I N T E R N E T ' S M A O I S T BI-M O N T H L Y = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = XX XX XXX XX XX X X XXX XXX XXX XXX X X X X X X X XX X X X X X X X V X X X V X X X X X X X XX XXX X X X X X X XX X X X X X X X XXX X X X V XXX X XXX XXX = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = THE MAOIST INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT MIM Notes 170 September 15, 1998 MIM Notes speaks to and from the viewpoint of the world's oppressed majority, and against the imperialist-patriarchy. Pick it up and wield it in the service of the people. support it, struggle with it and write for it. IN THIS ISSUE: 1. U.$. IMPERIALISM CONTINUES WORLD WAR III 2. NUMBER IMPRISONED IN AMERIKAN CONTINUES TO RISE 3. LETTERS 4. ALBANY PIGS & ALL PIGS ARE AMERIKKKA¹S MILITARY ARM FOR NATIONAL OPPRESSION; REPORT INCRIMINATES ALBANY POLICE 5. ALBANY COPS IMMUNE TO ASSAULT CHARGES 6. PROTESTS CONTINUE AGAINST U.$-BACKED INDONESIAN GOVERNMENT 7. PUERTO RICO SETS DATE FOR PHONY PLEBISCITE 8. SPIES TAKE $44 BILLION IN U.$. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY 9. REACTIONARY DOING TIME, DOING VIPASSANA TELLS PRISONERS: "FIND PRISON OPPRESSIVE? DON'T ORGANIZE, MEDITATE!" 10. U.$. BOMBS IMPORTANT PHARMACEUTICAL PLANT IN SUDAN 11. CONTINUED U.$. ATTACKS AGAINST IRAQI PEOPLE 12. U.$. IS BIGGEST TERRORIST IN AFGHANISTAN 13. DOWN WITH IMPERIALISM! U.$. BOMBINGS SHOW IMPERIALIST LUST FOR WAR 14. PEOPLE PROTEST IMPERIALIST MILITARISM 15. CIA TERRORISM GROWS IN ANGOLA 16. WHAT'S THE BIGGEST ORGANIZED CRIME FAMILY? THE FBI 17. GUATEMALA SUES U.$. TOBACCO FIRMS 18. OUTRAGE OVER RAPIST'S UNREPENTANT FRIEND: DON'T RELY ON IMPERIALIST COURTS AND COPS TO END PATRIARCHY! 19. PIG COLLECTION OF PRISONER'S DNA HALTED 20. RAIL RAISES CONSCIOUSNESS AND FUNDS AT WARPED TOUR 21. HAND-WRITING ANALYSIS IS LATEST MANAGEMENT HOCUS-POCUS 22. WHEN YOU ROLL SNAKE EYES, THE WHITE HOUSE WINS 23. UNDER LOCK & KEY: NEWS FROM PRISONS AND PRISONERS * * * WHAT IS MIM? The Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM) is a revolutionary communist party that upholds Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, comprising the collection of existing or emerging Maoist internationalist parties in the English-speaking imperialist countries and their English-speaking internal semi-colonies, as well as the existing or emerging Spanish-speaking Maoist internationalist parties of Aztlan, Puerto Rico and other territories of the U.S. Empire. MIM Notes is the newspaper of MIM. Notas Rojas is the newspaper of the Spanish- speaking parties or emerging parties of MIM. MIM is an internationalist organization that works from the vantage point of the Third World proletariat; thus, its members are not Amerikans, but world citizens. MIM struggles to end the oppression of all groups over other groups: classes, genders, nations. MIM knows this is only possible by building public opinion to seize power through armed struggle. Revolution is a reality for North America as the military becomes over-extended in the government's attempts to maintain world hegemony. MIM differs from other communist parties on three main questions: (1) MIM holds that after the proletariat seizes power in socialist revolution, the potential exists for capitalist restoration under the leadership of a new bourgeoisie within the communist party itself. In the case of the USSR, the bourgeoisie seized power after the death of Stalin in 1953; in China, it was after Mao's death and the overthrow of the "Gang of Four" in 1976. (2) MIM upholds the Chinese Cultural Revolution as the farthest advance of communism in human history. (3) MIM believes the North American white-working-class is primarily a non- revolutionary worker-elite at this time; thus, it is not the principal vehicle to advance Maoism in this country. MIM accepts people as members who agree on these basic principles and accept democratic centralism, the system of majority rule, on other questions of party line. "The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is universally applicable. We should regard it not as dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is not merely a matter of learning terms and phrases, but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of revolution." -- Mao Zedong, Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 208 * * * U.$. IMPERIALISM CONTINUES WORLD WAR III The United Snakes of Imperialism dealt its most recent military blow of World War III on August 20, 1998 with its bombing of Sudan and Afghanistan. Imperialism economically, politically and militarily dominates oppressed nations throughout the world. The purpose of imperialist hegemonic control is to extract wealth and exploit labor to increase the wealth and power of the imperialist nation. The most recent military strikes and the intensified so-called anti-terrorist campaign is part of a war long ago launched against the majority of the world's peoples -- World War III. This war is the primary cause of death, starvation, poverty, illness, crime and social problems. MIM supports the growing anti-imperialist sentiment and organizing among oppressed nation masses. We denounce the recent military attacks and MIM strongly denounces the real terrorist: Amerikkkan imperialism. In the official Amerikkkan rhetoric immediately following the strikes against Sudan and Afghanistan in which 75 Tomahawk cruise missiles were used, the United Snakes claimed that there was "compelling," yet classified, information which linked Osama bin Laden to the bombing attacks against the Amerikkkan embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. The United Snakes used this as reason for bombing alleged training camps of Islamic rebels in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan. A CNN-USA Today poll following the bombings stated that the majority of Amerikkka supported these imperialist attacks with 65% of parasitic imperialist masses in the country supporting the use of further action including ground deployment to allegedly stamp out Islamic terrorism. Immediately following the bombing, Pakistan announced that one of the never-miss missiles landed in its territory and injured a half dozen people. Clinton quickly called the Pakistani president. Afterward, Pakistan retracted its statement that a missile had hit its territory. Several days after the bombing, protests around the world, and compelling and well-documented information made clear that the U.$. had struck a genuine pharmaceutical plant. The constantly changing and contrived justifications that the u.s. uses to justify invasion of other countries, such as the claim that this plant was manufacturing a deadly nerve gas, do not convince MIM. And even if this were true MIM would not support the biggest terrorist organization in the world invading other countries as a self-appointed global police. As MIM Notes goes to press, the people of Sudan as well as many other countries have called for a fact-finding committee of the United Nations to prove that the factory had nothing to do with the production of chemical weapons components. The United Snakes says that this is not necessary and refuses to turn over the evidence which supposedly justifies the direct military invasion of two nations. MIM calls on all anti-militarists, pacifists and progressives to work with RAIL and oppose the direct military attacks against the Third World people. MIM calls on all anti- imperialists to organize against this particular campaign and imperialism in general and build genuine anti-imperialist organizations as strong forces within the United Front against imperialism. The MIM-led United Front against imperialism carries out education campaigns while developing independent institutions of the oppressed. We build towards the day when we will tear down the current illegitimate Amerikkkan government through armed revolutionary struggle to ending oppression and construct a society which represents the interests of the masses. * * * NUMBER IMPRISONED IN AMERIKAN CONTINUES TO RISE: Trend towards fascism against oppressed nations continues The number of people in Amerika's prisons and jails rose to 1,725,842 in 1997 - an increase of 5.2 percent. By 1997, the number of incarcerated Black men passed the number of white men in prisons and jails. Close to ten percent of Black men aged 25 through 29 were in prison last year. The imprisonment of Black men at eight times the rate of white men is an example of how the prisons system is a tool for the repression of oppressed nations within u.$. borders.(1) As the Bureau of Justice Statistics report citing these figures is being publicized, we are also learning that all the talk of decreased crime rates in Amerika may be just that. Several major U.$. cities have recently been exposed for tampering with their own crime rate statistics, especially downgrading felonies to less serious crimes to reduce the number of crimes that get reported to the federal government.(2) MIM likes to point out that despite the wildly growing number of prisoners in this country in the past 30 years, the crime rate remained steady. So Amerikan prisons do nothing to end crime. The fact that several police departments tampered with their crime rate statistics goes to show that crime rates are irrelevant to imperialism. In 1998, lower crime rates sell police departments and so lower crime rates are what the departments deliver. The important thing is to keep up some justification for increased fascism against oppressed nation communities. MIM calls the growing prison system and the police departments that feed off of putting people in prison all part of emerging fascism in Amerika. While we hold that Amerika is not fascist at this time, there are elements of fascism in this country, specifically in the prisons. Fascism is defined as the combination of the state and capital for the extraction of forced labor, and we see fascism in the pay-for-imprisonment systems that prisoners are being subjected to around Amerika. We see fascism particularly in prisons growth, complete with private capital investment in prisons.(3) Texas has the highest rate of imprisonment in the u.$. - 717 prisoners per 100,000 population. The nearest competitor is California, with 672 per 100,000. When it comes to regions, the South "wins," with 506 prisoners per 100,00 throughout the region.(1) Coincidentally, the two largest private prisons companies in Amerika are based in the South -- Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), in Tennessee (4) and Wackenhut in Florida. Business is booming for private prisons as Amerika cracks down on the oppressed. States all over the country are contracting with private prison companies to build pieces of their state system. Earlier this year, 100 Indiana prisoners were sent to a CCA-run prison in Tennessee. They are to remain there indefinitely. Contrary to the usual argument that private prisons are so great because they cost the state less money, it will cost roughly the same to house these 100 men in the Hardeman County Correctional Facility as it would have cost to keep them in Indiana.(5) More recently, CCA has signed agreements to open new prisons and jails with the state of Montana, and the county of Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Montana agreement calls for a 500-bed men's prison that will cost $25 million. The prison will be expandable to house 1,500 prisoners and will be built and then run for four years by CCA from the time it is completed in August 1999. This contract is supposed to bring in $9 million per year for CCA while it houses 500 prisoners.(6) In Tulsa, CCA will build a 1,440-bed multi-security-level jail of which 1,100 beds will be used immediately. The Tulsa facility should be open by April, 1999. After signing the Tulsa deal, CCA was running and building a total of 79 repressive facilities with 64,946 beds in the U.$. and other countries. The Tulsa contract will bring in more than $17 million for CCA when the jail is filled to capacity.(7) The state of Georgia recently built its first private prison - contracting with Cornell Corrections Corporation. The prison cost $38 million to build and will imprison 750 people. The town where the prison is located, Folkston, is apparently thrilled that it can now take part in the prisons boom. It is expecting to double its population from 2,400 to 4,800 because it can now support more citizens who will live off the repressive institution.(8) Just as we see emerging fascism in private corporations opening and running their own prisons for profit, we see it in state prison systems charging prisoners for their own imprisonment. One such pay-for-imprisonment is Ohio's recently adopted plan to squeeze $3 from a prisoner each time s/he makes a non- emergency visit to a doctor or other medical personnel. The state claims that the policy is intended to discourage false claims of illness -- so that prisoners will not try to skip days of work by claiming they are sick when they are not. But with inmate pay scales averaging to $18 per month, and needing that money to buy things like stamps, envelopes and soap, $3 per medical visit looks a lot more like extortion or an ultimatum to keep prisoners from seeking care than it looks like a deterrent to skipping work. An Ohio prisons spokesperson claims that prisoners who do not have money in their accounts are not denied care.(4) And possibly this is true, but MIM already knows that prisoners in Michigan have debits placed on their accounts regardless of whether the money is there when they make a charge or not. In Iowa and Michigan, prisoners also pay $3 a pop for health care visits, and this can be for minimal care or advice.(9) And in Illinois, prisoners are provided some health care within the prison, but are charged $2 if they have to leave the prison to go to the hospital.(10) Prisons growth With so much money to be made off imprisonment, it's no wonder Amerika is rushing to lock more people up than ever before. But rather than admit the real motives for building prisons -- national oppression and profit -- the U.$. government and media focus on the supposed fact that Amerikans "are safer because more criminals are behind bars."(8) But the same numbers that show the prisoner population growing at a rate that will top 2 million by the year 2000 show that most of this growth can be attributed to those under lock and key serving longer sentences and being denied parole. Prisoners incarcerated for parole violations also now account for 30 percent of the total prison population, up from 15 percent in 1980. And all of these changes amount to the same thing: prisoners are serving longer sentences for the same convictions.(1) This straight-up lock-em-up approach to prisoners reveals the gross hypocrisy of the system that claims it is for "corrections," and of those state systems like the one in Ohio that use the term "rehabilitation" in their names. By criminalizing prisoners, and by arguing that the most correct approach to crime is to keep human beings confined to prison cells for more years off their lives, the statisticians, analysts, policy makers, and the keepers of the keys are arguing that once a persyn is convicted of a crime that's it for them, bar them from society for life. MIM agitates against prisons and for prisoners' rights because we believe firmly that human potential is infinite, as Mao said. And prisons in Amerika do all they can to destroy human beings' capacity and will to exercise their potential. We write propaganda like this to show that while the bourgeoisie has its side of the story that says society is better with people being locked down, we have our side too. MIM builds independent institutions of the oppressed and builds public opinion in favor of the just struggles of the oppressed. We do this without any pretensions toward being objective because we are firmly subjectively invested in the interests of the oppressed. We are working toward the goal of revolution to overturn the oppressive institutions of the current imperialist society and replace them with institutions run by and in the interests of the international proletariat. Notes: 1. New York Times 9 August 1998, p. 14. (The contrasts between the white and Black nations in the prison figures are most stark, but part of this is attributable to inaccurate or incomplete reporting on Latinos in Federal surveys. Even with current reporting, 2.6 percent of "Hispanic" men between 25 and 29 are in prisons and jails -- compared to 0.8 percent of white men the same age. But it is impossible to distinguish between Blacks and the Latino nations with these categories because the government does not clarify how many Latinos are of African descent, etc. The article MIM found on this subject also did not list any figures for First Nations.) 2. New York Times 3 August 1998, p. 1. 3. MIM Theory 11: Amerikan Prisons on Trial. 4. Associated Press 10 August 1998. 5. The Evansville Press 10 April 1998, p. 15. 6. CCA press release 22 July 1998. 7. CCA press release 27 July 1998. 8. Savannah Morning News 10 August 1998. 9. Michigan DOC Notice to Prisoners: Prisoner Co-Pay for Health Care; An Iowa prisoner 16 July, 1998. 10. An Illinois prisoner 13 May 1998. (MIM is aware of many other states charging prisoners for pieces of their imprisonment, but there are too many instances to list in one place. Contact us if you would like to work with us on compiling all this information for quick anti-prisons activism reference.) * * * LETTERS Black wimmin face national oppression Dear Editor, I am writing your newspaper to protest and to provide a counter-analysis to "Black Birthrate for Single Woman the United States," which appeared in the New York Times July, 1, 1998. One of the oldest myths of US society is the sexual and family irresponsibility of Blacks in America. Whether it be the stereotype of the Black man as 'Mandingo' (the sexual stud) or the Black woman as a 'baby-making welfare queen' the sexual and irresponsibility myths are part of the pack of racist lies, slander, and defamation that are at the core of American ideology and values. A society cannot oppress a nationality without having an arsenal of ideas that justify that oppression. Newspapers, television, radio, movies, and popular culture in US imperialist society arc all undercoated with these myths as to why imperialism is 'correct and good.' Racist and sexist myths are used to justify every embodiment of sexual and racist oppression. In this instance, this newspaper article would have the naive reader to believe that if fewer single Black women gave birth to children, fewer Black people would live in poverty. Poverty is therefore defined by the NYT as a variable that can be controlled by the people. And Black poverty is, therefore, linked to poor, unmarried single Black mothers. The unspoken assumption is that Black women, not America, are the cause of this poverty. A revolutionary and historical analysis is the only method that can be used to arrive at the truth. We must define revolutionary as the set of ideas and values that seeks to overturn the power of capital (banking, finance, and manufacturing) by the oppressed toilers and masses. In this situation, the truth is that Black people in the United States (the descendants of the slave trade of the 17th, 18th and 19th century into the Western Hemisphere) have had a relationship to the United States government and the United States economy that is one of racism and national oppression. Post-slavery America has seen the full development of various classes in the Black nation, mostly working class and poor, with large numbers of middle class, and a small elite. Large numbers of Black people in the United States live in poverty, both women and men. (The majority of Black people are women.) Although this article will not quote statistics, the earning power of Black people is less than white people in the United States. The earning power of Black women is less than Black men. And the majority of Black families are headed by Black women. Therefore, the relationship between Black women and US imperialism is one of sexual and national oppression (also known as gender and economic racism). When these women bear children their families are, therefore, more likely to be poor than the children of a white American female. It must be remembered that racist US imperialism systematically under-employs Black people. It must be remembered that the dirtiest jobs in the economy are often filled by Blacks. It must be remembered that there are certain places in the American workforce where it is still rare to see a Black face (for example, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning jobs, or maintenance mechanics or electronic technicians or computer software technicians, et et cetera.) But there are many jobs where it is quite common to find Black single women (such as fast-food jobs, maids in hotels, and employees in dry cleaners, supermarket check-out cashiers.) Because of these realities, single Black female parents are more than likely to 'feel the heel' of the US economy on their neck while they work, live, and raise their families. This truth must be twisted by US imperialism because it is a truth that exposes the racist essence of the relationship between Black women and US imperialism. Therefore, articles are published that promote the myth of "irresponsibility" among Black single mothers. An interesting fact can also be seen by observing a chart in this same article. This particular line graph shows that while Black childbirths by Black single moms is supposedly decreasing, childbirths by white single women is not. No racist remarks or analysis is made about single white mothers causing white poverty. There is no need for US imperialism to create that lie. Why? Because white Americans do not face national oppression. The prisons are not reserved for them. And their wages are not depressed because of their structural relationship to US imperialism. Since this is not the case, lies and other myths will not be created to condemn them as a segment of US society. But since Black people do face national oppression in the United States, and since poor and working class Black women's wages are depressed as a consequence of their economic relationship to US imperialism, public opinion will be created to attempt to marginalize these women within US society. All dictatorships and all oppressive societies attempt to create scapegoats in order to hide the real reasons for glaring contradictions within their society. Single Black women are used as a scapegoat to explain the lingering poverty within the Black nation and the Black population. What can be done? The most important thing is to continue to build revolutionary movements, organizations, and theory. Without revolutionary movements, revolutionary organization and revolutionary theory, the revolutionary truth cannot be spread among the proletariat and oppressed masses. Without this trio, the power of capital cannot be opposed or overthrown. In this instance, the truth must be told far and wide. No sexist and racist attack on single Black mothers must be allowed to go unanswered. Revolutionaries should not shy away from important ideological issues such as the one discussed in this article. The imperialists attack their enemies daily, monthly, yearly and in each epoch with lies, slander, and myth. The revolutionaries, the proletariat, and their allies must spread their class truth in the same manner. This is the only way to create the conditions for staging winning important battles in the arena of ideas and politics. These battles and struggles are very important in waging the people's campaign to defeat US imperialism and its allies. --A comrade in the wind. July, 1998 MIM responds: We agree with this comrade's analysis of the national oppression faced by Black wimmin. The principal contradiction within u.s. borders is the contradiction between the oppressed and the oppressor nations. Because of this, the oppressed nations, including the Black nation, face the repression and oppression described by the writer. Because white people in the united snakes enjoy the status of oppressor nation, they also enjoy the cultural benefits which include propaganda portraying white wimmin as responsible mothers in contrast to Black wimmin as in the case of this New York Times article. We agree with the writer's conclusion that the only solution to this national oppression is revolutionary struggle. We must expose the ideas of our enemies for the lies that they are. And at the same time we must build an organization capable of overthrowing the imperialists using the lessons of past revolutionary struggles. Work with MIM to build this organization and expose the lies of our enemies. Send articles like the above to MIM Notes to help expose the imperialists. * * * ALBANY PIGS & ALL PIGS ARE AMERIKKKA¹S MILITARY ARM FOR NATIONAL OPPRESSION REPORT INCRIMINATES ALBANY POLICE by an RC Police brutality and national oppression within the Albany Police Department has been brought into the spotlight by local mainstream media in response to recent incidents. Two cases that occurred last year have been at the forefront of this coverage. The first case involved three young Black men who were attacked outside a local club by police yelling racist names who unleashed an attack dog on them. The second case involved a bar fight which ended by two off-duty officers bringing Jermaine Henderson to a police garage and beating him. In the latter case the court recently decided the pigs were all immune (see accompanying article pg. 5). In light of the recent attention given to police brutality, the Center for Law and Justice carried out an unscientific survey of Albany residents, and included it in "To Protect and Serve?" a status report on the relationship between the community and the Albany Police Department. The Center is a progressive group that has worked in Albany to advocate a lessening of the police state and the prison industrial complex in New York. For a more thorough history of police activity in the Albany area refer to the first section of the report which details a history of racism which was acknowledged by state officials and the whole police department. But this is not just an Albany issue, this history could be of any city in the U.$. where police are Amerika¹s military arm for national oppression. Oppressed nations and youth don't trust cops The most incriminating confession in the Center's report may be that given by a former Albany police officer who assured that being Black, Latino, in an interracial couple, or driving a nicer car than an officer are all circumstances that make police beatings more likely to occur. "Police brutality has been going on forever in the Albany Police Department. It starts with the rookies right out of the academy..." This statement does not come as a huge surprise to people who are the victims of police brutality everyday, as the Center's survey indicates. Compared to whites, Blacks and Latinos interviewed by the Center had a much more negative attitude in general towards the police. Similarly, people ages 16-20 expected much less from the police than older people who got progressively more confidant in the police with age. These attitudes are evidence of a systematic form of oppression. Blacks and Latinos don' t trust the police because experiences have taught them that the police are not looking out for their interests. On the other hand a majority of whites know that the police exist to protect their material interests which involve maintaining hegemony over the oppressed nations of the world, specifically the oppressed in the U.$. when we're discussing the domestic police forces. And it is young people who recognize the injustice that exists in a system which uses a large militarized force to maintain the wealth of the minority over the majority of people of the world. These same young people often don't have a large stake in maintaining such a system and therefore must be targeted by the police to keep them in check for as long as they stay opposed to that system. As part of their service to the community, the Center for Law and Justice collects reports of police brutality from the people. From 1996-1997 they received 53 complaints against the police: including 27 for brutality and 16 for harassment. Out of the 27 brutality charges only 12 had enough confidence in the police department to file a charge directly with them. Of those 12, most had trouble with the filing process. As of the report, 6 had still been unresolved and five had been reported as "unfounded" complaints by the department's internal investigations. In fact, from 1991-1997 there were a total of 776 complaints filed with the department; 106 of which were for brutality. Of those only two were considered "substantiated" by the department itself. One of the problems dealt with by the Center is the difficulty that people face filing charges against police in the first place. They criticize the police department for "performing much of its work out of the public view and operating as a paramilitary operation set apart from the community." While this is true, this is inherent in the nature of a force whose purpose is to protect the interest of one group (the white settler nation) against the interest of another (oppressed nations.) They are not there to "serve the people" as the title of the report questions. Once one recognizes this, it becomes futile to try to turn the imperialist police into a force that serves the communities they are occupying. While organizing for more citizen power in police investigations is a progressive action, accepting the existence of the police will lead to a reformist strategy that depends on the cops to change the cops. MIM upholds a revolutionary platform which has the goal of eradicating the police as a part of the U$ government that is responsible for violent repression around the world. How to fight criminal injustice The Center's survey addressed a few possibilities for improving the relations between police and the community. The results were the following: 63.5% supported more cops on the street, 76.9% supported more police sponsored education programs, 89.4% supported community oversight of internal investigations, and 95.2% supported officer training in ethnic/cultural issues. (One should remember the survey was not carried out scientifically, therefore these numbers are probably flawed.) The worst of these solutions is to increase the number of police. It should be noted that only 33% of young people supported this option, while 100% of those over 60 did. Many people in the U.$. are under the false illusion that more police and prisons will bring more order to society by isolating the bad seeds. But as the police state of the latter part of this century advances, numbers are becoming more conclusive that increased police and prisons do not reduce crime at all. (See MIM Theory #11 "Amerikkkan Prisons on Trial" p.42 and other articles for more information on this. Available from MIM for $6.) The number three choice, more police programs, is also against the interests of the people, merely giving the police more power and influence over the community. For some reason the Center was "surprised" by the 89.4% who supported community oversight of the police. It is unclear why this was surprising to them. This solution is the only one of the four that could be progressive, and serve to help the community in dealing with the police. Carried out in the model of the Black Panther Party where the revolutionary organization policed the pigs and kept them from beating and killing people in the community, police oversight can literally save lives. However, this option does not stop systematic repression and can further the integrationist strategy of trying to get more pigs who are Black or Latino, but really represent the interests of the oppressor. Under the leadership of the proletariat can community policing be a tool against national oppression. The most popular choice, sensitivity training, is very idealistic to think that police can be taught to be nice to the people they are programmed to repress. This is why MIM stresses the national contradiction here in the U.$., to point out that it is not individual's racist ideas that are the problem, but a system based on national oppression that creates the problem. A materialist view of the situation shows that ideas that stem from social relationships. (See MIM Theory #7 "Proletarian Feminist Revolutionary Nationalism" for more on the national contradiction with u.s. borders. Available from MIM for $6.) While community oversight can be a good way to organize against the police, that does not mean that any so-called oversight committee will serve the people by protecting them from police brutality. Again the mistake is often made of relying on the system to change its ways without changing the system as a whole. The Black Panther Party had a program that relied on policing the cops, thereby denying the authority of the U.$. police by instituting their own protection through force. During its time it was a very successful program which looked out for the people in the community. The Center's status report gives a good example of the very opposite. It looks at the Community Police Relations Board, established in 1984 after the murder of a handicapped Black man by the Albany police. This was not built by the community and not led by the proletariat, but set up by the government. The Board has virtually no public participation because of inconsistent, last minute scheduling. Further investigation by the Center proved the Board to be more of a police support group than anything else. The minutes from meetings showed a "preoccupation with police-sponsored activities and programs such as PAL and DARE." Members reportedly frequented police academy graduations and police retirement celebrations. Their activities proved to be against the people when the Board lobbied the New York Court of Appeals for stiffer sentencing penalties against defendants. In fact, the Community-Police Relations Board serves the purpose of smoothing over relations between the police and those members of the community who are willing to support the intensifying police state. It is up to the people to create their own organization that will increase the power of the people, not of the police. The Center's report both looks at the history of police activity in Albany and brings forth new evidence to incriminate the department. While the report lacked a clear line, it does give people a lot of information to use against the injustice system. In a high point of the report, they question "whether limiting citizen oversight to instances of individual police misconduct and discipline is adequate to effectively address the problem which is often rooted in the operating environment, both political and social, of the department and community." However, they do not go on to describe that environment which is the imperialist system carried out by the U.$. government. It is by recognizing police brutality and criminal injustice as a systematic problem, and not a few bad cops like the mainstream media suggests, that we can begin to come up with ways of ending such violent repression. Note: To Protect And Serve? The Center for Law and Justice, Inc. June 1998. For a copy send $3 to Pine West Plaza Building 2, Washington Ave. Ext. Albany, NY 12205. MIM and RAIL receive countless direct reports from the masses both battling the pigs on the streets and the pigs in prisons. We publicize the information to organize against this constant terror, but we can use your help in distributing the information further and working with MIM and RAIL on a compilation project. Contact mim@mim.org to help gather and distribute the information gathered from the masses. * * ALBANY COPS IMMUNE TO ASSAULT CHARGES One of the high-profile brutality cases in Albany last year was the beating of a young Black student athlete by two white cops. The fight began between Jermaine Henderson and two off-duty cops in a local bar. The incident ended in the garage of a police station where Henderson was beaten by officers Bonanni and McKenna. The officers were immediately suspended. Soon after, Mayor Jerry Jennings released evidence of a cover-up attempt by the department. The Albany police responded in full fascist form by marching in front of city hall to protest the treatment of the two officers. They knew that it was the government's job to back up the department in their repression, both legal and illegal. Many police also raised money to support their colleagues, which brought the attention of many Black groups concerned with the power of the Albany Police Officers Union.(1) Mayor Jennings continued to hold strong against the charged police to their dismay. However, the court dismissed charges of assault against the officers after they testified against Henderson without waiving their right to immunity. They dropped the charges against Henderson in a similar deal.(2) As a result, the courts releasing two guilty cops with the small trade off of letting one Black man free. Meanwhile hundreds of thousands of Black men fill U.$. prisons, while cops continue to run the streets free. Even though the police have taken some heat in this case, the system has succeeded in maintaining the Amerikan status quo. The Albany police continue to keep brutality investigations secret so that the pigs can cover each other's asses. Until we overthrow this system of imperialism we can't expect the pigs to change. Their job is to protect and serve the unjust system. Note: 1. To Protect and Serve? 2. Times Union 13 August 1998, p.A-1. * * * PROTESTS CONTINUE AGAINST U.$-BACKED INDONESIAN GOVERNMENT by MC17 In Indonesia protests continue against the U.$. backed military dictatorship. On August 25 police broke up a demonstration in support of Megawati Sukarnoputri in the city of Palu. In 1997 the U$ congress allocated an additional $4.5 million in aid to the Indonesian dictatorship, with $100,000 aimed at military training alone.(2) In addition to brutally repressing and offering up for exploitation its own people, Indonesia occupies East Timor, an occupation infamous for the brutality and oppression the East Timorese have undergone. In all, the United States has sold more than $1.1 billion in weaponry to Indonesia since its 1975 invasion of East Timor; the sales have gone on in Republican and Democratic administrations alike, regardless of the rhetoric espoused by the President at the time. According to the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, from 1992 to 1994 (the most recent years for which full data is available), Indonesia received 53% of its weapons imports from the United States.(3) Megawati was ousted as head of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) in a military-sponsored party congress in June of 1996 under President Suharto's leadership. Although Suharto stepped down in the face of massive protests, his successor was a loyal and trained supporter and little has changed since the new figurehead, B.J. Habibie, took power. Over 1,000 Megawati backers converged on the building where the congress of the PDI was being held, claiming that Soerjadi had been illegally installed as chief of the party. Megawati is the eldest daughter of Sukarno, Indonesian's president prior to the coup by Suharto which led to the massacre of hundreds of thousands of communists and other activists. The military seizing control of the PDI is just one more example of the failure of electoral politics throughout the imperialist controlled world. The PDI never represented more than a liberal reformist alternative to the military dictatorship. It is far from a radical or revolutionary organization. Yet even this alternative is seen as dangerous by the dictators. On the same day, in the capital of Jakarta, police blocked about 300 workers from marching in the streets during a protest for labor rights injuring a number of the protestors. It is clear that the people of Indonesia will not be allowed to participate in democratic elections under the current government. This is not possible while the country is militarily and economically controlled by the imperialists. The just demands of the people for control of their government must be led by a revolutionary line and strategy that can effectively take on imperialism and win: Marxism-Leninism- Maoism. Notes: 1. Associated Press. 25 August 1998. 2.http://amadeus.inesc.pt:80/~jota/Timor/TimorNews/Mar97/Indo.n ot.concerned.with .US.proposal.to.stop.aid 3.http://amadeus.inesc.pt/~jota/Timor/TimorNews/Mar97/US.arms.t ransfers. to.Indo.I * * * PUERTO RICO SETS DATE FOR PHONY PLEBISCITE by MC17 On August 14 Puerto Rico's legislature approved holding a referendum on whether the island should become a U.$. state. The referendum is scheduled to be held December 13 and has been pushed forward by Governor Pedro Rossello who is a strong statehood supporter. This vote, which pretends to offer the Puerto Rican people self-determination, offers three options: statehood, independence, or the current "Freely associated state" also called commonwealth status. As a "Freely associated state" or commonwealth, the Puerto Rican people have u.s. citizenship but if they live in Puerto Rico they can not vote on u.s. ballots. Puerto Rican's can and are expected to fight in u.s. wars, and Puerto Ricans sustain combat causalities in u.s. wars in numbers far exceeding their proportion in the population. Pedro Rossello, governor of Puerto Rico and willing lackey of u.s. colonialism, has as his goal, like that of other colonial lackeys who desire greater access to their master's wealth and privilege, to gain full statehood for Puerto Rico as the 51st state. The United States is not bound by the referendum. In March, the U.S. House passed -- by one vote -- a bill allowing for a similar referendum and agreeing to work with the island on possible statehood. But that bill is held up in the Senate. Rossello apparently hopes a strong majority for statehood would move Congress to act. Rossello refers to a plebiscite as the "self determination process," an "orderly method" which would allow the people of Puerto Rico to decide what they want with all the definitions spelled out clearly for them. But this so-called self determination is not real democracy. It is not possible to talk about the Puerto Rican people exercising their right to self determination with u.s. troops occupying their island and the u.s. government controlling the country. At this time, the plebiscite that most u.s. and mainstream Puerto Rican politicians propose would simply show what the Puerto Rican people will say with the bribery and arm-twisting of Uncle Sam. Only the people themselves in Puerto Rico can establish a true plebiscite of the people for self- determination. After a stage of revolutionary nationalism, the Puerto Rican people will be able to decide their future without the influence of imperialist power. Anti-imperialists must use this opportunity to expose the lie of self-determination at every turn. We must remain strong in our demand for complete u.s. withdrawal from the island of Puerto Rico. Notes: AP, August 14, 1998. For more information and analysis of U.$. imperialism in Puerto Rican send $1 for a copy of the RAIL pamphlet "End U.$. colonialist domination of Puerto Rico: 100 years is too long." * * * SPIES TAKE $44 BILLION IN U.$. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY In the summer of 1997, the U.$. government arrested two Taiwan spies trying to steal biotechnology secrets from U.$. corporations. The government arranged a sting. The American Society for Industrial Security said $44 billion were stolen in 17 months up to June 30, 1998. Even though the Cold War is over, the capitalists still have high stakes espionage going on. As long as their is a property- system there will be a reason for such espionage. So-called intellectual property has become more and more important in international economic and political relations. While the Third World feeds and clothes the people of the imperialist countries, the people living in comfort in the rich countries undertake more and more white-collar labor. Everything from access to life-saving drugs to computer software is blocked under the capitalist system thanks to property rights. Not only is distribution of good ideas and products blocked under capitalism, conflicts between nations and ultimately war arise over property. The corporations say they need a reward for their work; hence, they must have patents and the ability to make profits from inventions only they control. In contrast, we believe that rewards for invention should be distributed once by the government. Organizations and individuals can still be rewarded and their greed satisfied, but once the reward has been made the invention becomes the property of the people. Such will speed up the application of everything from software to life- saving drugs. The purchase of invention ideas by the government will also eliminate the incentive for espionage. It is the same incentive under capitalism -- profit -- that inspires both the company inventing the new drug and the spy seeking to steal it. When the profit system is eradicated, a number of problems disappear with it -- arms sales, pornography as big business, pushers for addictive drugs and espionage for profit. Note: Austin American-Statesman 10 May 1998, p. G1. * * * REACTIONARY DOING TIME, DOING VIPASSANA TELLS PRISONERS: "FIND PRISON OPPRESSIVE? DON'T ORGANIZE, MEDITATE!" Greenfield, MA -- In early August, RAIL attended a screening of Doing Time, Doing Vipassana at Greenfield Community College, organized by the Vipassana Meditation Center in Shelburne, Massachusetts. RAIL attended to organize the participants into our campaign against control unit expansion and learn more about the movement. While a large number of people were interested in the MASS RAIL and some gave RAIL donations, it was less than should be expected at a prison related event. In fact, the organizers were so disturbed by our presence that we were offered a bribe to go away. They were afraid that we would scare away their invited Department of KKKorrection guests and therefore sabotage the effort to bring this reactionary movement into more prisons. Doing Time, Doing Vipassana is a 50 minute documentary about the introduction of a program of 10-day Vipassana Mediation courses in Tihar Jail New Delhi. According to the video, Tihar is one of the world's most notorious jails. Tihar is maximum security, but an accused pickpocket can spend 6 years there waiting to get a 1 year sentence. Vipassana's response to this injustice? Don't think about it, but concentrate on yourself, how you hurt society, and seek forgiveness. The introduction of Vipassana mediation into prisons is a thick liberal veneer over a terribly reactionary core of perpetuating this system. The liberal veneer can confuse some. For example, the Vipassana teachers insist that some guards and prison staff also take the course. In Tihar Jail, the warden sent the most corrupt and violent guards -- under threat of termination -- to the courses. Many supposedly came back improved, less violent people. Which gets us to the next part of the veneer, that the course helps people to concentrate and reflect on their actions. Any highly structured quasi-voluntary program of doing nothing but listening to your breathing for 10 days couldn't but help people to focus. The corrupt guards learned that their practice wasn't an effective control strategy and it was about to lose them their jobs. The course also made many prisoners begin to feel sorry for their actions against society. It is important that people take responsibility for their actions. In a just society, crime will have to be dealt with by the people and not an occupation government. Criminals will undergo a process of self-criticism by which they transform their outlook and behavior. But this can only take place when the larger society has some moral authority. The Amerikan government actively imports drugs into the country with it's CIA, and yet it has the nerve to call small-time dealers and possessors of drugs to be criminals. For Amerika to look down its nose at prisoners is hypocrisy at best, and more accurately it could be called a carefully packaged program of changing the subject. Crime is without doubt a problem, but the solution to crime is increasing social justice. When people live in an honorable society and can contribute to society in a socially useful way, crime will no longer exist. Focusing on yourself -- to the exclusion of society -- merely helps you fit into the dominant ideology of imperialism. * * * U.$. BOMBS IMPORTANT PHARMACEUTICAL PLANT IN SUDAN In Khartoum, Sudan, the U.$. bombed a pharmaceutical plant, Al- Shifa, located on the outskirts of this large city. Although the u.s. claims they were bombing a plant that was controlled by Osama bin Laden and manufacturing components of a deadly nerve gas, all evidence suggests that the U.$. destroyed a company that only produced medicine. The only evidence supporting the u.s. claim is, predictably, classified. While Sudan is welcoming any and all visitors to inspect the site, the company has produced evidence that the UN had authorized Iraq to purchase large quantities of medicine from it, and workers and builders of the plant have come forward both in Sudan and around the world to state that the company did not have the equipment or the secrecy to carry out the operations the u.s. alleges. Al-Shifa was opened in July of 1997. The plant is a private joint venture between Sudanese and Jordanian nationals which had been partly finances by a Nairobi-based bank owned by the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa.(1) Idris Babiker, the Al-Shifa plant manager stated that much of the machinery was imported from the United States, Sweden and Switzerland and at the time, the English ambassador attended the ceremony and since then, the United Nations has approved contracts with the factory specifically for the sale of pharmaceutical products.(2) Three Jordanian engineers who oversaw the pharmaceutical plant's production and first three months of operation said that it would have been impossible to convert the plant into a chemical weapons factory. In addition, an English engineer who assisted in the construction of the factory and who worked for four years as a technical manager for the Baaboud family who in part owns the plant refuted the United Snakes' claims that it would be possible for the plant to produce chemical weapons.(3) The fact that the u.s. evidence for the danger posed by its bombing targets is almost completely lacking only serves to underscore the true militarist and imperialist intentions of the u.s. attack. But even if bin Laden did control the camps and pharmaceutical the u.s. bombed, this does not give the united snakes the right to invade and attack these countries. Along with the destruction of Al-Shifa, in the process of perpetuating peace and democracy, the Amerikkkan missiles also damaged two food processing plants during the raid on Al- Shifa.(1) This is in a country where 2.6 million people are threatened with death through imperialist-imposed starvation. Where the United Snakes attempts to perpetuate the idea that Amerikkkans help starving children around the world through the IMF and World Bank and Sally Struthers programs, the reality is that the United Snakes desperately needs to prevent the Third World from develop self-sufficient means to meet the needs of oppressed people. If oppressed nations are successful in nationalist development, the imperialists lose out on the interest from loans. They also lose the ability to exploit and invest imperialist capital as well as the political puppeteering power which comes with the aid. Though its self-sufficient production of medicines does not seem to be the most important reason for the imperialists to destroy Al-Shifa, the imperialists battle against nationalist self-sufficiency around the globe. If anything, this loss of food and medicine production in Sudan further benefits imperialist hegemony. Notes: 1. AFP. 21 August 1998. 2. Reuters. 22August 1998 3. AFP. 22 August 1998. * * * CONTINUED U.$. ATTACKS AGAINST IRAQI PEOPLE Saturday following the U.$. attack on Sudan and Afghanistan, an Iraqi newspaper published documents which contradict the Amerikkkan story of chemical weapons production. The documents showed that Iraq had bought medicines from the plant. The purchase of pharmaceutical products and medicine from Al-Shifa had been approved by the United Nations. The documents were initialed by the U.N. Security Council's sanction committee and this was confirmed by the United Nations the day following the cruise missile attack.(1) As a result of the release of this information the United Snakes was forced to change its story. It then claimed a link between the bombed Sudanese plant and alleged development of chemical weapons in Iraq. Countering the growing outrage at the bombing, the United Snakes said that it "believes that senior Iraqi scientists were helping to produce elements of the nerve agent XV at [Al-Shifa]." The U.N. stated that Al-Shifa had a $200 million contract to provide Iraq with medicines.(2) This is under the oil-for-food program which allows Iraq to sell limited amounts of oil to purchase badly needed basic living supplies. During the 1991 attack against Iraq, the imperialists killed an estimated 200,000 people and virtually demolished the entire infrastructure of the country through direct bombings. But the war did not end when U.$. troops stopped bombing the people. The ongoing warfare waged through the economic blockade and continuing military threat has lead to the death and suffering of approximately 1.5 million Iraqi people. The measly oil-for-food agreement to allow Iraq to sell about $2 billion in oil a year to buy basic human necessities is severely threatened by the recent events and U.$. proclamation to intensify its war. (See MIM Notes #153 for information on the affects of sanctions and MIM Notes 152, 157, 158 for more information on the continuing U.$. war against the Iraqi masses.) Amerikan policy toward chemical weapons has been inconsistent and hypocritical ever since these imperialist snakes first refused to participate in the banning of chemical weapons in 1907. In the Persian Gulf War, Amerika used such weapons as napalm and fuel-air explosives against both military and civilian targets, in violation of the Geneva Convention. Even after the formal end of the war, the United Snakes used chemical and biological weapons against retreating Iraqi troops and Palestinian, Jordanian and other refugees traveling on what became known as the "Highway of Death" at the end of 1991. While the United Snakes maintains that it is on a gallant mission to end the accumulation of chemical weapons and terrorist use, the facts show that it is the use of terrorist force and such weapons by the United Snakes that has murdered more of the world's people than any other organization or country during World War III. Notes: 1. Reuters. 22 August 1998. 2. AFP. August 21 1998. * * * U.$. IS BIGGEST TERRORIST IN AFGHANISTAN Merely the day prior to the U.$. bombing of Afghanistan, the United Snakes labeled Osama bin Laden a prime suspect in the earlier bombings of the U.$. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. The Afghanistan Taliban stated immediately prior to the Amerikkkan raids that if the U.$. produced evidence that bin Laden was involved in the embassy bombings, the Taliban would negotiate with Amerikan officials on how to diplomatically deal with bin Laden.(1) Osama bin Laden is one of many previously on the CIA pay roll. During the 1980s, bin Laden and other groups received billions of dollars from the CIA to conduct anti-Soviet operations following the 1979 social-imperialist Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. It is the military infrastructure that was developed during that time which the U.$. has stated is the training camp it bombed on August 20.(2) The United Snakes refused to deal diplomatically with the Taliban despite the fact that it controls about 90% of Afghanistan. The New York Times quoted one imperialist spokesperson who said "they would not trade Mr. Bin Laden's capture for American recognition of the Taliban's de facto government. But the Administration was weighing other ways to persuade the Afghans to cooperate."(3) The U.$. used 75 Tomahawk missiles within 24 hours of the Taliban offer to negotiate to persuade Afghanistan and the rest of the Third World that it is a hegemonic power not to be challenged. The U.$. claims show that it would rather murder innocent people, destroy a medicinal factory, damage food processing plants and launch military strikes than hold talks with a government it opposes. The U.$. still clings to the imperialist recognized lackey government of Afghanistan which stated that "it supported the fight against terrorism" but that it "doubted that air strikes could totally eliminate all terrorist training centers in Afghanistan."(2) Insofar as it opposes imperialism, the Taliban can be a potential ally of the oppressed during this stage. However, genuine representation of the masses must come through armed struggle and seizure of state power by the masses led by a Marxist-Leninist-Maoist party. As with all nations with dormant or developing Maoist centers, MIM anticipates greater politicization and Maoist-led anti-imperialist organization to facilitate the quickest victory against imperialism. The Chinese people led by Mao and the CCP showed that a proletarian-led battle against imperialism is the quickest path to liberation. There are times when Islamic revolutionaries and other elements of the oppressed nation bourgeoisie can be allies of the proletariat, but genuine liberation has only occurred with the proletariat leading because other classes vacillate in their opposition to imperialism. Notes: 1. The New York Times. 20 August 1998. p.A1. 2. The New York Times. 20 August 1998. p.A6. 3. AFP. 21 August 1998. * * * DOWN WITH IMPERIALISM! U.$. BOMBINGS SHOW IMPERIALIST LUST FOR WAR by MC45 A Sudanese lawyer and member of the ruling Islamic party of Sudan posed the question: why does the United Snakes attack Sudan and Afghanistan to get to a Saudi businessman? If shutting down the supposed terrorist operations of Osama bin Laden is the genuine and only concern of the U.$. military, "why don't you say everything he invested in in Saudi Arabia should be bombarded?"(1) While the Sudanese lawyer is not a representative of the proletariat, he shows an instance in which the bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations can have the same interests as the proletariat -- the bourgeoisie too wants to expunge imperialism from its midst. As MIM examines the recent bombings of Sudan and Afghanistan by the U.$. navy, we ask the same questions as this Sudanese bourgeois: why is Amerika bombing Sudan and Afghanistan? And can Amerika's motives really have anything to do with the claims it makes in public? The answer is "No," imperialism is not concerned with what it calls terrorism. It is concerned with exporting capital for the purpose of repatriating profit, to dominate the world economic system. The Amerikan imperialists are not distracted as they seem to be by bombs exploding here and there. Cloaked in the language of "making the world safe for democracy," the U.$. is focused on a straight-line approach to unifying the world economy in a way that makes the dollar stronger and U.$. profits greater. Just as anti-Communism and the supposed Red Menace were the excuses for Amerikan imperialism following World War Two, fighting terrorism is the excuse today. MIM calls out U.$. imperialism -- export of capital and theft of Third World labor and natural resources, supported by military domination -- as the real terrorism. Imperialism is an international economic and military system through which monopoly capitalists extract wealth from Third World countries for the sake of enriching First World countries. This system is propped up by military force when it is necessary to kill resistance to this economic plunder. Imperialism is the real and only reason for the U.$. attacks on Sudan and Afghanistan; Amerika resorts to state military terror whenever oppressed nations show signs of getting out of line, and of not acquiescing happily to the theft of their own resources. MIM opposes imperialism in all its forms, and we hold the struggle between imperialism and the oppressed nations to be principal in the world today. So when we talk about opposing two bombings in August 1998, we are talking about opposing two events in an ongoing hot war that the imperialists are conducting against the oppressed nations of the world. Afghanistan -- finding a regime that will protect the oil The U.$. has direct and specific economic interests at stake in Afghanistan, in the form of the Central Asia Gas Pipeline--a project still in the planning and negotiating stages that will carry gas from Turkmenistan to Pakistan for sale to the West. While Afghanistan has no significant tapped petroleum resources of its own, it is strategically located between a wealth of central Asian gas to its north and the ports from which this gas will ship to the south. This anticipated $2 billion project represents a large chunk of change even for the monopoly capitalists, and will mean much transfer of wealth from the oppressed nations of central and south Asia to the U.$. and other partners in this project.(2) The Amerikan company, Unocal, heads the CentGas consortium of seven big oil companies that will build the pipeline through Afghanistan. But CentGas and the U.$. government have made clear that they will not build the pipeline until Afghanistan has a government that they are convinced is stable. Meaning that until Afghanistan's government is willing to lick Amerikan boots, Afghanistan will not have the benefit of hosting a profit-making venture for the U.$. Unocal officials have already met with Taliban representatives to negotiate the pipeline deal. So while Amerika refuses to recognize the Taliban, those with dollars to spend may be more direct in negotiating with the people imperialists think will make their profit possible.(3) While Amerika and Amerikan-based multi-national corporations manipulate and bully Afghanistan over future compliance with imperialist orders, the system of imperialism continues to exploit the Afghan people. The population, much of which is still returning to Afghanistan after fleeing the social- imperialist Soviet invasion of the 1980s, has a life expectancy of only 46 years -- testimony to inadequate food, medicine and other basic needs. Regardless of whether the U.$. invests in specific new projects in Afghanistan, that country is in a very weak economic position relative to Amerika. Afghanistan's currency, the Afghani, is traded on the "free" market at 17,000 per one U.$. dollar. This 1997 figure is up from 7,000:1 in 1996, and 1,900 in 1994, showing that true to imperialism, Amerika's strength continues to rest on the weakness of the oppressed nations' economies. Sudan -- lassoing an uppity Islamic state In the case of Sudan, many people in authority there are openly speaking out in defiance of U.$. terror. In response to Amerikan economic sanctions on Sudan, the Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir announced a policy of boycotting the Amerikan dollar in transactions within Sudan. When he made this announcement, he also pointed out that the American dollar "owe[s] its existence and strength to the labours of Africans and other oppressed people."(4) Amerika cannot tolerate Third World countries that do not behave as they are supposed to. So when Third World peoples take the stance that "we will not be a puppet for another country like the United States," that is cause for military action.(1) Like the rest of the Third World, Sudan is important to imperialism for its inanimate resources and for the labor of its people, both of which can bring wealth to the imperialist nations. The largest African country, whose area is more than one-quarter that of the U.$.,(5) Sudan has natural and human resources that Amerika sees as potentially exploitable and is generally a sore spot for the Amerikan imperialists as a Third World country that will not give itself over to easy domination. Adding insult to the injury Amerika already perceives from Sudan, Sudan has taken loans from the Islamic Bank for Development in Saudi Arabia, while having rocky relations with the U.$. The loans, totaling $23.4 million, were given to rebuild a dam on the Blue Nile and to build health centers.(6) The U.$. is only showing its murderous colors when it attacks Sudan, a country that already suffers an estimated 133% annual inflation rate, and whose official unemployment rate stood at 30% early in this decade. Attacking the Third World, not Islam MIM believes Amerika's insistence that it is not out to attack Islam per se.(8) But we argue that there is more than a passing coincidence between religious affiliation and these bombings. Many peoples in oppressed nations are drawn very strongly to Islam because the religion represents something that is very different from the West. To align themselves with a non-Western ideology is a correct and anti-imperialist impulse for the majority of the people of the Third World. Amerika seeks to dominate the Third World militarily and economically, and Third World peoples righteously resist the imperialist drive in many ways. Islam the religion is not the specific target of imperialism, just like Islam as a religion is not going to topple imperialism for good. But it is definitely the goal of imperialism to quash the peoples and the countries that are most drawn to Islam because these peoples and countries are in many cases opposed to imperialist domination. In Sudan and Afghanistan today, we can see that as Mao said, the reactionaries and the imperialists are only paper tigers. They may make scary faces, but in the long run they will be destroyed and it is the people who are truly powerful. We can see this as people all over the Arab world in particular have held anti-Amerika rallies since the bombings, and have burned Amerikan flags in a direct rejection of U.$. imperialist aggression.(8, 9) A leader of Hamas in Palestine reminded demonstrators that Amerika will "reap the harvest of its aggression,"(8) the analog to our Marxist observation that capitalism in the form of U.$. imperialism is building the tools of its own destruction. In our support for national liberation struggles, MIM supports all calls for genuine anti-imperialism, and recognizes as correct all statements that draw attention to Amerika's dominant role in stifling the self-determination of the peoples of the world. We call on all genuine revolutionary nationalists, Marxists and anti-imperialists to support the peoples of the Third World in their struggles for liberation against imperialist hegemony.Notes: 1. New York Times 23 August 1998, p. 9.2. "Trans-Afghan pipeline suspended," British Broadcasting Service 22 August 1998. 3. "Taleban in Texas for talks on gas pipeline," BBC 4 December, 1998; "Proposed Central Asia Gas (CentGas) Pipeline Project," www.unocal.com/globalops/asiapipe.html 21 August 1998.4. "Sudan to boycott Dollar," BBC 18 November 1998.5. CIA World Factbook, 1997.6. PanAfrican News Agency (PANA) 29 April 1997.7. New York Times 25 August 1998, p. 6.8. New York Times 22 August 1998.9. PANA 22 August 1998. * * * PEOPLE PROTEST IMPERIALIST MILITARISM Daily protests have followed the U.$. strike against Sudan and Afghanistan. Friday following the bombings, Sudanese masses stormed the empty residence of the u.$. ambassador and stoned the English embassy. The protesters tore down and burned imperialist flags. "Foreign office staff in Britain contacted the Sudanese authorities to urge them to draft extra police to the building."(1) Saturday, thousands demonstrated in Khartoum against U$ imperialism. Protesters shouted anti-imperialist slogans and burned imperialist effigies and flags. Protesters also delivered a memorandum to the UN office for Kofi Annan which demands a fact-finding commission to investigate the U.$. charge that Al-Shifa produced chemical weapons. During Saturday's rally, Sudanese president, Omar Hassan al- Bashir, promised to "retaliate against aggression" and stated that Sudan is "ready to return the blow in double." He compared the fight against Amerikan imperialism to the battle which was fought and won against English imperialism in the last century. The Arab League held an emergency meeting on Monday following the attacks. Sudan asked for an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council. Sudan has withdrawn its diplomats from the United Snakes and the imperialists still refuse to show the evidence to justify (in the eyes of the imperialists) the military strikes. Even if the United Snakes produces fabricated or partially- genuine evidence to show that Al-Shifa had the capability of producing chemical weapons, its links to bin Laden or that the bases in Afghanistan were really training camps for Islamic revolutionaries, MIM opposes this and all imperialist military attacks against foreign nations and attacks against nations held captive within the United Snakes. Militarism enforces Amerikan imperialist interests in economically controlling other nations and using exploited labor and stolen wealth to plump up Amerikkkans. Progressives should also oppose all forms of intervention by imperialist Amerika. Amerika does not represent the people of the world that it controls and MIM supports the people around the world in their protests against U.$. imperialism. Notes: 1. AFP. 22 August 1998. * * * CIA TERRORISM GROWS IN ANGOLA by RC68 The CIA financed terrorist organization UNITA has remobilized in Angola. UNITA has begun forcibly conscripting men and wimmin between the ages of 13 and 30 to serve in its army. It has also resorted to killing people opposed to UNITA. Hundreds of Angolan people have been murdered by these jackals. Over 64,000 Angolans have fled into Zambia to escape the slaughter being carried out by the U$ backed UNITA terrorists.(1) UNITA's renewed terrorist violence shows the shortcomings of negotiated peace with U.$. backed terrorists. In 1994, in Lusaka Zambia, the United Nations sponsored peace talks called the Angola Joint Commission for Peace. Subsequently, an agreement called the Lusaka Peace Protocol was reached and the 20 year long Angolan civil war was formally ended. But the war was really only ended on paper.(2) Amerikan backed criminals like UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi can hardly be expected to keep any agreements they make. As part of the peace process, the UN imposed an arms embargo on UNITA. This has not stopped UNITA from re-arming itself. The terrorists in the U$ government and organizations which it finances will never respect peace and will almost never abide by signed treaties. Some of the weapons UNITA is currently using to massacre Angolan people are from Bulgaria.(3) The recently privatized Bulagarian arms manufacturers, with no Soviet social- imperialists in power to supply with insane amounts of murderous technology, are seeking new markets for the deadly products. UNITA has been bragging that it is now better armed than before the Lusaka Peace Protocol.(2) This indicates that UNITA is not the only group violating this peace agreement. UNITA was never self-sufficient and has no legitimate economic base. It does not have any real mass base of support and is not capable of establishing its own independent means of production. UNITA's income could only be from banditry and outside aid. UNITA has in fact been raiding diamond miners and stealing money, food, and equipment from African peoples.(4) UNITA also has a long history of working directly with the CIA, the world's #1 sponsor of international terrorism. The CIA has proven in the past that it has no problem finding ways to finance murderous militarists. One of the CIA¹s favorite ways to do this is by smuggling drugs and using the profits to buy weapons. On August 4, Angolan police seized 30kg of cocaine at a Luanda airport being smuggled from Brazil.(5) Like all U$ sponsored terrorist organizations, UNITA's campaign of ghastly atrocities is horrifying. In one town, 200 people were murdered by UNITA.(6) 88 of these people were burned alive. The attack was carried out by 440 heavily armed men that robbed the population of 700.(4) In another town, UNITA soldiers murdered 145 people, including some foreign citizens.(7) So far over 600 hundred people have been murdered this summer by UNITA terrorists. Besides the U$, particularly the CIA, UNITA's allies include some of the most notorious criminals in Africa. UNITA is allied with Mobutu's old guard and extreme right-wing former South African security forces.(4) Any place Jonas Savimbi and UNITA control will be a safe haven for these murderous terrorist criminals, just as they provided UNITA with safe hiding places when they were in power. In fact, Savimbi and Mobutu were such good friends that UNITA tried to help Mobutu when Laurent Kabila led a movement to topple the tyrant Mobutu. For several years Savimbi, Mobutu, and the South African extreme right were allies of the U$ in the crusade to rid the world of communism. UNITA, the Israeli army, and other U$ backed terrorist organizations show the urgent need for the people in the world to oppose terrorism. The number one perpetrator of terrorist violence is the United Snakes of Imperialism. People around the world must not be fooled by amerika's hypocritical propaganda against terrorism. Amerika's bombs in the Sudan and Afghanistan did not discriminate between civilian and military targets. UNITA terrorists do not either. Neither did the amerikan backed Death Squads in El Salvador in the 1980s. 0pposing terrorism means exposing the criminal anti-human behavior of the U$ government and its terrorist allies. Notes: 1. The Times of Zambia. 3 August 1998. 2. Afrika News Network. 5 August 1998. 3. The Post of Zambia. 7 August 1998. 4. The Mail & Guardian. 7 August 1998. 5. Panafrican News Agency (PANA). 14 August 1998. 6. PANA. 4 August 1998. 7. The Mail & Guardian. 14 August 1998. * * * WHAT'S THE BIGGEST ORGANIZED CRIME FAMILY? THE FBI Over the last year, the Boston Globe has provided several days a week of coverage of a Mafia-FBI soap opera. It seems that Irish FBI agents were working with Irish mobsters to crush the Italian mafia. At best, the Irish mobsters were just as bad and put into power by the FBI. But it gets better. First, Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi (who is in police custody) and James "Whitey" Bulger (whereabouts unknown) were long time informants for the FBI. Flemmi and other Globe sources say the pair were allowed to commit any crime short of murder, and the Globe has uncovered evidence that the pair were killers and the FBI knew about it and did nothing. Flemmi and Bulger regularly socialized with the Irish FBI agents and gave them expensive gifts, including cash. The FBI agents then scuttled or sabotaged other police agencies' investigations of Flemmi and Bulger. And as if the connection between "legal crime" and "illegal crime" wasn't thin enough, Bulger's brother is former Senate President and current UMass President William Bulger. William Bulger is reported to have walked into social/business meetings with his brother, Flemmi and the FBI. Flemmi's revelations that he and Bulger were informants--a story first publicized by the Globe in 1988--also jeopardizes previous government convictions of mobsters. In the past, accused mobsters would argue in their defense that the Mafia doesn't exist. But in the last few years the FBI was able to use a "roving wiretap" to tape an alleged Mafia induction ceremony. But the police only got permission to use such a wiretap by misleading a judge that they did not in fact have informants inside the mob. In 1995, indictments came down for Flemmi and Bulger. But somebody tipped off Bulger and he disappeared. For the first two years, the FBI could hardly be said to be seriously looking for Bulger and who had appearances across the country. August 20, Flemmi revealed who tipped off Bulger: FBI Supervisor John Morris. Flemmi is currently arguing in court that the charges against him should be dropped because of his immunity agreement with the FBI. RAIL doesn't care whether individual mobsters go to jail when the FBI is a far more corrupt, violent and dangerous enterprise. Prosecutors are trying to convict Flemmi anyway, saying the immunity deal--if it even existed--was created by "rogue agents" and shouldn't bind the government. This should serve as a warning to potential informants within our own movement: You might get some short term gain from the pigs, but they'll leave you out to dry when they are done with you. The largest lesson we can draw from this soap opera is that the FBI and the Amerikkkan government have no moral authority to say what's a crime and who deserves punishment, since they are the biggest criminals of them all. * * * GUATEMALA SUES U.$. TOBACCO FIRMS Guatemala is seeking $2.4 billion from U.$. tobacco firms for smoking-related illnesses in Guatemala. 10.6 million people are affected in that Central American country. MIM has never had any reason to say anything good about the Guatemalan ruling class, but we agree with Attorney General Acisclo Valladeres Molina on this point. Under the dictatorship of the proletariat, such reparations to the Third World will be carried out across-the-board by the socialist government and not piecemeal as in lawsuits. Note: USA Today 13 May 1998, p. 11a. * * * OUTRAGE OVER RAPIST'S UNREPENTANT FRIEND: DON'T RELY ON IMPERIALIST COURTS AND COPS TO END PATRIARCHY! By late August over 20,000 petition signatures had been collected urging prosecution of a man who failed to stop or report the rape and murder of a 7-year-old girl by his friend at a Nevada casino. People are outraged that this University of California, Berkeley student could have walked away from this crime and done nothing. MIM shares this outrage, but we strongly oppose any effort to increase prosecution within the Amerikan criminal injustice system. Prosecutors say they can't punish this student, named Cash, because there is no law in Nevada that makes it illegal to fail to report a crime. Among the plans of the activists in this case is a new petition supporting a "Sherrice Iverson Memorial Bill," making it a crime for anyone who witnesses or has knowledge of a sexual attack against a minor to fail to report it to police. Activists fighting sexual assault frequently fall into the trap of the criminal injustice system and seek greater police and court involvement as a solution to gender oppression. But this is no better than calling on the Klan to help stop violence in Black neighborhoods. The end result is greater numbers of Blacks and Latinos locked up and killed by the state in the name of protecting wimmin and children. The man who is the object of the petition drive has said in interviews that he hasn't lost any sleep over the killing, and that the notoriety has actually helped him get dates. MIM is not surprised by this in a culture that eroticizes violence. It is this sickening patriarchal culture which leads to the violence rampant in romantic relationships and encourages men to enjoy forced sex with young girls. It is not help from the imperialist state that we need to fight the patriarchy, we need to take on these battles without looking to the current state for protection. Remember that this is the same state that locks up Blacks and Latinos in tremendously disproportionate numbers with disproportionate sentences for the same crimes as whites. This is the same state that condones rapes committed by its armed forces in Third World countries in the name of the fight for democracy. Any protecting done by this state will only be in the interests of furthering the imperialist patriarchy. We need to replace the current state, which serves the interests of the imperialists and white supremacy, with a state which truly serves the interest of the majority of the world's people. Such a state would be able to prosecute the real criminals - militarists, war profiteers, big-time pornographers and the like - and also be able to effectively struggle against patriarchal, anti-social creeps like Cash. Notes: Associated Press, 24 August 1998. * * * PIG COLLECTION OF PRISONER'S DNA HALTED On August 14, Massachusetts prisoners won a victory in the courts, with Superior Court Judge Isaac Borenstein ruling that the state's DNA database was unconstitutional. Forty-seven other states have similar laws, and the prisoner's and probationer's attorneys hope that precedent has been set to strike down these other laws. The principal grounds by which the law was struck down was of privacy rights based on the Fourth Amendment. The judge argued that "[r]egardless of the state's compelling interest, an unjustified random bodily intrusion without any indication of individualized suspicion is unreasonable and intolerable." Typically privacy "rights" are reserved for those with power and prestige to protect. We put rights in quotation marks because unlike the bourgeoisie, we don't pretend that there are certain rights that people have. Rather, we believe, as Mao Zedong said, that "there are no rights, only power struggles." The only thing that we can count on in this world is what the masses themselves can fight to gain and retain. The Bill of Rights in the U.$ Constitution claims to speak for all citizens, even thought it is rarely that way in practice. But it is a good tactic for progressive lawyers to try and get the Bill of Rights to apply to everyone, especially prisoners. An additional weakness of the Massachusetts law is that it did not restrict what the DNA could be used for. It would have been totally legal for the pigs to use it in their current state- funded racist quest for a "crime gene." Nor was information gleaned from the DNA--such as disease susceptibility--required to be shared with the person from which it was snatched. We oppose the DNA database because it is a potential weapon in Amerika's war against the internal colonies. The database could be (mis)used in many ways, but even as it relates to the fight against actual crime, we don't want to see the pigs gain any additional tools. As sixty years of government statistics show, locking more people up doesn't affect crime. We aren¹t saying that violent crime is Ok, although we rarely fail to point out that such crime is a small portion of what prisoners are incarcerated for. But we can't let this system and its leaders point fingers at street crime when they are guilty of far larger and more violent crimes each day. Note: Boston Globe 15 August 1998, p. B1, B8. * * * RAIL RAISES CONSCIOUSNESS AND FUNDS AT WARPED TOUR July 29, Northampton, MA -- RAIL attended the Warped Tour concert in force this year. The Warped Tour is a skateboarder- culture concert that annually stops in Northampton and other cities across North America. RAIL was able to set up an information table inside the concert, and a MIM Notes distributor sold a large number outside the gates. This was the first year that we had a presence inside the show, and it represented a qualitative leap in terms of the quality of political discussions we were able to have compared to when we had a presence only outside the gates. Inside, we had a lot of positive feedback and many good discussions with the anarchist-inclined youth audience. Many people stopped by to sign petitions to stop control units in Massachusetts prisons as well as to bring back prisoners sent to Texas. While we brought many blank sheets with us, we underestimated the crowd and filled up all the petitions we brought. One concert-goer from Oklahoma responded to our appeal to aid the prisoners transferred to Texas with the report that prisoners from his state are also being transferred to Texas. The list of states sending (or that have sent) prisoners to Texas includes MO, MI, MA, LA and OK. We talked to several anarchists from around New England who want to work with RAIL in the fight against the prison system which serves as a means of social control against the oppressed nations within U.$ borders. Within Massachusetts, about 90% of prisoners in the control units are Latino and put there because they speak Spanish -- which the guards don't understand -- or they have tattoos, which are taken to mean gang affiliation, even if no affiliation exists. Overall, the crowd was comprised of white anarchist-leaning and non-political youth, many of whom responded to RAIL's message. Being able to table inside the concert increased the quality of our political interactions with the people, and we will expand this type of effort in the future. * * * HAND-WRITING ANALYSIS IS LATEST MANAGEMENT HOCUS-POCUS In a country where the people live off all the hard-work of other countries, it is no surprise that management has a hard time figuring out how to be more effective. After all there is no link between management and getting more work done in the imperialist countries like the U$A. Two trends have arisen as a result. A high-tech firm in Natick, Massachusetts named Cognex asks all prospective employees to undergo handwriting analysis. According to USA Today a Dallas public accountant agrees with the practice: "'It's so accurate.'" The handwriting analysts charge $75 to $250 per persyn analyzed. These analysts are yet another parasitic profession helping the ruling class choose who to spoon out the gravy to. Another trend has a mystical name "Six Sigma"-all marketing hype. The concept is simply 99.9997% perfection. Under capitalism, such a goal is impossible because management has profit and career motives to lie. A truly scientific approach to the economy would require central planning and a thorough examination of work organization. Such is impossible under capitalism. The reason for the success of a company -- its ability to tap into surplus-value, especially from the Third World -- is shrouded behind many veils of secrecy and ignorance. For this reason, not even the management of a company really knows why it succeeds or fails. It comes up with various stories not much different in writing style and fictive imagination than the how-to-get-a- boyfriend stories running in Vogue or Cosmopolitan. Handwriting analysis and other management fads are all examples of the mythology of the ruling class and its labor aristocracy allies. It is necessary filling where it would be dangerous to the property system for the bright light of science to shine too much. MIM opposes superstition everywhere including in so-called "business school" where such mythologies of individualism and no statistical analysis reign supreme. Note: USA Today 21 July 1998, p. 1B, 2B. * * * When you roll Snake Eyes, the white house wins Review Snake Eyes 1998 This film starring Nicholas Cage stinks. Cage is a corrupt Atlantic City cop. There are lots of corrupt, scheming military officers. There is one boxer who takes a dive. And behind it all is a military contractor who kills just to get his weapons built and purchased by the military. This movie stinks because even though the pigs are portrayed in a justly negative fashion, it still has patriotism at its core. The military officers then have the Secretary of Defense assassinated when the boxer pretends to fall. Predictably for an Amerikkkan movie, the shooter is a Palestinian nationalist, and everybody is willing to believe the initial lie that he acted alone. The Secretary of Defense was close to stopping production of a missile defense system. The system is flawed, but the contractor and some military officers think the system is an improvement and can be fixed later, so the flaws are covered up. To protect the system, the Secretary is killed. When Cop Cage starts to uncover the plot, he overcomes his history of looking the other way for a bribe and fights for the truth. There is no discussion of why other countries want to shoot missiles at Amerikan Navy ships. That's the appropriate question, not whether the missile defense system--and the military officers/contractors methods--are correct. * * * UNDER LOCK & KEY: NEWS FROM PRISONS AND PRISONERS Exposing False Security Threat Group (STG) System ...A struggle inmates have to deal with in the Michigan Prison system is the administration and this fake program they started called STG (Security Threat Group). I'm in an organization and all someone (an enemy of mine) has to do is write a letter to any officer (or administrator) saying I want to inflict injury on them, or just say I hold rank. And for no reason the police will put a person in this program. The problem is once you are in this program; you can't get out until you sign some renunciation papers (saying you won't be a member no more). But when you sign these papers (if you do) then you could get into a fight or anything that is not related to gang activity and they'll place you in a Max joint for two to five years. And if you don't sign the papers the same thing occurs. So it's really a no-win situation. ...the way it's designed in inmates get no justice. There are two levels to this STG program - Level I and II. Level II is supposed to worse, if you're in Level II STG you can never go to a Level I prison until you sign those papers. If you never sign these papers and you're released from prison, the institution is supposed contact the nearest police station, to where you are being released, and tell them that you're a security threat.... -- A Michigan Prisoner, 9 May 1998 New Jersey Prisoners Targeted I am writing this letter to enlighten the public on the situation of the gang member unit at Northern State Prison named the Security Threat Group Management Unit (STGMU). Over 300 inmates were targeted for this unit. Many inmates including myself have not demonstrated any patterns of gang activities inside the prison, yet were placed this status simply because of being identified as a member. The administration's main targets were Latino. 80% of the isolated inmates here are Latino. This program is NOT working. It's causing mental and emotional anguish in a stressful environment. This program was designed to segregate so-called "gang members" from the general population for their beliefs. This is a violation of the 1st, 4th, and 14th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. In reality it's causing more hardships than creating resolution. For example all sorts of violations against their own rules with no remedy of matters. The administration is violating all sorts of due process in the handling of the hearing procedures.... Meals that are called for to be served hot are served cold. No social workers are assigned the unit STGMU to attend to our personal matters. Inmates are being denied medical treatment. Showers are given every three days. Visits with family are a non-contact visit once a month. Phone calls are once a week. The programs were supposed to start March 4, 1998 and now it's May 5, 1998 and still there is no orientation or any types of programs given. We are like dogs in a kennel cage waiting for when they are ready. Recreation is in a fenced cage 26 feet by 24 feet for ten inmates at a time. Officers are stealing and/or destroying the inmates' property. In one instance, officers stole $700.00 worth of prisoner property. And officers damaged a personal radio. Inmates are NOT allowed to obtain educational, religious, or personal books of any sort. The officers and administration are NOT treating inmates respectfully, impartially or fairly. Officers are taunting and antagonizing inmates, instigating incidents where the inmates fall victim and pay for it. The officers are causing an intensified atmosphere in this unit. When an inmate requests for a shift supervisor to remedy the situation with the officer, inmates are denied. If one is seen, the supervisor justifies the wrongdoing of the officer. Administrative remedies are filed without answer or avail of rectifying the matter. Rights and privileges are being denied and taken without due process procedures. Internal Affairs and the Administrators (Mr. Barke and Mr. Sherver) are fully aware of all this and yet they refuse to intervene but instead condone what the officers are doing. The officers are also interfering with outgoing and incoming mail. Mail being sent out is not reaching its destination and letters being mailed to us are not reaching our hands. Stamps inside the envelope end up missing. These people are abusing their authority in these matters, and nothing positive is flourishing from this except spending funds and taxpayer's money.... Respectfully, -- A New Jersey Prisoner 5 May 1998 Threatened with STG for speaking out ...I've been threatened by the prisonkrats with being placed on their STG (Security Threat List) for basically speaking out against the system. I will continue to speak out and be active by raising political awareness and engaging in activities of struggle against oppression, injustice, brutality, etc. Even though this is an uphill battle, the struggle will be endless until be are able to revolutionize this korrupt system and replace it with a humane system (socialism).... i am, i remain relentlessly in struggle, -- A New Jersey Prisoner, June 1998 Gulags use "Gangs" as excuse to Repress Latinos In January 1998 the Hispanics were locked down on this unit!! After investigation of (2) months all were released from not [being] gang members. Thereafter all were put in field, forced to work; as time went many were set up with cases for bullshit set up lock ups. I will not give lists of names for their lives are now in danger. I seek help for each of the men who are suffering. In March a new round up was done; many of the same offenders were locked back up even after being found not to be gang members but it doesn't matter, they are Hispanic and that alone makes them guilty!!! The warden has no proof, nothing to show reason for the lock up of these men!!! The system says it has not to answer to anyone, it does not have to go by any laws be them federal TDCJ or any other law. -- A Texas prisoner Gang Label Used To Oppress Prisoners I was furious about the article that I read in your newsletter titled "Exposing New Gang Units in New Jersey" in the June 15, 1998 MIM Notes issue number 164 on page 10. It states that the 5%ers are a gang, which is not true. I know firsthand because I am a 5%er. Also because the dungeon I am locked up in now (Northern Uncorrectional Institution, NCI) just did a similar investigation on the 5%. Three pigs raided my cell, mishandled all of my property and confiscated my 5% lessons. The excuse was we (the 5%) were being investigated for gang classification. I argued that we are not a gang, which our lessons even state so. And the Devils who did the so-called investigation said that they were not going to designate the 5% as a "Security Risk Group". In addition, "Exposing New Gang Units" is also a false statement because the Latin Kings originated in Chicago in the early 60's or 40's. They are there to help the Latino Race. ...I know about the Latin Kings because I have friends who are associated with them. As far as the NETA's, they originated from Puerto Rico. So there's nothing new to them or the 5% which came into existence in 1964. It's just the Devils who need a reason to start building new control dungeons. It's a divide and conquer technique to keep us fighting against each other so they can start their poli-trick-ing. I have a message to all those out there being oppressed in these dungeons: Focus on the oppressor himself, not your brother or fellow prisoners. Direct your energy into changing things, not complaining about your environment. Because all the complaining in the world is not going to change nothing. Action and Revolution is what will change your environment. So stop crying and start fighting your oppressors. -- A Connecticut Prisoner, 18 June 1998 MIM Responds: Thank you for your letter and your criticism. We agree that the term "Gang" is being used by prisoncrats to target progressive, active and revolutionary prisoners. The pigs use "gang units" and "security threat group" labels to encourage prisoners to fight each other instead of the pigs. We agree that prisoners should unite against their common imperialist oppressors. But the letter you criticize was exposing the "Gang Units" which are being newly built in many prisons, not the organizations they are built to house. The fact is that these units really are built to contain members of groups such as the Latin Kings and the 5%ers specifically because these organizations pull together members of oppressed nations. This is considered a serious danger and the prisons use the name "gang unit" to justify the repression. New "gang units" are being built in many prisons across the country. (Note, "new" refers to the lock-up units, not to the organizations being housed in these torture chambers.) You are correct to criticize the prisoncrats for labeling groups as gangs in order to repress them. We encourage all our comrades behind bars to join in the effort to expose this criminal injustice. Experimental Drugs Offered for Isolation Induced Depression ...I'm angry because I'm disavowed the opportunity to be individually productive among the population. Yet, I don't cause any problems for my oppressor in which they can perceive and use to justify their keeping me locked down. However the psychological effect of this form of isolation is counter productive to the conditions in which much displayed in order to be released by their review board. To be released from security detention one must stay disciplinary free from six to twenty-four months, endure harassment from the pigs in every form imaginable physical and psychological; yet remain obedient and submissive and not let this be a cause of changing ones actions. Yet this doesn't mean you will be taken off security detention. After enduring this for 6, 12, 18, 24, 30 or 36 months -- only to be reviewed every six months as a possible return. ...Even though the written policy is for inmates who display assaultive behavior, the practice is to destroy those of us in these units mentally and psychologically. [Their policy is] kill the head and the body will fall. I did a little testing of the system recently. I requested to speak with a mental health worker. I explained to them that I was very depressed due to being held in isolation for over 20 months. I told her this problem was caused by being isolated and no other reason. As I expected she offered me some experimental psyche medicine to alleviate the problem. Yet I informed her that she had yet to understand. The alleviation of the problem would only come with the removal of myself from this depressive condition. She then stated that she had not the power to change my condition physically but she could offer psychological change. This is how I left her office a second later.... -- A South Carolina Prisoner, 9 July 1998 Exposing Oppression in Massachusetts ...I have filed [a suit] against these swines to shed light on the injustice that is oppressed upon us as prisoners on a day to day basis. I'm a Rastafarian prisoner who is currently confined to the Departmental Disciplinary Unit (DDU). Which is a separate building inside the MCI Cedar Junction- Walpole State Prison Facility. About 120 other prisoners and me are confined in this building. ...Each tier has ten cells and a dirty shower stall at the end of the tier, which is seldom cleaned by correctional staff. We are in leg shackles and handcuffed behind our back every time we leave the cells. We are allowed one hour a day, five days a week to go outside into fenced in dog kennels. We are allowed no contact with any of the other prisoners Prior to coming out of the cells we are subjected to strip- searches which is nothing more than blatant sexual harassment. After we put on our clothes and are handcuffed behind our backs and leg shackled, we are then subjected to what they call "pat searches" where we are groped by these pigs. I seldom go out of the cell because of these harassment tactics. In addition, while we are out of the cells the guards tear up our legal documents, which is the only way out for those doing life sentences. The department of corrections allows them to sanction prisoners to be confined in the DDU for up to ten years in one cell. That's MADNESS! ...You have not even heard half of the shit that goes on in this place! ... Sincerely, -- A Massachusetts Prisoner, 18 June 1998 New Policy Threatens Prisoners' Lives I scribe you to introduce to you the new (Neo) DOC Policy number: DC-ADM 201. Policy Subject: Use of Force. Below is an excerpt from the Policy Bulletin: IV. Definitions Five Yard Rule: Staff Equipped with fire arms may use force, including deadly force, if an inmate is within five yards and is believed to be in a act of aggression, which will compromise weapons retention. V. Policy B-3-e Maintain weapons retention when an inmate is within five yards. The above is a death penalty for those the government missed on its lethal injection list. With these robots (correctional officers) in possession of firearms it is a forum of megalomania for these weak minded and sadistic so- called correctional officers (c/o's) providing the ability to exercise their inner fantasies of their childhood icons such as Al Capone, John Wayne, etc. The inmates who have several bogus misconduct reports contrived by the policy executioners (c/o's) such as threatening staff assault (whistling too loud) will be legal target practice for these Go-Bots (c/o's). If you take a good look at this policy it states "if an inmate...is BELIEVED to be in an act of aggression..."[emphasis added by prisoner.] This asinine policy is legally stating that actual fact doesn't have to be apparent--just assumption or paranoia on the behalf of the over-worked, underpaid, sexually agitated, low self-esteemed, biased and prejudiced young correctional officer who is in dire need of counseling. This is death at the hands of the already dead (mentally). It seems the DOC is the real gangsters. They attempt murder and have murdered under the banner of their own laws. I guess there will be a lot more George Jacksons and Soledad Brotha's in Pennsylvania's DOC in the upcoming years. -- A Pennsylvania Prisoner, 6 July 1998 Police-Coerced Confession Puts Woman In Prison For 17+ Years I was sentenced to a term of 60 years in 1983, for the murder of X in 1981. I was found guilty by an all-white jury with the exception of one African American man--not a jury of my peers. In this trial, no physical or scientific evidence from fingerprints, weapon, or eyewitness existed. The only evidence against me was an unsigned, un-court-reported statement, a statement by Chicago police alleging that I confessed. I testified at Court that I was detained by Chicago police who had me held in interrogation with my children of ages 1, 4, and 9 years old, when the police assaulted me and threatened me that if I did not confess, I would never see my children again. I testified that at that point I had no access to an attorney or any way to know that the police would not do as they threatened unless I agreed. At trial, I testified falsely that Y, a male suspect questioned by Chicago police, was not at the crime scene. After my trial, I testified that during my trial, Y and his family members had contacted me and made threats upon my family's lives. I presented the letters [containing these threats] to the Court. After several years, Police Captain Z notified the Dwight Correctional Prison and informed my counselor that Y had been murdered and that his family members had confessed that he committed the crime I was and am being held for. In spite of appeals and testimony even to the Illinois Prison Review Board after seventeen years both the Illinois Judicial System and Governor Jim Edgar refused to investigate the case, in spite of the credible witness--a police officer of the law. I have served seventeen years of my 60 year sentence and would like public support to assist me to get an investigation into the case. -- A Womyn Prisoner in Illinois Prisoner Denied Medical Care, But Required to Pay For It I have required medical assistance on more than one occasion and been denied. I was in administrative segregation at a previous prison (Michigan Reformatory). I had overdone myself with push-ups and messed my bone up in my elbow. Every time I moved my arm, the bone in my elbow would pop. The fake nurses told me since I have belly-chains on (which Michigan Reformatory requires you to wear when going to Health Service while in the hole), they can't do nothing about it, so they denied me medical care, but surely took my three dollars. --A Michigan Prisoner, 27 May 1998 More to Offer Than a Life in Prison I'm sorry I haven't written sooner, but it was impossible because I've been at court. I have received the MIM Notes, and I do share them with others as well as discuss the topics. It's sad to say these pigs are forcing me to take one and a half to three years more in prison. It's not much; it's the principle of their injustice system that makes me so angry. I really do wish to remain on the mailing list for MIM Notes. The MIM Notes are very useful tools of education. In the New York [state] prison system, there's been an outbreak of war between Latinos and the Bloods. It's sad and I try through educating the brothers about this "divide and conquer" attitude. It seems at times things go smoothly, but it never lasts for long. It doesn't help that the pigs are using physical and psychological torture to do as they wish. They only get away with that shit because we are locked in our cells 23 hours a day and we are in handcuffs and waistchains any time we leave our cells. They play with the food and the grievance procedure does not work, and it's impossible to get access into the courts unless we go through their administrative avenues which are impossible. You get the picture. It just pisses me off that society thinks prisons are resorts or country clubs. That's so crazy. The brutality is out of control and when we defend ourselves we get more prison time. My rage is boiling and it's only a matter of time before I lose control. I know it will be and would be counterproductive. I have more to offer to the cause than spending my life in prison. Well, comrades, I'll close for now. Peace to all those oppressed. --A New York State Prisoner, 4 June 1998 Notes on a South Carolina Prison ...I am on lockdown, so I don't have first-hand info on the labor here, but I do know per order of the dictator (commissioner) that no one gets paid for work anymore except those who had a job before the new year, and if they lose their job, they don't get paid anymore when they start back work, and the law in this state is now mandatory 85% service of sentence, so slavery is in again! They just implemented the new system for health care this month, and we're supposed to pay for all service and any medical damage we do to someone else! I don't know about AIDS medication and all that; that is confidential, and those who do have the disease don't talk about it. However, when I was on the supermax wing here, they allegedly had an AIDS patient back there and they treated him worse than a dying animal. He could not talk or focus well enough to carry on a conversation. He was in need of serious health care, but they gave him the opposite. Stripping him out with no tissue or clothing or hygiene items and turning the air conditioner wide open. There is no educational materials on this lock-up that is furnished by this prison. There was previously a book cart, but it stopped coming around when the new system and changes came in effect. The only legal materials available is digests. Other books (supplements, U.S. reporters, etc.) are only made available if you request a specific book in that category. We are not allowed to go to any law library room. They have law clerks who often misinform people of the law, or they try to find ways to hustle us. The guards here are continuously assaulting brothers in cuffs. I fear the same, not because of the pain, but because of the response I may make that could enhance my sentence. Recreation here has been very disturbing recently. They've been constantly denying us our one hour recreation for no reason at all (though they always create one). The latest wave of condition or treatment that I've found inconsistent with state practice in other prisons in this state is mace/gas. Recently they have been macing prisoners for hitting the door or stagging on the food flap hole in the cell door, and they refuse to give us a shower afterwards. I've been maced twice in the last two weeks. They allege it's a new policy, but no one has it [in writing]. They will mace prisoners without even inquiring into the problem that led to the hitting on the door or stagging on the flap, and they refuse to get a supervising official. What's so bad about this is, if you file a grievance, they will dismiss it because of the write-up against the prisoner that has nothing to do with him being denied a shower to get mace off of him. ...We do not want to waste our energy or yours begging the oppressor. We would rather channel this energy into building and organizing a stronger force. Pamoja Tutashinda! (Together We Will Win!) Re-Build, --A South Carolina Prisoner, 8 June 1998