11/22 Pamphlets to Prisoners
11/24 Radical Spanish Language Film Series/Ciclo de Cine Radical en Español

Mon, Wed, Fri at 8pm, and Sun at 7pm: Food Not Bombs near Herman Square @ Smith and McKinney
Every Friday @ 7:30pm: Houston Indymedia Radio 90.1fm KPFT

from the open publishing newswire: UPDATE: 11/20 protesters released, still have questions for Cigna
Today starting about 11 AM, demonstrators from Health Care for All Texas, the Progressive Action Alliance, Code Pink, Harris Co. Green Party, and others gathered at the Cigna headquarters by the Galleria in Houston, at 2700 Post Oak.

The demonstrators called for an end to unfair medical insurance practices that deny care to people in need, and an end to excessive industry profits and executive pay. They said they supported universal single payer health care ("Medicare for All" or House Resolution 676) and an end to the domination of the health industry by insurance companies.

Two other demonstrators, who wanted to go inside to speak with the Cigna executives, were not allowed to do so. They decided to sit outside the front door of the building until they could speak with the executives... Finally, after at least 45 minutes, the two demonstrators sitting by the entrance were handcuffed, put in a police car, and taken away as the rest of the demonstrators showed their support for them. [Read the Full Story with photos] More from the newswire: protest at cigna (photos) | Health Care protesters arrested (video) | www.healthcareforalltexas.org

from the open publishing newswire: Breaking: Gerald Eldridge's execution has been stayed pending further psychiatric examinations.
Texas is set to execute three people in three days starting today, November 17. The first is Gerald Cornelius Eldridge, who is mentally ill and has an IQ of 72. Eldridge, 45, was sentenced to death for the 1993 shooting deaths of his former girlfriend, Cynthia Bogany and her nine-year old daughter Chirissa in Houston.

The second is a man named Danielle Simpson, sentenced to death for the murder of 84-year old Geraldine Davidson. On Thursday, Robert Thompson is scheduled for execution. He was convicted and sentenced to death under the Law of Parties, even though it was his accomplice who fired the bullet that killed the victim. The accomplice was sentenced to life.

Call Governor Perry at 512 463 1782 to protest these executions or contact Perry by email through his website [Read full story]

Related: If you hire a lawyer, the chances are you won't be sentenced to death in Houston. University of Denver Criminologist Scott Phillips reviewed 504 capital indictments over three decades in Harris County, Texas, and found that defendants who hired lawyers for the entire trial were never sentenced to death -- and were more likely to be acquitted. [Read full story]

from the opening publishing newswire: These jerks [The Genocide Awareness Project] set up at the University of Houston today and have set up in Butler Plaza directly in front of the library, causing a huge clot of people to gather blocking the walkway. The display has drawn strong responses from people who agree that abortion is baby murder (and yell loudly at people they disagree with that they are baby murderers) and students and community members who support a woman's right to chose.

Some of the opponents of the display carried a sign reading "Abortion is NOT murder" and engaged in debate with people who seemed to buy this nonsense. They seemed to be supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party The display consists of photos comparing abortion to Nazi Germany, and to Jim Crow lynchings in the south (as well as animal testing). In addition to making a huge photo display, they put up signs all over the courtyard 'warning' about the display. Some folks who appear to disagree with this religious fundamentalist nonsense used these signs to get their own opinions out. [full article and photo]
Photos & Articles from the Newswire: Off our campus! Off our bodies! Students confront anti-choice "Genocide Awareness Program" | Photos from the third day of protesting the Genocide Awareness Project

* Throughout history of legal abortion, anti-abortion extremists have used propaganda, misinformation, and outright lies to dissuade women from choosing abortion.
* Anti-abortion activists claim that medical abortion is unsafe for women, even though there is no evidence to support this claim. The real goal of those activists is to stop all types of legal abortion - a situation that would put the lives and health of women in danger. Full Article: Flier from protest of "Genocide Awareness Project"

On January 30th, 2009, Kristina Clair of Philadelphia, PA — one of the system administrators of the server that hosts the indymedia.us site — received in the mail a grand jury subpoena from the Southern District of Indiana federal court. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has represented Indymedia in other cases like this in the past and immediately got involved in the case.

The government inappropriately used the subpoena to demand: All IP traffic to and from www.indymedia.us" for a particular date, including "IP addresses, times, and any other identifying information." This entire subpoena was never discussed openly within indymedia because it contained instructions not to discuss any of it's details, even though the government had not obtained the gag-order that would normally go along with such a demand.

The EFF responded to the indymedia subpoena, and now finally, the government has backed down. That means we can talk about it! Listen to Nick Cooper interviewing Kevin Bankston of EFF. For more info, check out the EFF information page about the incident. More coverage on the indymedia.us site.

from the open publishing newswire: Our community is distraught by the tragic shooting at Fort Hood yesterday. We extend our condolences to the families and friends of the victims. As upset as we are about this incident, this shooting does not come as a shock. Eight years of senseless wars have taken a huge toll on our troops and their families. It’s time to admit that the wars in southwest Asia are in no one’s best interests. Bring the troops home now!

The Army has also repeatedly demonstrated that it is more interested in making soldiers “deployable” than it is in helping them fully recover from PTSD and other mental health issues. This often leaves soldiers with few options other than to self-medicate with drugs and alcohol. The Army routinely deploys soldiers who are clearly suicidal and homicidal. Yesterday was a gruesome reminder of the possible violent consequences of this policy. We hope the Army now takes its duty to take care of soldiers more seriously.

We demand transparency from the Army and other federal agencies involved with this investigation. [Full article by Under the Hood Café &Iraq Veterans Against the War – Fort Hood Chapter]

from the open publishing newswire: We want to thank all the folks that came out on Tuesday to show opposition to racial profiling by Houston law enforcement and stand up for immigrant communities. Despite packing the meeting room with opponents of the program, and the vast majority of speakers opposing the program, the commisioners voted 4 to 1 to join this program. Judge Ed Emmet, Jerry Eversol, Steve Radack, and El Franco Lee (who as commissioner for precinct 1 represents the University of Houston) voted in favor of the program. Only Sylvia Garcia voted against the program.

The event was relatively well covered by local media (in that they talked about it on tv, not that they put it in context or examined the racist and bad public policy behind the program), check out these stories.

In Irving Texas, when the local police entered into a CAP agreement (a similar program to 287g that gives access to immigration records in their city jail) with ICE in 2006, arrest records have shown an increase in arrests of Latinos for petty offenses. The University of California at Berkley Law School wrote a report [download pdf] that exposes the expansion of racial profiling that took place once they reached an agreement with ICE.
Photos from 287g vote and protest at County Commissioners Office | Video: Houston fights 287g

from the open publishing newswire: Each October since 2000, people from all walks of life and all parts of Texas, the U.S. and other countries have taken a day out of their year and gathered in Texas to raise their voices together and loudly express their opposition to the death penalty. The march is a coming together of activists, family members of those on death row, community leaders, exonerated prisoners and all those calling for abolition. The march started in Austin in 2000. In 2007 and 2008, the march was held in Houston (Houston Indymedia Coverage from 2008, 2007). This year, it is came back to Austin.

The annual march is organized by several Texas anti-death penalty organizations, including the Austin chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, Texas Moratorium Network, the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Texas Students Against the Death Penalty, Texas Death Penalty Education and Resource Center and Kids Against the Death Penalty. [Full article with photos]
More from the Newswire Audio from the 10th annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty | Reginald Blanton killed by the state of Texas | Legal Lynching? Executions continue in the Lone Star State

Families and supporters raised the cases of Reginald Blanton, Rodney Reed, Jeff Wood, Clinton Young, Robert Garza and others. The march this year focused on raising the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was executed in 2004 by Rick Perry based on the testimony of arson investigators who research has been found "relied on bad science, unproven theories and personal bias" by the report of the Texas Forensic Science Commission in August of 2009.

by Nick Cooper
Two important peace and justice organizations are having internal conflicts over recent comments by their founding members. Human Rights Watch's Robert L. Bernstein criticized his own group for overly denouncing Israel, and Code Pink's Medea Benjamin stopped demanding an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.

Code Pink is an organization started by women that fights for peace and justice in often humorous and flamboyant ways. Upon returning from Afghanistan, Code Pink's activist-celebrity Medea Benjamin declared that she "found very few people who would like the troops out now. Most say that the country would collapse into civil war or be taken over by the Taliban if the US troops were to leave." She also said "I feel we have to have a responsible exit strategy that includes pressure on this government to get rid of people who were responsible for crimes, to build up a justice system that can actually function."

Many people involved with Code Pink around the country had been demanding immediate withdrawal for years, and so were shocked. In Houston, Code Pink participants held a straw poll in which 20 to 0 voted to continue calling for immediate troop withdrawal. read more

from the open publishing newswire: On Monday October 12th, Houston SDS distributed fliers in front of the MD Anderson Library on campus and performed street theater about the racist nature of the 287(g) program, which gives local law enforcement the ability to enforce immigration law, which is a federal responsability. The text of the flier is below, as well as uploaded as a jpg and pdf that we encourage supporters of immigrant rights and racial justice to distribute.

On Wednesday October 14th, we hosted a workshop by the Houston Interfaith Worker Justice Center about the 287(g) program and the efforts taking place in Houston to get the city and county to terminate their agreements with the federal government through this program. We are working on a letter writing campaign to the Harris County Commisioners and the mayoral candidates for them to strongly oppose the implementation of this program, which is a waste of local resources and a violation of civil rights. 287(g) is a program that should be scrapped in Houston and nationwide.

Right now the city of Houston has ended its agreement with the Department of Homeland Security. Mayor Bill White has declared “Rather than letting us simply write the agreements on our own terms, they want to put language in there that we object to. We don't want anything that creates obligations on the part of the city, or that would be inconsistent with our policies not to divert patrol ocers from solving crimes.” However Harris County continues the 287(g) program in its jails. We oppose this program and want Sheriff Adrian Garcia and the County Commisioners to end this program as soon as possible to defend our rights and our pocketbooks. Tell them you oppose 287(g) www.co.harris.tx.us/elected_officials.asp [read full article with photos]

from the open publishing newswire: In 2006, Houston janitors stood up to win better jobs for Houston after they were forced to go on strike. They won a collective bargaining agreement that gave them access to affordable healthcare and raised their wages to $7.75. Their contract expires in November.

With negotiations to improve more than 3,200 local jobs set to start at the end of the month, Houston janitors hosted this convention and march to call for an economy that works for everyone. Speakers included representatives from Service Employees International Union (SEIU), U.S. Representive Sheila Jackson- Lee and Houston Mayoral candidate Annise Parker.

At the conclusion of the convention, we marched through the intersection of Post Oak and Westheimer, the scene of the janitors’ first civil disobedience during their '06 strike. The crowd swelled to over 700 with four more bus loads showing up at the Williams Tower. Houston City Council member Jolanda Jones marched the entire time at the front of the line stretching for blocks. [read full article with photos]

from the open publishing newswire: Houston SDS hosted a Teach in on Afghanistan that was attended by about 70 people, overwhelmingly students, on October 7th. We screened an excerpt of Rethink Afghanistan and had presentations by University of Houston History Professor Bob Buzzanco about the history of Afghanistan focusing on the period during the cold war, and by Afghanistan Veteran Matt Dobbs about his experiences in two tours of duty in Afghanistan, and how he has come to oppose the war on a civilian population which is fighting a battle of self-defense against the US lead occupation.

This event kicks of the work of our anti-war and occupation working group which will be hosting additional events about Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine this semester. We’d like to thank Matt Dobbs and Professor Buzzanco for taking the time to prepare and give statements to this teach in, as well as to all the other folks who helped put together and promote this event.

On Wednesday October 7, students on 26 campuses across the United States protested eight long years of war against and occupation of the people of Afghanistan. Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a nation-wide student organization committed to activism for peace, justice and equality, organized the protest. [read the full article]
UH SDS | SDS Antiwar Working Group | Indymedia.us coverage of Antiwar protests across the US on October 7th

Houston Progressives or Military Recruiters?
by Nick Cooper
photo credit: Matt Fitt / Santa Cruz Indymedia
Houston Mayoral candidate Annise Parker, was a guest on the KPFT show "Growing Up in America" on August 24th. The show seems widely respected among listeners, and this critique is not to disparage the vast majority of the show's efforts.
Parker came out encouraging enlistment for our students by saying that the "military has been, has a long proud tradition of moving people into the middle class in our society." Host Robert Sanborn chimed in, in absolute agreement, saying "absolutely, and with the new GI Bill, it's gonna even do even more for that but you're right absolutely."
I have invited all of the mayoral candidates on to Houston Indymedia Radio on KPFT to comment on these remarks, but none have responded yet.
The military has a long proud tradition of moving people into the middle class? They could have mentioned that the military has a long proud tradition of moving 10% of its people into coffins, into vegetative states, into rooms in their parents house in which they can barely take care of themselves, and into wheelchairs. Then there is the long proud tradition of leaving veterans in the streets. According to the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, 33% of the homeless male population is made up of veterans. In any given year, 3% of all veterans experience homelessness. One percent or more of veterans are in jails. There is an epidemic of suicides and severe depression among veterans.
read the full article here

from the open publishing newswire: Houston hero Lenwood Johnson has been organizing residents of Freedmen’s Town in 4th Ward for over 30 years, fighting demolition and gentrification of the city’s oldest Black neighborhood. He reminds everyone of the price paid by the founders to make a home for their people in perpetuity: The bricks that pave many of the historic streets in Freedmen’s Town were hand made over a century ago by formerly enslaved Africans.

When Lenwood E. Johnson, the son of Texas sharecroppers, moved into Houston’s Allen Parkway Village project housing, the Freedmen’s Town section of the city had yet to be designated historic and the village had yet to be saved. By the end of the 1990s, the village was preserved and Johnson had proved to be something of an unlikely hero here in Houston’s 4th Ward, historically one of the poorest sections of the city – but always ripe for redevelopment because of its proximity to the downtown. [read the full article]

W.E.B. DuBois once wrote that the question white people so often want to ask black people is, "How does it feel to be a problem?" Bob Jensen turns the tables and recognizes some simple facts: Race problems have their roots in a system of white supremacy. White people invented white supremacy. Therefore, the color of the race problem is white. White people are the problem. White people have to ask ourselves: How does it feel to be a problem?

from the open publishing newswire: When asked a question about quotas and affirmative action, Bob answered affirmatively, and went further to address white supremacy and the duty of those of us with privilege to push the envelope, be "the craziest one in the room."

After delivering his talk titled "The Color of the Race Problem is White" at Sedition Books in Houston the evening of 16 September, 2009, Robert Jensen answered questions. This is one. The sound quality leaves something to be desired, because fans were full tilt as it was a warm evening in a packed house. This version of his entire talk is also posted on Vimeo, here, or you can see an earlier presentation in Austin with better sound here. [read full article with video]
More from the newswire: The Color of the Race Problem is White (Audio)

From the open publishing newswire:
Where We're At
This is a point in history where the world is dominated by a system of brutal capitalist exploitation. Nothing in this world is safe from it or the U.S. empire - it's main enforcer. Things as fundamental as human dignity and the very planet that we live on are subservient to the interests of the capitalist class and the endless pursuit of profits. And after centuries of attempts at reforms, only changes in the form of oppression have come, while the system's fundamental workings remain intact and even more destructive...

Our Collective
In the context of these great challenges, our collective is forming here in Houston to contribute to this overall task together with many others. Though we don't have all the answers, we're determined to contribute as best we can. We take our inspirations from three core ideas. [read full article] Going Forward on this New Road by Houston's FIRE Collective www.thefirecollective.org

Houston Indymedia has changed the wording of our Mission Statement, which sits on the about page and serves along with the Action Guidelines as the document new participants sign. The wording of the new statement is:

"The Houston Independent Media Center is an all volunteer collective committed to using media production and distribution as tools for promoting social and economic justice. We seek to provide alternatives to for-profit media not only in our coverage, but also within our collective by implementing consensus based non-hierarchical work-group models of decision making. While focusing on local social movements, we will explore connections to global systems. We believe that by reporting on dissent, by critiquing corporate, government and military domination, and by promoting art, culture and critical thinking through participatory events, we can contribute to the development of an equitable and sustainable society."

Some of the significant changes since the previous Mission Statement from early 2001 includes that we are all volunteers, that we are focusing on social movements, that we reporting on dissent, and that our events are intended to be participatory.
If you are interested in becoming a volunteer with us at Houston Indymedia, please send an email to: houston at indymedia dot org