Mn-prog-events Mailing List: Progressive Calendar 11.14.09

[David Shove (shove001]

            P R O G R E S S I V E   C A L E N D A R   11.14.09

1. Peace walk        11.14 9am Cambridge MN
2. WILPF/later years 11.14 10am
3. CUAPB             11.14 1:30pm
4. Northtown vigil   11.14 2pm
5. RCTA gala         11.14 6pm
6. Stevens Sq arts   11.14 7pm
7. Grand jury/scare  11.14 9pm
8. Transracial films 11.14

9. Dave Lindorff  - Thank you Congressman Stupak! Health care reform: DOA
10. Robert Jensen - Of turkeys and holocausts
11. Gilad Atzmon  - From the river to the sea
12. ed            - Rotting incumbents  (haiku)

--------1 of 12--------

From: Ken Reine <reine008 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: Peace walk 11.14 9am Cambridge MN

every Saturday 9AM to 9:35AM
Peace walk in Cambridge - start at Hwy 95 and Fern Street


--------2 of 12--------

From: Doris Marquit <marqu001 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: WILPF/later years 11.14 10am

Women's International League for Peace & Freedom      www.wilpfmn.org
WILPF  "Coffee With" Discussion
Saturday, Nov. 14, 10 am-noon
Van Cleve Community Ctr.
901 15th Ave. SE, Mpls
"Changing Demographics: Productivity in Later Years"
with Jan Hively (of OnTheCommons.org)

Bring 2 books to contribute to SALE-
(See below)
And save the date: Sun. Dec. 6, 3-5 pm
WINTER PARTY: SWEET & SAVORY
SNACKS & STORIES - PLUS
Bargain Book Sale, Riverview Tower, 1920 S 1st St., Mpls


--------3 of 12--------

From: Michelle Gross <mgresist [at] visi.com>
Subject: CUAPB 11.14 1:30pm

Meetings: Every Saturday at 1:30 p.m. at Walker Church, 3104 16th Avenue
South http://www.CUAPB.org

Communities United Against Police Brutality
3100 16th Avenue S
Minneapolis, MN 55407
Hotline 612-874-STOP (7867)


--------4 of 12--------

From: Vanka485 [at] aol.com
Subject: Northtown vigil 11.14 2pm

Peace vigil at Northtown (Old Hwy 10 & University Av), every Saturday
2-3pm


--------5 of 12--------

From: Jason Stone <jason.stone [at] yahoo.com>
Subject: RCTA gala 11.14 6pm

Resource Center of the Americas
Gala Celebration Saturday 11/14

Join us for appetizers, dancing, silent auction, special guest speaker
Senator Patricia Torres-Ray, and words from RCTA supporters
November 14th, 2009
6:00-9:00pm
Patrick's Cabaret
3010 Minnehaha Ave S
More information at www.americas.org


--------6 of 12--------

From: Stevens Square Center for the Arts <ssca [at] stevensarts.org>
Subject: Stevens Square arts 11.14 7pm

Sixth Annual SSCA Members' Exhibition
November 15 - December 6, 2009

Opening Night Reception
Saturday, November 14, 7:00 - 10:00 pm
Our gallery is located at 1905 Third Avenue S., directly above the Third
Avenue Market.

Six years ago, a rag-tag group of artists took over an abandoned police
sub-station and declared themselves a co-op. No one thought that the
experiment would last. The organization had no permanent endowment, no
paid staff, and no outside source of funding.

Six years later, the Stevens Square Center for the Arts (SSCA) has
transformed that ugly water-damaged storefront into a functioning gallery
 - one that has quickly emerged as one of the city's most exciting venues
for non-commercial art. "Sometimes seeing something is as important as
talking about it," says founding member Zachary Korb. "Actually going up
in the space, it lets you sort of envision what the possibilities are."

In the midst of an economic recession that has forced many long-running
galleries to shutter their doors, the SSCA Gallery is not only surviving,
but thriving. In 2009, the art center hosted 11 major exhibitions, as well
as the Twin Cities Zine Festival, and a Community Forum. [We hope they
aren't living off poor bedraggled starving artists freezing in unheated
drafty attics, frostbite on their suffering paint-flecked fingers and
toes, sobbing day and night at their cruel master-driven fate, tears
adding nuanced streaks down their rickety soiled canvases. -ed]

Coming at the end of the SSCA's busiest season ever, the Sixth Annual SSCA
Members' Exhibition is a showcase for the member-artists whose hard work
and dedication have kept the gallery functioning. While other exhibits are
usually based on a theme, the Members' show is a truly open exhibition,
featuring broad sampling of styles and materials.

>From the life-sized oil paintings and charcoal drawings of J.M. Culver, to
the scrambled portraits of painter Samuel Bjorgum, the Sixth Annual SSCA
Members' Exhibition is a showcase for a group of emerging artists who you
can expect to hear more from in the near future.

FEATURING ARTWORK BY:
   - Chris Williams
   - Erik Farseth
   - Erika Hammerschmidt
   - Faye Buffington Howell
   - Guntis Kupers
   - J.M. Culver
   - Karin Knudson
   - Patricia Barnes
   - Samuel Bjorgum
   - Terrance Davis
   - Trish Brock
  [- Vincent Van GoGo
   - Pablo Piccolo
   - Marcel DuChump
   - Drooling Julius ]


--------7 of 12--------

From: Eric Angell <eric-angell [at] riseup.net>
Subject: Grand jury/scare 11.14 9pm

Minneapolis Television Network (MTN) viewers:
"Our World In Depth" cablecasts on MTN Channel 17 on Saturdays at 9pm and
Tuesdays at 8am, after DemocracyNow!  Households with basic cable may
watch.

Sat 11/14, 9pm and Tues, 11/17, 8am
Grand Juries and the Green Scare

Last month, 20 year old local activist Carrie Feldman was subpoenaed to a
federal grand jury in Davenport, Iowa.  The Grand Jury is reported to be
investigating animal rights actions that took place in 2004.  At the time,
Carrie was 15 years old.

Understanding how grand juries operate, Feldman is refusing to testify
before the grand jury.  She is scheduled to reappear in Davenport again
this month and maintains that she will continue to refuse to cooperate.
As a result, Feldman could face jail time for contempt of court.  We speak
with Carrie as well as RNC 8 defendant Luce Guillen-Givens, who faces
felony charges for organizing against the 2008 RNC in St. Paul.


--------8 of 12--------

From: Sarah Pradt <spradt [at] hecua.org>
Subject: Transracial films 11.14

The first Twin Cities festival to showcase voices from the transracial and
transcultural adoption community through film, words, and music.

The Minnesota Transracial Film Festival is being held at the Oak Street
Cinema on November 14th, 2009.

The MNTRFF program schedule includes Adopted The Movie, Tie A Yellow Ribbon,
Running Dragon, Jagadamba and Homeschool, and in addition will also feature
readings by local artists Sun Yung Shin and Bryan Thao Worra, and music by
singer/songwriter Mayda.

To see the schedule and to purchase tickets in advance (recommended - it
is open seating), please go to http://www.mntrff.org/dev/


--------9 of 12--------

Thank You Congressman Stupak!
Health Care Reform: DOA
By DAVE LINDORFF
CounterPunch
November 13-15, 2009

I never thought I'd find myself thanking the women-loathing, Christian
fundamentalist-pandering Democrats in Congress for anything, but here it
is: Thank you Congressman Bart Stupak (D-Mich), for your outrageous
amendment to the House version of the health insurance reform legislation
in Congress, which bars any insurance company in the proposed health
insurance exchange from offering a health insurance plan that includes
abortion coverage.

This amendment, which would actually bar women or families from buying
even with their own money and no government subsidy health insurance that
includes funding for a medically recommended abortion, was supported by 64
Democrats along with all but one Republican in Congress.

Because it passed and was attached to the House health reform bill, it
gives hope to the notion that the disastrous so-called health reform
legislation in Congress will die.

And so it should.

Because of an [intentional -ed] utter lack of leadership from the
president, and because of the massive corruption in Congress, which is
wallowing in lobbying money from the insurance industry and other parts of
the Medical-Industrial Complex, a historical opportunity to finally bring
the US out of the dark ages on health care has been blown. [pole-axed -ed]

The legislation emerging in Senate and House does not reform the system.
In fact it in many ways makes things even worse than they are today, with
unfunded mandates that struggling working people buy insurance or be
penalized, with taxes placed on better plans negotiated through long
struggle by labor unions, with little in the way of cost controls on
doctors, hospitals and the drug industry, and it doesn't even provide
coverage for all.

Way back in 1965, a different Democratic president and Democratic Congress
passed landmark health reform that gave the US a pioneering single-payer
healthcare program, with the only problem being that you had to live to 65
in order to qualify for it. Today that program, Medicare, while repeatedly
shortchanged and underfunded by Congress, is relied upon by over 40
million elderly and disabled Americans, and is widely appreciated for its
simplicity and its universality. Sure it could be better. We could do away
with the gaps in coverage, and tighten the screws on payments to doctors,
hospitals and the suppliers of tests, equipment and drugs. But it remains
a beautiful model of what could be done for the rest of the country.

Instead of drawing on this excellent, time-tested model, President Obama
and the Democrats in Congress have pretended Medicare doesn't exist. Obama
went so far as to say on several occasions, including in his address to
Congress on health care reform, that while single-payer plans like those
in Canada and France might work well in those countries (indeed they do,
and at much less cost than our insane "system" here!), introducing such a
system here would mean "starting from scratch."

Come again Barack? From scratch? Those countries modeled their systems, in
part, on Medicare, which we had here first! And Medicare is actually a
bigger program than the entire Canadian health care system!

Medicare for all would have been the proper way to reform American health
care, and in fact, it could have been implemented right away at a huge
overall savings to all of us. This was never admitted by the Democratic
leaders in Congress of by the president. In fact, bills in the House and
Senate, sponsored, respectively, by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich) and Sen.
Bernie Sanders (I-VT), have never even been allowed to get a hearing or to
go to a floor vote, for fear that the public would see what they are being
denied.

Medicare for all, while it would certainly have meant higher payroll taxes
for all of us, would have been a huge net savings, because it would have
eliminated the need for the Medicaid program for the poor ($450 billion a
year), the Veterans Administration healthcare system ($100 billion a year
and mounting), and publicly funded charity care by hospitals ($300
billion). It would have eliminated over $150 billion a year in private
health industry administrative costs and between $75-100 billion in health
industry profits. Total it up: that represents savings of over $1 trillion
a year. Since adding the under-65 population to Medicare would only add
about $750-800 billion a year to the program costs, that's a net savings
of over $200 billion a year, without even counting the fact that
businesses and citizens alike would no longer have to pay ransoms to the
private insurance industry - a savings to individuals and employers of
close to $1.5 trillion a year! [That's 1.5 trillion the rich wouldn't get,
a shocking denial of their right to all our money. -ed]

We need health care reform. 40 million Americans have no access to health
care. 40,000 a year die because of lack of access. 30-40 million more have
lousy care funded by state Medicaid programs, many of which are
underfunded and few of which provide for routine care. The rest of us are
indentured to our employers, afraid to unionize, afraid to strike, afraid
to speak up on the job, for fear of losing our insurance coverage.

The health care "reform" bill in Congress does nothing to solve these
problems. Aside from outlawing a couple of the worst abuses, such as
denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, or pricing such
people out of the insurance market, or dropping coverage when someone
actually becomes ill, it leaves all the evils of the current system in
place, and assures that the crisis will continue and continue to worsen.

But with the ban on abortion coverage, there is a chance that at least
some principled members of Congress, backers of a woman's right to
unimpeded health care that she and her doctor say she needs, will reject
the whole obscene package. If they do, this fradulent reform legislation
will go down in flames.

Then we'll be back to square one, and we can finally demand that Congress
and the President give us the reform that will work: Medicare for all.

So again, thank you Rep. Stupak, and all you anti-women's rights Democrats
who backed the amendment barring abortion coverage in the health reform
legislation. You may have coathangered this faux health "reform"
legislation and given us another shot at real health system reform.

Dave Lindorff  is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist.

[On the schoolyard, "stupak" is the worst thing you can call somebody; if
you do, you'd better run fast or be much bigger. -ed]


--------10 of 12--------

Of Turkeys and Holocausts
How I Stopped Hating Thanksgiving and Learned to be Afraid
By ROBERT JENSEN
CounterPunch
November 13-15, 2009

I have stopped hating Thanksgiving and learned to be afraid of the
holiday.

Over the past few years a growing number of white people have joined the
longstanding indigenous people.s critique of the holocaust denial that is
at the heart of the Thanksgiving holiday. In two recent essays I have
examined the disturbing nature of a holiday rooted in a celebration of the
European conquest of the Americas, which means the celebration of the
Europeans. genocidal campaign against indigenous people that is central to
the creation of the United States. Many similar pieces have been published
in predominantly white left/progressive media, while indigenous people
continue to mark the holiday as a "National Day of Mourning".

In recent years I have refused to participate in Thanksgiving Day meals,
even with friends and family who share this critical analysis and reject
the national mythology around manifest destiny. In bowing out of those
gatherings, I would often tell folks that I hated Thanksgiving. I realize
now that "hate" is the wrong word to describe my emotional reaction to the
holiday. I am afraid of Thanksgiving. More accurately, I am afraid of what
Thanksgiving tells us about both the dominant culture and much of the
alleged counterculture.

Here's what I think it tells us: As a society, the United States is
intellectually dishonest, politically irresponsible, and morally bankrupt.
This is a society in which even progressive people routinely allow
national and family traditions to trump fundamental human decency. It's a
society in which, in the privileged sectors, getting along and not causing
trouble are often valued above honesty and accountability. Though it's
painful to consider, it's possible that such a society is beyond
redemption. Such a consideration becomes frightening when we recognize
that all this goes on in the most affluent and militarily powerful country
in the history of the world, but a country that is falling apart - an
empire in decline.

Thanksgiving should teach us all to be afraid.

Although it's well known to anyone who wants to know, let me summarize the
argument against Thanksgiving: European invaders exterminated nearly the
entire indigenous population to create the United States. Without that
holocaust, the United States as we know it would not exist. The United
States celebrates a Thanksgiving Day holiday dominated not by atonement
for that horrendous crime against humanity but by a falsified account of
the "encounter" between Europeans and American Indians. When confronted
with this, most people in the United States (outside of indigenous
communities) ignore the history or attack those who make the argument.
This is intellectually dishonest, politically irresponsible, and morally
bankrupt.

In left/radical circles, even though that basic critique is widely
accepted, a relatively small number of people argue that we should
renounce the holiday and refuse to celebrate it in any fashion. Most
leftists who celebrate Thanksgiving claim that they can individually
redefine the holiday in a politically progressive fashion in private,
which is an illusory dodge: We don't define holidays individually or
privately - the idea of a holiday is rooted in its collective, shared
meaning. When the dominant culture defines a holiday in a certain fashion,
one can't pretend to redefine it in private. To pretend we can do that
also is intellectually dishonest, politically irresponsible, and morally
bankrupt.

I press these points with no sense of moral superiority. For many years I
didn't give these questions a thought, and for some years after that I sat
sullenly at Thanksgiving dinners, unwilling to raise my voice. For the
past few years I've spent the day alone, which was less stressful for me
personally (and, probably, less stressful for people around me) but had no
political effect. This year I've avoided the issue by accepting a speaking
invitation in Canada, taking myself out of the country on that day. But
that feels like a cheap resolution, again with no political effect in the
United States.

The next step for me is to seek creative ways to use the tension around
this holiday for political purposes, to highlight the white-supremacist
and predatory nature of the dominant culture, then and now. Is it possible
to find a way to bring people together in public to contest the values of
the dominant culture? How can those of us who want to reject that dominant
culture meet our intellectual, political, and moral obligations? How can
we act righteously without slipping into self-righteousness? What
strategies create the most expansive space possible for honest engagement
with others?

Along with allies in Austin, I've struggled with the question of how to
create an alternative public event that could contribute to a more honest
accounting of the American holocausts in the past (not only the indigenous
genocide, but African slavery) and present (the murderous U.S. assault on
the developing world, especially in the past six decades, in places such
as Vietnam and Iraq).

Some have suggested an educational event, bringing in speakers to talk
about those holocausts. Others have suggested a gathering focused on
atonement. Should the event be more political or more spiritual? Perhaps
some combination of methods and goals is possible.

However we decide to proceed, we can't ignore the ugly ideological
realities of the holiday. My fear of those realities is appropriate but
facing reality need not leave us paralyzed by fear; instead it can help us
understand the contours of the multiple crises - economic and ecological,
political and cultural - that we face. The challenge is to channel our
fear into action. I hope that next year I will find a way to take another
step toward a more meaningful honoring of our intellectual, political, and
moral obligations.

As we approach Thanksgiving Day, I'm eager to hear about the successful
strategies of others. For such advice, I would be thankful.

Robert Jensen is a journalism professor at the University of Texas at
Austin and board member of the Third Coast Activist Resource Center
http://thirdcoastactivist.org. His latest book is Getting Off: Pornography
and the End of Masculinity (South End Press, 2007). Jensen is also the
author of The Heart of Whiteness: Race, Racism, and White Privilege and
Citizens of the Empire: The Struggle to Claim Our Humanity (both from City
Lights Books); and Writing Dissent: Taking Radical Ideas from the Margins
to the Mainstream (Peter Lang). He can be reached at
rjensen [at] uts.cc.utexas.edu and his articles can be found online at
http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/index.html.


--------11 of 12--------

>From the River to the Sea
by Gilad Atzmon
November 13th, 2009
Dissident Voice

Let.s once and for all stop getting excited about America mounting
pressure on Israel to freeze West Bank settlements. The entire fascination
with the topic is a product of Zionist spin. It is there to divert
attention from the root cause of the conflict: The robbery of Palestine
and Palestinians in the name of a "Jewish home coming". The call to stop
Israeli construction in the West Bank is there to leave us with the false
impression that the robbery of Palestine started in 1967. The facts are
known to many of us, but not to all. The vast majority of Palestinians
were expelled from their towns, villages, fields and orchards in 1948.

What seems as an American peace initiative putting pressure on Israel to
halt its expansion into the West Bank is in fact an agenda that is
promoted by Zionists within the US Administration who realise like the
late Sharon, that the only chance for the Jewish state to survive the next
decade, is to shrink into a little Jewish shtetle (ghetto). The Two state
solution is indeed the last effort to keep Zionism alive.

Netanyahu is far from being stupid. He understands it all. He knows that
his Zionist Revisionist father's dream of "greater Eretz Yisrael" is
unattainable.

Haaretz reported that the Israeli PM admitted in Washington that he was
committed to "two states living side by side". However, he stressed that
the "the right of Palestinian refugees to return to the homes from which
they were expelled, would not be on the table". Seemingly, an Israeli
hawkish PM is voluntarily confronting the Israeli original sin namely the
expulsion of the vast majority of the Palestinians people. However, the
fact that he insists that it won't be "on the table" can only mean that it
is on the table already. "They", continues Netanyahu, "must abandon the
fantasy of flooding Israel with refugees, give up irredentist claims to
the Negev and Galilee, and declare unequivocally that the conflict is
finally over".

Clearly, Netanyahu expresses here a wish that is shared by most if not all
Israelis. They all dream to open their eyes in the morning just to find
out that all Goyim, Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims just left the region.

I am here to advise Netanyahu and every Israeli who is willing to listen
that this is not going to happen. As much as being flooded by "refugee"
Palestinians is a deep Israeli nightmare, it is far from being a
Palestinian fantasy. It is actually a reality waiting to happen. Israel
has lost its opportunity to reconcile with its neighbours. It failed to
settle its conflict with the indigenous people of the land. The fate of
Israel will be determined by "facts on the ground" namely demography. In
terms of reconciliation, Israel has past the no return Zone. Its fate is
doomed. One Palestine from the river to the sea is not any more a matter
of "if" but rather a question of "when".

Unlike most Israelis who dismiss the Palestinian cause, Netanyahu admitted
today that Palestinians were indeed expelled. For the first time
Palestinians' "irredentist claims" are being addressed by an Israeli PM.
And yet, Netanyahu should stop deluding himself and his people. It is not
just the Negev and Galilee. It is actually every piece of land between the
river and the sea: Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa, Be'er Sheva and every
village, orchard, field, river and tree in between. The only question that
is left open is how long will it take for the Shekel to drop? How long
will it take before Israelis grasp that they dwell on stolen land? How
long will it take before the Israelis realise that the battle is lost? How
long will it take for the Israelis to internalise the obvious fact that
they have once again managed to get on the wrong side of their Neighbours?

Gilad Atzmon was born in Israel and served in the Israeli military. He
lives in London, and is the author of two novels: A Guide to the Perplexed
and the recently released My One and Only Love. Atzmon is also one of the
most accomplished jazz saxophonists in Europe. He can be reached at:
atz [at] onetel.net.uk. Read other articles by Gilad.


--------12 of 12--------

 City hall is filled
 with unquenchable stench of
 rotting incumbents.


------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   - David Shove             shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu
   rhymes with clove         Progressive Calendar
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