

May 25, 2015: As many as 200 people marched through housing projects and past schools in Cleveland, blocking streets, demanding justice. Image from video used with permission from Ed Sweeney.

On Monday, May 25, a couple dozen people gathered at a rally called by Cleveland Revolution Books at the Zelma George Rec Center. Four hours later, marching through housing projects, chanting, getting out Carl Dix’ statement and the statement from the Cleveland Branch of the Revolutionary Communist Party, the crowd grew to two hundred. People came out of their houses, youth joined on bikes in an angry, boisterous expression of outrage. People chanted “Fists up, fight back!” “Drop the charges,” and “Indict, convict, send the killer cops to jail, the whole damn system is guilty as hell!” and “137 shots, how you justify that?!”

Getting out the Statement by Carl Dix, Cleveland, May 25, 2015.

An organizer from Revolution Books told Revolutionthat many people had been waiting for a chance to make a statement, and were challenged to get into the Stop Mass Incarceration Network and get with what Bob Avakian has brought forward.

Housing Project police harassed people throughout the afternoon, claiming they were concerned with the “safety” of the young people who joined – to which people responded, “What about Tamir Rice?” People refused to back down, blocking streets with their bikes.

The organizer from Revolution Books reported that people were raising a need to reach out and draw in people beyond the projects, and that is a challenge to solve. This evening, a protest has been called by religious forces. The struggle continues! 

Marching through Cleveland, 5/25, demanding no charges against arrested protesters and justice for Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams.  Vine used with permission @edscle.

Tuesday, May 26…

Hundreds of religious people rally at Cleveland City Hall, May 26. (Photo: Twitter @ScottTaylor19)

Over 500 people of different nationalities from 40 church congregations in the Cleveland area marched through downtown to City Hall in protest of the not-guilty verdict. People loudly chanted, “We can't wait," calling out the injustices in the prison system and the racism among police. The Greater Cleveland Congregations, an interfaith advocacy group, delivered a letter to the prosecutor urging police reforms. A woman in the march said, “The march was important because we have to keep confronting the authorities. They don’t want to do anything, and we have to keep bothering them. And the diversity of people and religions was good.”

Weekend of May 29 - 31

Cleveland: Saturday, May 30, 2015.

On Friday, May 29, 15 people rallied in a poor area of Cleveland including several of the young people arrested on Saturday, May 25, when the not guilty verdict on cop Brelo came down. It was lively, with posters, chants, and lots of exchanges with people going by. People got out the Stolen Lives posters, revolution kits, and Revolution papers to cars and people coming from their apartments, and raised almost $50 for materials. The crew then went to where Al Sharpton was speaking to continue to spread the word and distribute the Carl Dix statement and the local RCP statement.

The next day there was a small march through a busy area of the Black community. From the minute people went into the street, horns blew, fists went up, and people grabbed the Stolen Lives posters and gave money. People disrupted traffic and cars were backed up, which only drew more attention to the call to STOP POLICE MURDER, as people saw the posters and heard the loud chants, like “Indict, Convict, Send the Killer Cops to Jail. The whole damn system is guilty as hell!” Hearing and seeing the big Stolen Lives posters, a shoe repair shop owner called people over to get posters to put up in his window.

Sunday May 31

Some 40 people, mostly Black, marched through East Cleveland, an extremely poor Black community, in rain and cold. The chant, "Indict, convict send the killer to jail/The whole damn system is guilty!" rang out loud and clear. As we came to the place where Malissa and Timothy were legally lynched, balloons were released to remember and honor them. The march was organized by Cleveland Renaissance, a movement of young people and by "my loud radio" a network radio and was joined by the movement for revolution. We blocked an intersection and marched to where Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell, unarmed and Black, were murdered with 137 shots by 13 pigs. As the protest broke up, a young Black woman said, " I felt I had to be here. We need answers to the current system, which will not bring justice. We can't let this die down."

The struggle continues!

Follow developments at revcom.us.

YOU ARE NOT COOL

This is for all of those idiots who say they like to "watch porn", and then laugh like beavis & butthead, thinking that they are somehow rebellious or "cool", whatever the fuck that means these days. You are not. You are a soulless braindead idiot. Read this and shut up.

Check It Out and then Act: Hot Girls Wanted

by Sunsara Taylor | June 3, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

If you are one of the millions and millions of people, especially men, who regularly watch porn, I strongly recommend you click on something else today: the new documentary, Hot Girls Wanted, which was released to Netflix on May 21, produced by Rashida Jones, and directed by Jill Bauer and Ronna Gradus. Of course, it’s much better if you don’t watch porn—but either way I strongly recommend this film.

In less than an hour and a half, you will be introduced to just a few of the real human beings whose lives are turned upside down and hollowed out by the porn industry. You will meet young women who start out bright and full of life, excitement, and ambition. They are fed up with the stultifying life of their hometowns and are looking for adventure. They’ve been sold the idea that being wanted as a sex object is “empowering” and want to cash in on their youth and inexperience. And, for a short while, they are able to hold together the collective delusion that, packed into a generic five-bedroom house in Miami owned by their “talent-agent”/pimp, they are calling the shots and living the lives they’ve always wanted.

There is a reason, however, that most young women who enter pornography don’t stay for more than a month or maybe three. Many don’t make it past their first shoot.

One young woman is hired for a series called, Virgin Manipulations. She plays an unwilling virgin who is preyed upon by a trusted older friend of the family. “Here’s the key point,” a voice tells her from off screen as she is about to shoot the scene, “You’re never like fully engaged into it.” Another young woman is filmed in a series called, Latina Abuse. A man spits in her face, chokes and slaps her, and aggressively forces his penis and huge dildos down her throat with the aim of making her vomit. The camera zooms in to capture the trauma and tears pouring from her eyes and you can hear her gagging violently. When she finally pukes, she is forced to lick it up out of a dog food bowl, all the while bearing unending and grotesque racist and woman-hating insults.

Typically, once their innocence and naïveté has been extinguished, they are no longer cast as virgins and can only keep working if they go along with ever more extreme brutality and humiliation.

The film treads lightly in these scenes, showing enough to force the viewer to confront the actual content of this porn, but never using these scenes to “titillate” the viewer. When the film shows nudity and degrading sex acts, you experience them from the point of view of the young woman who is acting them out. As the days and weeks go on, the trauma and degradation of it all begins to bubble up through their own words, in their eyes, and in the pall that falls over their collective living space and banter.

A statistic appears on the screen, “In 2014 abuse porn websites averaged over 60 million combined hits per month. More hits than nfl.com, nba.com, hotwire.com, cbs.com, fortune.com, disney.com, and nbcnews.com.” Another informs us that “teen” is the most commonly searched word in all of Internet porn.

A question that the film never asks, but that viewers really should, is: WHY is there such a market for this kind of predatory abuse and degradation of women? What kind of society is this where millions and millions of men are daily visiting websites to watch women be abused, violated, insulted, spit on, choked, tortured, and humiliated through sex and in other ways? And what does the mainstreaming of this kind of abuse do to further normalize this hatred against women, to socialize men and even very young boys to see women as objects to be used and abused for sexual pleasure? Is this the only way the world can be, and is it a world that anyone should want to live in?

It is very important that this film humanizes and makes audible the voices of the young women who are preyed upon by the porn industry. But it is also important to pull the lens back even further—to examine not only these women’s lives and choices, but even more fundamentally what gives rise to a world where these are the choices available to women in the first place.

Bob Avakian, the leader who has developed a whole new synthesis of communist revolution, which includes the most radical and thorough-going approach to the full liberation of women, has emphasized:

First, people don’t make choices in a vacuum. They do it in the context of the social relations they’re enmeshed in and the options they have within those relations—which are not of their own choosing. They confront those relations, they don’t choose them.

Two, if people feel for whatever reasons that they want to choose to harm themselves and others, we’re going to struggle with them—but we’re not going to blame them. We’re going to show them the source of all this in the system, and call on them to struggle against that system, and transform themselves in the process. Just because a youth “chooses” to sell drugs, or a woman “chooses” to commodify herself sexually, doesn’t mean that they chose to havethose choices. And there is no other way besides fighting the power, and transforming the people, for revolution that all this will change for the better. Blaming the masses for bad choices just reinforces the conditions that they are oppressed by.

In sum, people do make choices—but they make them enmeshed and confined within social relations that are not of their choosing. We have to bring into being different social relations and conditions so that masses of people can act differently and relate differently to each other. Fundamentally, that takes a revolution which is aiming for communism.

Getting into all of what it means to make a revolution aiming for communism, and why that is the only real and lasting way to liberate women, goes beyond the scope of this article. But there is work you can—and should—get into. I recommend starting with Break ALL the Chains! Bob Avakian on the Emancipation of Women and the Communist Revolution and A Declaration: For Women’s Liberation and the Emancipation of all Humanity

The point is, it is completely unacceptable that thousands of teenage girls and young women are degraded and abused by the porn industry every single year. It is unacceptable that this is just a fraction of the violence and humiliation, the torture and sexual brutality that is inflicted on millionsof women and very young girls every single year world-wide in the sex “industry.” It is also entirely unnecessary.

By bringing viewers face to face with just a tiny—but extremely powerful—fraction of this unnecessary oppression, Hot Girls Wanted, makes an important contribution. Take the time to check it out. If you are someone who watches porn, now is the time to stop. And for everyone who wants to see an end to this disgusting and damaging culture of rape and pornography, of woman-hating and sexualized degradation, now is the time to rise up and fight! Get involved today with the movement to End Pornography and Patriarchy: The Enslavement and Degradation of Women.

A Declaration: For Women’s Liberation and the Emancipation of all Humanity

Break ALL the Chains! Bob Avakian on the Emancipation of Women and the Communist Revolution.

End Pornography and Patriarchy: The Enslavement and Degradation of Women

“Frequently Encountered Bullshit at the NYC Porn Film Festival”

NOT ENOUGH

Anything short of revolution's not enough....

TORONTO — Canada's decades-long government policy requiring Canadian First Nation children to attend state-funded church schools amounted to "cultural genocide," a long-awaited report has found.

Truth and Reconciliation Commission chair Justice Murray Sinclair said Tuesday the residential schools represent one of the "darkest and most troubling chapters in our collective history."

The report is the result of a six-year study of Canada's former government policy requiring Canadian aboriginals to attend the schools, often the scenes of physical and sexual abuse. First Nation leaders have cited the legacy of abuse and isolation as the root cause of epidemic substance abuse on reservations.

From the 19th century until the 1970s, more than 150,000 aboriginal children were required to attend Christian schools to rid them of their native cultures and languages and integrate them into mainstream Canadian society.

More than 130 residential schools operated across Canada.

The federal government previously admitted that physical and sexual abuse in the once-mandatory schools was rampant and Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued an historic apology in Parliament in 2008. Many students recall being beaten for speaking their native languages and losing touch with their parents and customs.

The goal of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was to give survivors a forum to tell their stories and to educate Canadians about that dark chapter in the country's history.

Sinclair, a First Nations Canadian judge, described how the commission heard from residential school survivors who were robbed of the love of their families.

"They were stripped of their self-respect and they were stripped of their identity," Sinclair said.

The commission was created as part of a US$5 billion class action settlement in 2006 between the government, churches and the 90,000 surviving First Nation students.

Alma Scott was one of thousands of survivors in Canada who recounted her experience to the commission. She described being taken to a school in Fort Alexander, Manitoba, at the age of five.

"I just remember feeling really sad, and I was in this truck full of other kids who were crying, and so I cried with them," said Scott.

Among the TRC report's 94 recommendations, it calls on the federal government to launch a national inquiry into the number of missing and murdered aboriginal women. It also seeks an apology from the Pope on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church. And it recommends the government fully adopt and implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as the "framework for reconciliation."

The TRC's summary also makes clear that the expectations of the aboriginal community in the wake of Harper's apology for the residential school tragedy in 2008 have not yet been met.

Assembly of First Nations Grand Chief Perry Bellegarde said the prime minister's 2008 apology will be empty if it is not followed with action.

Harper said he apologized for the devastation caused by the schools seven years ago. He didn't call it a cultural genocide Tuesday or promise to enact any of the report's 94 recommendations.

Sinclair said he was scheduled to sit down with Harper later Tuesday.

A center at the University of Manitoba will become the permanent home for all statements, documents and materials gathered by the commission. It is scheduled to open this summer.

In Australia, former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a formal apology in Parliament in 2008 to the so-called Stolen Generations — thousands of aboriginals who were forcibly taken from their families as children under assimilation policies that lasted from 1910 to 1970.

FOUNDATION

This is the foundation on which this country was built. This is the reality, and not "at least we're not as bad as the states, eh". Many children died in kkkanada's genocidal residential school  system, and those who survived, are broken. 

How many First Nations kids died in residential schools? Justice Murray Sinclair says Canada needs answers

Ottawa stopped recording deaths around 1920, after a medical officer drew attention to the alarming statistics — and was fired.

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JUSTIN TANG / THE CANADIAN PRESS

Truth and Reconciliation commissioner Murray Sinclair, in a black suit, marches along with Assembly of First Nations Chief Perry Bellegarde (in headdress) in an Ottawa march on Sunday that was part of the closing events of the commission's work. The event drew about 7,000 participants.

By: Chinta Puxley The Canadian Press, Published on Sun May 31 2015

The commission that has spent five years examining one of the darkest chapters in Canada’s history is winding up its work with a key question left unanswered — exactly how many aboriginal children died in residential schools?

Justice Murray Sinclair, who heads the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, says the federal government stopped recording the deaths around 1920, after the chief medical officer at Indian Affairs suggested children were dying at an alarming rate.

“He was fired,” Sinclair says. “The government stopped recording deaths of children in residential schools, we think, probably because the rates were so high.”

Sinclair has guessed up to 6,000 children may have died at the schools but it’s impossible to say with certainty.

“We think this is a situation that needs further study,” he said.

More than 130 years after the first residential schools were established to “take the Indian out of the child,” the commission is to release a summary of its six-volume final report on Tuesday. It will include testimony from survivors, as well as numerous recommendations to address the legacy of forced assimilation.

The commission didn’t originally intend to examine how many children never came home, but it quickly emerged as an issue, Sinclair says.

Schools were often crowded, poorly ventilated and unsanitary. Children died from smallpox, measles, influenza and tuberculosis. Some were buried in unmarked graves in school cemeteries, while others were listed as “missing” or “discharged.” In some cases, parents never found out what happened.

Some provinces handed over death certificates to the commission, but Sinclair says the work is far from over.

“We have recommendations around that in the report. We’re going to tell you there are lots of records out there that are missing.”

About 150,000 First Nations, Inuit and Metis children were taken from their families and forced to attend government schools over much of the last century.

The $60-million commission was part of a landmark compensation deal between Ottawa, the Crown and residential school survivors. It visited hundreds of communities and heard testimony from 7,000 survivors, including graphic details of rampant sexual and physical abuse.

The legacy of the schools is evident today, Sinclair says. High poverty rates, a large number of aboriginal children in foster care, a disproportionate number of aboriginals in jail and hundreds of missing and murdered aboriginal women can all be traced back to residential schools, he suggests.

National Chief Perry Bellegarde of the Assembly of First Nations says part of reconciliation is ensuring that aboriginal children have the same quality of life as everyone else. If that doesn’t happen, he says, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s historic 2008 apology to residential school survivors will mean nothing.

“If we’re going to talk about reconciliation, there really has to be action attached to the apology.”

The churches that ran the majority of the schools have promised to work toward reconciliation.

In a letter from the Ottawa archdiocese, released by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Archbishop Terrence Prendergast calls on the faithful to repent for how the church treated aboriginal people.

“We face the past and sincerely ask for forgiveness,” the letter reads.

The Anglican Church of Canada apologized to students and their families in 1993.

“We’ve been trying to live into that apology ever since,” the church says on a website dedicated to reconciliation.

Some worry the commission is ending its work before real healing has begun.

Manitoba Aboriginal Affairs Minister Eric Robinson was sent to a residential school when he was 5 and left when he was 9 — one of the lucky ones, he says.

The number of children who died at residential schools is just one of the areas that needs more exploration, he says. The medical experiments conducted on children, as well as forced military training, should also be properly studied.

“Five or six years is hardly enough time to ascertain a century and more of hurt and punishment inflicted upon Indian people. We almost need a permanent forum.”

Sinclair says the responsibility to repair the relationship with aboriginal people rests with Canadians.

“It’s the people talking at the community level, the need to overcome racism that people have been raised with, overcoming the stereotypes.

“One of their first obligations is to recognize they are in a relationship with aboriginal people that is like no other.”