[Peace-discuss] Re: **ISO Events This Week**
C. G. Estabrook
galliher at uiuc.edu
Thu Aug 9 15:21:15 CDT 2007
Martin--
I should think that AWARE would be interested in sponsoring Dahar Jamail
and contributing to the cost. A proposal could be considered at the
meeting this coming Sunday. Give me a figure for what you're asking.
Regards, Carl
ISO Champaign wrote:
> thanks for the response Carl! yes, we hope to work more in concert with
> AWARE.
>
> btw, did you happen to get the email about helping us sponsor Dahr
> Jamail? We really don't feel that we can bring him to Champaign without
> support from the community, including help getting a possible honorarium.
>
> what do you think?-Martin Smith
>
> On 8/6/07, *C. G. Estabrook* <galliher at uiuc.edu
> <mailto:galliher at uiuc.edu>> wrote:
>
> Glad to see you feature the important letter by AWARE's Roger Epperson.
>
> State and Revolution is an interesting and important text, but Lenin
> himself took a rather different view once he became the state. --CGE
>
>
> ISO Champaign wrote:
> > International Socialist Organization Upcoming Events
> >
> > 1. Upcoming Mtg.: Study and discussion of Lenin's State and
> Revolution,
> > Aug. 8 at 7pm, Pekara Bistro and Grill at 116 N. Neil St.
> > 2. VICTORY! COKE IS KICKED OFF CAMPUS!!!
> > 3. Separate and Unequal: articles on segregation in Iraq
> > 4. Blackwater Contract Scandal at UIUC
> > ***************************************
> > 1.
> > hey everyone!
> >
> > You won't want to miss our upcoming ISO Meeting. We will be
> having our
> > last gathering for the summer at Pekara Bistro & Grill on Wed.,
> August
> > 8, at 7pm.
> >
> > We plan to discuss Lenin's State and Revolution, a classic
> revolutionary
> > text!
> >
> > Second only the Communist Manifesto in importance for the socialist
> > movement, in it, Lenin argues with wit and biting prose that the
> state
> > is a reflection of class interests. As such, what strategies
> socialists
> > and revolutionaries devise must grasp that in order to change the
> > economic and social order, one must also change the nature of the
> state.
> > Put simply, we must "Smash the State," not merely reform it.
> >
> > State and Revolution can be read online here:
> > http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/
> <http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/>
> >
> <https://ms5.express.cites.uiuc.edu/wm/mail/fetch.html?urlid=42539be75f188adfef9a080c7fae5d9c5&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.marxists.org%2Farchive%2Flenin%2Fworks%2F1917%2Fstaterev%2F
> <https://ms5.express.cites.uiuc.edu/wm/mail/fetch.html?urlid=42539be75f188adfef9a080c7fae5d9c5&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.marxists.org%2Farchive%2Flenin%2Fworks%2F1917%2Fstaterev%2F>>
> >
> >
> > OR YOU can purchase a copy from Ryan for $5.00--just shoot him
> and email
> > to meet at: convention+iso at gmail.com
> <mailto:convention+iso at gmail.com> <mailto: convention+iso at gmail.com
> <mailto:convention+iso at gmail.com>>
> >
> > in solidarity!
> >
> > ************************************************
> > 2.
> > Coke is out!
> >
> > After 2 years of intensive and sustained effort, the University of
> > Illinois, Urbana Champaign is no longer an exclusive Coca-Cola
> campus!
> > In a recent decision, the State of Illinois has granted pouring
> rights
> > to Pepsi, and the Urbana Champaign campus has agreed to join this
> > contract. Further, the University has declared that certain
> retail shops
> > on campus will be outside the contract where drinks may be purchased
> > from multiple vendors. For more details, please read our press
> release
> > available at http://caccuc.blogspot.com/
> >
> > The effort to hold Coca-Cola accountable for its egregious practices
> > around the world would not have succeeded without your continued and
> > over-whelming support. Every phone call, letter, petition and
> personal
> > boycotts have helped toward making this campus coke-free. Thank you!
> >
> > While we welcome the non-renewal of the contract with Coca-Cola, we
> > would like to continue to highlight and mobilize
> around corporatization
> > of higher education on our campus. We invite you to join us for a
> > debriefing dialog on August 29, 2007. Please look out for meeting
> > updates on our website [http://caccuc.blogspot.com/].
> >
> > Please share this information widely. If you and/or your group
> would be
> > interested in participating in the afore-mentioned dialog, please
> rsvp
> > by August 20th to cokeactiongroup at riseup.net
> <mailto:cokeactiongroup at riseup.net>
> >
> <http://us.f537.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=cokeactiongroup@riseup.net
> <http://us.f537.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=cokeactiongroup@riseup.net>>.
> >
> > In Solidarity,
> > Coalition Against Coke Contracts (CACC)
> > http://caccuc.blogspot.com/
> >
> > ***********************************************
> > 3.
> > At US Base, Iraqis Must Use Separate Latrine
> > http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080607C.shtml
> > < http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080607C.shtml>
> > Mike Drummond reports for McClatchy Newspapers: "It's been nearly 60
> > years since President Harry Truman ended racial segregation in the US
> > military. But at Forward Operating Base Warhorse it's alive and well,
> > perhaps the only US military facility with such rules, Iraqi
> > interpreters here say."
> >
> > Segregation: The American Experience
> > http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080607G.shtml
> > In Le Monde, sociologist, teacher and researcher Eric Fassin
> elucidates
> > the lessons for the desegregation movement in the US and in
> France from
> > the US Supreme Court decision in Parents v. Seattle.
> >
> > Amy R. Gershkoff | Saving Soldiers' Jobs
> > http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080607E.shtml
> <http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080607E.shtml>
> > Amy R. Gershkoff writes for The Washington Post: "Thousands of
> the brave
> > men and women lucky enough to return safely from Iraq are being left
> > without jobs, without hope and without recourse. The government has
> > failed to protect these reservists and has covered up the
> evidence. It
> > is time for Americans to protect those who protect us by demanding
> > thorough oversight of the Uniformed Services Employment and
> Reemployment
> > Rights Act."
> >
> > ****************************************************
> > 4.
> > a. letter to editor in News-Gazette:
> >
> > Need investigation of UI's Blackwater link
> >
> >
> > Sunday August 5, 2007
> >
> > In an exclusive story, the Chicago Tribune reported on July 31 of an
> > investigation involving the director of the prestigious University of
> > Illinois Police Training Institute and Blackwater U.S.A., the
> > controversial private paramilitary Iraq contractor. Blackwater USA is
> > the world's largest paramilitary organization with over 20,000
> soldiers
> > and its own air force.
> >
> > It is not only that The News Gazette was scooped by the Chicago
> Tribune,
> > but to this reader's knowledge no local reporting of the
> Blackwater USA
> > and police training institute connection, including even a press
> release
> > from the police-training institute itself has appeared in print,
> even
> > though Blackwater and the institute signed a collaboration
> agreement in
> > May 2007.
> >
> > Lack of local reporting about Blackwater USA, allegedly involved
> in the
> > torture at Abu Ghraib prison, and other paramilitary groups
> including
> > Triple Canopy, another private contractor that signed an
> agreement early
> > in 2007 with the police-training institute, has created an
> informational
> > vacuum.
> >
> > Hopefully, the UI will undertake to thoroughly investigate the
> > relationships between Blackwater, Triple Canopy and other potential
> > paramilitary connections to the institute, and The News-Gazette and
> > other media will report on how these relationships with paramilitary
> > groups may adversely affect the quality of law enforcement
> training in
> > Illinois.
> >
> > Do we really want global policing organizations involved in the
> training
> > of Illinois law enforcement and to depart from the 50-year-old
> tradition
> > of a local program that trains Illinois police to protect and serve?
> >
> > ROGER EPPERSON
> >
> > Urbana
> >
> > --------------
> >
> > b. Chicago Tribune's article:
> >
> >
> http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-blackwater31jul31,1,366933.story?ctrack=1&cset=true
> <http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-blackwater31jul31,1,366933.story?ctrack=1&cset=true>
> > <
> https://ms5.express.cites.uiuc.edu/wm/mail/fetch.html?urlid=41f1fb72a85237f97dd6d0503f8af345f&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.chicagotribune.com%2Fnews%2Flocal%2Fchi-blackwater31jul31%2C1%2C366933.story%3Fctrack%3D1%26cset%3Dtrue
> <https://ms5.express.cites.uiuc.edu/wm/mail/fetch.html?urlid=41f1fb72a85237f97dd6d0503f8af345f&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.chicagotribune.com%2Fnews%2Flocal%2Fchi-blackwater31jul31%2C1%2C366933.story%3Fctrack%3D1%26cset%3Dtrue>>
> > TRIBUNE EXCLUSIVE
> > Blackwater-U. of I. tie
> >
> > Tom Dempsey is under scrutiny for a link to military trainers
> >
> > By E.A. Torriero and Jodi S. Cohen | Tribune staff reporters
> > 10:03 AM CDT, July 31, 2007
> >
> > The University of Illinois is investigating potential conflicts of
> > interest involving the director of the school's prestigious
> > police-training institute and Blackwater U.S.A., the military
> contractor.
> >
> > The institute's director, Tom Dempsey, signed an agreement in May
> > allowing the state facility and private contractor to exchange
> staff and
> > students and share facilities. The pact could give Blackwater a
> foothold
> > in training candidates for sworn law-enforcement positions in
> Illinois.
> >
> > Even as he represented the institute, Dempsey has also been
> working as a
> > Blackwater consultant in his spare time, top university officials
> > confirmed Monday in response to questions from the Tribune. On
> July 19,
> > two months after Dempsey signed the institute's partnership agreement
> > with Blackwater, he submitted a written request for time off to
> consult
> > for Blackwater.
> >
> > University administrators who were unaware of the partnership
> agreement
> > agreed to the 30-day leave of absence, which Dempsey requested so he
> > could travel to Afghanistan to work for the North Carolina-based
> company
> > in anti-drug-trafficking and police training of Afghan forces,
> according
> > to university provost Linda Katehi.
> >
> > Dempsey, 58, a former Marine and director of the institute since
> 2002,
> > did not respond to several Tribune requests for comment last week
> and
> > Monday. He is paid $118,178 annually by the university.
> >
> > Sources at the university, who believe Dempsey is currently in
> > Afghanistan, said he has corresponded with the university by
> e-mail in
> > recent days. Officials plan to speak with him by phone this week
> about
> > the potential conflict of interest.
> >
> > The university's conflict policy requires employees to disclose
> whether,
> > through an outside venture, they are receiving $10,000 or more
> from a
> > company doing business with the university.
> >
> > Katehi said that in most cases, if an individual notes a potential
> > conflict on disclosure forms, those forms are not accepted without a
> > thorough investigation.
> >
> > She said the university is now trying to find out whether Dempsey was
> > employed by Blackwater when he signed the partnership, and why
> any work
> > he is doing for Blackwater is not spelled out in the partnership
> agreement.
> >
> > The probe comes as Blackwater, a security firm whose most-publicized
> > business is providing private paramilitary personnel for
> America's war
> > on terror, is already facing controversy surrounding a training
> facility
> > opened last spring in far northwestern Illinois.
> >
> > The university's institute, located in Champaign, is one of the
> largest
> > in the nation. It trains would-be law-enforcement and corrections
> officers.
> >
> > By aligning with the institute, Blackwater could then receive
> approval
> > from the Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board to
> become
> > part of the primary training process for law enforcement, state
> > officials said, possibly opening up future contracts for Blackwater.
> > Only five facilities in Illinois are fully certified by the board to
> > train candidates for sworn law-enforcement positions.
> >
> > Board officials said they have not received an application from
> > Blackwater to align with the university.
> >
> > Now university officials say they will evaluate whether it is
> > appropriate for the state's largest and most visible education
> facility
> > to be aligned with Blackwater.
> >
> > "We are trying to reconsider that and get more information about what
> > their intention was and to make sure there is an alignment
> between the
> > mission of Blackwater and the mission of the campus," Katehi
> said. "We
> > don't want our name associated with a firm that is controversial."
> >
> > A Blackwater spokeswoman said it is against company policy to discuss
> > employees in sensitive positions overseas. She said the university
> > agreement, however, involves only domestic law-enforcement
> training and
> > not military support efforts.
> >
> > The agreement does not call for money to change hands, according to a
> > copy obtained by the Tribune. Cooperation would be developed "as
> deemed
> > beneficial by the two parties."
> >
> > "It's an exchange of services," said Anne Tyrrell, the Blackwater
> > spokeswoman.
> >
> > Thus far, Blackwater has not been involved in training at the
> institute,
> > according to Blackwater and university officials. How the two
> > organizations would work together is unclear.
> >
> > Formed in 1997, Blackwater tumbled into the American
> consciousness when
> > four of its workers were killed and their bodies mutilated in
> Fallujah,
> > Iraq, in 2004.
> >
> > In addition to Blackwater's sprawling 7,000-acre North Carolina
> campus,
> > used for paramilitary and law-enforcement training, Blackwater
> North in
> > Mt. Carroll, Ill., has trained some 200 people from 40
> law-enforcement
> > agencies from as far away as New York and California, company
> officials
> > said.
> >
> > Since opening last spring 150 miles west of Chicago, Blackwater North
> > has endured criticism and questions regarding its operation from
> > neighbors and peace groups protesting "America's private army."
> >
> > It is unlikely that any of the training ventures with the university
> > would take place at Blackwater North, Tyrrell said.
> >
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
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