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Great shot of The Chieftain Hotel sign by Rigphoto at http://www.flickr.com/photos/rigphoto/183817247/
Farm Machine Music
from http://www.snopes.com/photos/arts/musicmachine.asp This event will be held at Totem Hall in Squamish - I’m excited! Celebrate! Have lunch at your friends house, play soccer, read, play cards, etc. Just try to not purchase anything for 24 hours! Started by the ever so wonderful BC Based Adbusters: THE ULTIMATE REFUND: On November 24th and 25th – the busiest days in the American retail calendar and the unofficial start of the international Christmas-shopping season – thousands of activists and concerned citizens in 65 countries will take a 24-hour consumer detox as part of the 14th annual Buy Nothing Day, a global phenomenon that originated in Vancouver, Canada. Buy Nothing Day isn’t just about changing your habits for one day. It’s about starting a lasting lifestyle commitment to consuming less and producing less waste. With six billion people on the planet, the onus if on the most affluent – the upper 20% that consumes 80% of the world’s resources – to begin setting the example.
Claim: Video clip shows a music-playing "farm machine" built at the University of Iowa.
Status: False.
Example: [Collected via e-mail, 2006] University of Iowa Farm Machine Music
This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between the Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa. Amazingly, 97% of the machines components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft Iowa, yes farm equipment!
It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was WELL worth the effort.
It is now on display in the Matthew Gerhard Alumni Hall at the University and is already slated to be donated to the Smithsonian.
Enjoy.
Squamish Nation PowWow this weekend!
Happy Buy Nothing Day - Nov. 24
APPO Press Release Denouncing Police and PRI
OAXACA CITY, OAXACA. NOVEMBER 21, 2006.
TO THE LOCAL, NATIONAL, AND INTERNATIONAL PRESS
TO THE PEOPLE OF OAXACA, MEXICO, AND THE WORLD
Today, after 184 days of struggle against the tyrant and repressor Ulises Ruíz Ortiz, his paid assassins, paramilitaries and thugs, the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) finds it necessary to denounce the abuses against the people of Oaxaca.
OAXACA CITY, OAXACA. NOVEMBER 21, 2006.
TO THE LOCAL, NATIONAL, AND INTERNATIONAL PRESS
TO THE PEOPLE OF OAXACA, MEXICO, AND THE WORLD
Today, after 184 days of struggle against the tyrant and repressor Ulises Ruíz Ortiz, his paid assassins, paramilitaries and thugs, the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) finds it necessary to denounce the abuses against the people of Oaxaca.
Yesterday, as the APPO was holding a peaceful march to commemorate the 96th anniversary marking the beginning of our revolution, we were provoked by the occupying force of the Federal Preventative Police (PFP) as we passed in front of their contingent, and later again at the corner of Alcalá and Morelos streets. Rocks and marbles were thrown at the members of the APPO participating in the march, provoking a confrontation that lasted nearly 4 hours, leaving a toll of 10 detained and 50 wounded from the APPO, whose names are the following:
Felemón Ortega, José Luis Órnelas were left with a fractured leg and intoxication from the gases, Jesús Alvarado and a foreign woman who were left with wounds on the left side of their ribcage from the impact of a teargas canister, and all of this leaves further proof of the criminal and cowardly acts of the PFP against the people of Oaxaca, and only to protect Ulises Ruíz Ortiz, and to keep him in power.
The APPO condemns this criminal act and the general impunity with which the PFP is acting against the compañeros from various media outlets, assaulting them for merely trying to do their work and trying at all costs to prevent these matters from coming to the public eye. We recognize the bravery and professionalism with which the true reporters are acting by complying with the people.
The actions carried out by Ulises Ruíz’s armed groups cannot go unpunished: burning the APPO encampment in order to destroy it, robbing people of their provisions, and burning the clothes of children who are staying in the encampment. It is clear that they came with the intention of assaulting and even assassinating members of the APPO, by coming with heavily armed thugs and paramilitaries, and fortunately, thanks to an anonymous tip passed along to the APPO, we had already asked the compañeros to retire from the encampment.
Finally, we want to recognize the support that was brought by members of the Union 3 de Marzo del Municipio de Oaxaca that came to the encampment to clean up the garbage and materials burnt by URO’s paid assassins, something that speaks highly of the Democratic Unions.
ATTENTIVELY
APPO PRESS COMMITTEE
ALL THE POWER TO THE PEOPLE
Hell Is Rising in Oaxaca: An Interview with an Oaxacan Rebel
by Ron Jacobs
When I lived in Washington state, some of my closest friends were from the Mexican state of Oaxaca. I have kept in touch with a few of them, and they have kept me in touch with the rebellion unfolding in the streets of Oaxaca over the past few months. After the escalation of the situation there on October 27, 2006, when paramilitary forces shot and killed four people (including Indymedia journalist Brad Will), I spoke with my friends David Abeles and Hilaria Cruz who helped me contact some of their people in Oaxaca city. Given the circumstances currently existing in the area and the uncertainty of the immediate future because of the military and police presence there, I felt that the best way to get firsthand information out to the wider world would be to conduct an email interview. The first interview is below. I hope to have another one ready in the next couple days.
Ron: Hey Tomas. Thanks for taking the time to answer a few questions. Would you be willing to introduce yourself?
Tomas: Hi, I would like to salute all the readers of this electronic journal. My name is Tomas Cruz, I am a native from a community in Oaxaca in the highlands. I was forced by the economic situation to migrate to the States. Fortunately I gained an education at the Evergreen State College. I also went to the University of Texas at Austin for a graduate degree in Latin American studies.
Ron: So, you’ve been in Oaxaca during the entire uprising? Can you tell us the sequence of events as you see them up to now?
Tomas: I have been involved in diverse NGOs working for the communities in Oaxaca up until the time of the Oaxacan uprising.
What we are seeing in Oaxaca is a breakdown of political system that is completely corrupt and deliberately abuses its citizens at will, using the legitimacy of the state to impose a government that only uses power to advance a personal agenda and that of a very small political oligarchy. Since the start of the present government, it was characterized by repression of political leaders, immediately killing them and imposing its repressive mode of government.
The result of the events which are occurring as we speak began with an annual demonstration by the teachers’ syndicate. In the 14th of June, the state police attacked the teachers who were at the zocalo for the demonstration.
The response from the citizenry was immediate — hundreds of people joined the teachers strike and saw an opportunity to stop the continued abuses from the government.
I can only describe what is occurring as catharsis of the population, especially of the immense poor population of the city.
After the attack by the state and the immense response from the population, the most remarkable event in the politics of the movement has been the formation of a popular assembly of the pueblos of Oaxaca, also known as APPO.
The APPO organizations have been capable of resisting all the attacks from the state government, from spots attacking the protesters as a bunch of radicals to the death squads sent to kill people who were protesting at night.
The response of the APPO was to develop barricades to stop the death squads. This resulted in a historic, animated political culture, with also a strong popular support.
Recently, the violence escalated when the international reporter died at the hands of the mercenaries paid by the governor.
Yesterday, there was an intervention by the federal police after the multiple deaths and probably also after the international pressure following the death of the international reporter. The federal police killed at least 4 people and raped one woman during the intervention. The response of the APPO is to maintain the protest until the governor resigns and the political system is reformed.
Ron: What groups were involved that you know of? Also, I imagine that many people were unaffiliated. What were their reasons for joining, in your estimate?
Tomas: This movement is composed of the poorest section of the population. Old housewives who think of this as a parallel to the revolution of 1910 and are ready to resist for years, beggars who are tired of the abuses by the police or simply sympathize with the movement because they see no hope and future in their lives. Mechanics, civil servants, citizens from the neighboring neighborhoods who have had their municipal presidents imposed on them. Citizens from the poorest sections of the city.
Ron: From my understanding, PRI and its allies were responsible for the shootings that killed several people on October 27th. Is PRI the only party responsible for the situation in Oaxaca or are other political parties also responsible?
Tomas: No, the PRI is seeing its last days, and it has resorted to the only thing that it knows, violence.
Ron: You’re in Oaxaca right now. What the hell is going on?
Tomas: Hell is rising in Oaxaca, the force of the government against teachers, students, housewives, mechanics, peasants. The whole city and the whole state is filled with federal police, local police, military.
Ron: How are the spirits of those in the rebellion? Where do they get their food and water?
Tomas: There is ample popular support for this uprising which results in a steady flow of donations from communities and lay citizens who donate at different points. Mainly this has been coordinated by using radio stations. At this point, there is one station left, which is being broadcast through the internet at www.indymedia.org — you (those of you who can speak Spanish) can listen to what is going on as we speak.
The radio broadcasters who have little experience but a huge heart respond to the needs of the people on the barricades. Yesterday, for example, they organized the installation of medical aid stations because the Red Cross got instructions from the governor and its director not to attend to the flurry of people who were shot at by the governor’s police.
Ron: Do you think there is a potential for armed conflict (beyond that seen already — which seems mostly to originate from the forces of the state)?
Tomas: Hmm, if the state continues on its support of a political figure who has lost completely popular support, especially from the poor, then we will see an escalation of violence. because the demands of the people after decades — some argue centuries — have been unattended. Honestly, I think that this would continue as peaceful opposition, and hopefully we would see a more democratic state. Only if the government continues its escalation of violence would we see a critical cyclical point in Mexico’s history.
Ron: If the federal forces are able to quash the rebellion, what kind of repression do you think will follow? Indeed, based on past experiences, after the media leaves the region, what do you foresee happening to the movement, its participants and supporters, and the region in general?
Tomas: I think that the violence is going to be targeted at the organizers and the leaders of the movement.
Ron: In the greater scheme of things, how would you relate this to other struggles occurring in the Americas? What relationship, if any, do you see the demands of the protestors have to the anti-imperialist/anti-global capitalism movements in this hemisphere and around the world?
Tomas: This rebellion reminds me of Bolivia, because of it indigenous component. As in Bolivia, once the indigenous population decide that a government needs to be overturned, we see that they gain a determination that has caused it to fall. In the case of Oaxaca, the most likely scenario is that the governor is going to be overthrown. What we are seeing also is a political scenario that changes everyday. The news today is that the political parties at the national level are all calling for the governor to resign.
If the movement maintains the level and determination that we are seeing, then this movement has a chance of playing an important role in national politics and possibly a shift in the neoliberal government of Mexico.
Ron: Anything more to add?
Tomas: I was at the scene five minutes before the reporter from Indymedia was killed. I remember hearing the shots, people running all over the place, unarmed mechanics, housewives. There was a woman there, I do not know if she was a teacher, I only remember her words, "This is our moment, we cant go on living like this, it is enough. I went to school barefoot, and it makes me cry to see what happens here. Our only future is the border with the United States. It makes me sad to see our young finish a university degree only to work as taxi drivers. This is our moment, we can’t let them continue to oppress us."
*
Ron Jacobs is author of The Way the Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground, just republished by Verso. Jacobs’ essay on Big Bill Broonzy is featured in CounterPunch’s new collection on music, art and sex: Serpents in the Garden.
Oaxaca - APPO supporters endure torture
By John Gibler/Special to The Herald Mexico
El Universal
Lunes 20 de noviembre de 2006
Rene Trujillo Martínez, a thin 25-year-old lawyer and volunteer radio announcer with the Oaxaca People´s Assembly (APPO), holds the uncomfortable distinction of having survived a disappearance.
Trujillo was recently abducted from his apartment by armed men in civilian clothes, brutally beaten at gunpoint, taken to a safe house and tortured. He says he was then held incommunicado for two days while being interrogated by federal authorities, and then, miraculously, released on bail.
According to APPO spokespeople and the Mexican League for Human Rights Defense in Oaxaca, at least 30 APPO protesters are currently missing, awaiting a similar miracle.
"Usually the disappearances are not so massive as they are now, 30 in just a few days," said Florentino López, a spokesperson for the APPO, referring to the number of protesters who have allegedly been abducted or gone missing in the past two weeks since the arrival of federal police in Oaxaca.
"Like torture, disappearances are a part of state terrorism against social movements," he said.
Federal and state authorities denied interview requests for this article.
ABDUCTION
On Nov. 7, at about 2:15 p.m., Trujillo and two friends got out of a taxi and began walking up Santo Tomás, the narrow, hilly side street that leads to Trujillo´s rented room. They noticed a group of men following them and began to run. The men also broke into a sprint, catching up to Trujillo and his friends just as they were closing the garage door.
The men, at least six of them according to several eye-witness accounts, forced their way into the garage with pistols in hand, firing and then beating the three young men, forcing them out into the street.
"I don´t know if they were waiting for him or following him, but they came in with pistols and everything," said one witness (all witnesses interviewed spoke on the condition of anonymity). "They were dressed in civilian clothes. They came in hitting him; they pulled him out violently. They didn´t even talk; it was pure violence."
Trujillo and his two friends, Mauricio Marmolejo and Benito Pereda Fernández, were each held down and beaten in the street by two men. But it was Trujillo they were after, and Trujillo who received the most intense beating: after being struck repeatedly in the face with the barrel of a pistol, Trujillo´s assailant stuck his gun into Trujillo´s mouth while slamming his head against the wall.
Days later Trujillo´s blood was still visible on the rocks outside his house.
RADIO ANNOUNCER
Trujillo participated in the June 14 takeover of Radio Universidad and volunteered around the station until a paid saboteur threw acid on the transmitter and the station went off the air. But Trujillo hung around, helping maintain the barricade protecting the university station. He then began as a program announcer on Oct. 21 when the radio went back on the air with a repaired transmitter.
Trujillo ran the 3 a.m. to 5 a.m. program, known as Barricade Radio, providing information about police movements around town and barricades that needed reinforcement.
APPO protesters began to build hundreds of barricades throughout Oaxaca City after gunmen linked to local police opened fire on their protest camps on Aug. 22, killing one protester.
KIDNAPPED
The gunmen forced Trujillo and his friends into a yellow rental pick-up truck, which they had called for by cell phone during the beatings, according to witnesses. The assailants then covered the men´s faces with their shirts and forced them face down in the back of the truck, knees pinning down their backs.
After driving for about 20 minutes, the gunmen stopped and switched to a white pick-up truck, where they placed nylon hoods over the three men and then took them to a warehouse - they think near the airport.
At the warehouse the gunmen tortured them, sticking needles under their finger nails (the scars were visible three days later), applying electric shocks to their feet, beating them on the head, and choking them, according to the three men, who were later released.
They asked them to identify militants in the APPO, the most active people at Radio Universidad, and the men who had captured two soldiers, and later released them, a few days before. The men had Oaxaca, Mexico City and northern Mexican accents.
BEING FRAMED
After some 10 hours of torture, the gunmen made them hold guns and then took pictures and filmed them with the guns in their hands. The three men were then taken to the federal Attorney General´s Office (PGR) complex in Oaxaca and charged with the federal crime of possession of illegal firearms.
They were held incommunicado at the PGR, where again they were interrogated and terrorized by threats. On Nov. 9, they were released on bail. Trujillo says he paid US$4,000 for his liberty.
It is unclear how many protesters have disappeared in the past weeks. With rumors constantly circulating through town, the number could be significantly less, or higher, than 30 - the number of known APPO protesters reported missing by family members.
The involvement of several levels of authorities also complicates the issue, says Jessica Sánchez, the president of the Mexican League for Human Rights Defense in Oaxaca.
Local, state and federal authorities make detentions without regard to jurisdiction, she said, and they take prisoners to random jails across the state.
The victims are refused access to lawyers and human rights workers, making the job of locating and identifying those on the list of disappeared extremely difficult, Sánchez said.
"This is testimony to the state of suspended guarantees in Oaxaca," she said, "of the lack of governability and the failure of public institutions."
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