Snatch-and-Jail Justice?
By DAVE LINDORFF
CounterPunch
Reading the latest AP report on how American citizens are being snatched up, detained and deported (sic) by the Immigration and Naturalization Service has reminded me just what a f**ked up place this country has become.
Ever since September 11, 2001, the country has simply lost it.
Remember back then, no sooner had the dust settled over Lower Manhattan, than the INS and other police agencies began rounding up thousands of people with Muslam sounding names, or even with non-Muslim sounding names but Muslim-looking faces, and locking them away in federal and county detentenion centers, with no access to lawyers. People who were here on grants of asylum because of political persecution in their home countries were being shipped home to likely torture and death, without any hearings.
Most Americans seemed okay about this.
There has been a “nativist” (sic) resurgence, with people who consider themselves “real” Americans getting hysterical about all the non-white immigrants and descendants of non-white immigrants in this country. (Of course the whole idea of calling such idiocy “nativist” is itself nonsense, since the real natives are the people that we systematically exterminated in the 19th and early 20th century, and that we try to keep confined on reservations.) So it shouldn’t be surprising that besides plenty of immigrants who are here on legitimate grounds being caught up in the government deportation machine, there turn out to be many actual American citizens who are being snatched up and sent to god knows where.
Not that any of this is new.
La Migra, as the agency is known among Latinos, and by people who live south of the border, has never been particularly careful about whom it deports when it comes to those with Hispanic surnames. I remember back in the late 1970s, when I was part of a collective running a spunky little alternative weekly newspaper, the LA Vanguard, in Los Angeles, we had a had a cartoonist, Joseph Billie, who did a comic strip for us called “Taco Rabbit.” Despite his name and surname, neither of which was Hispanic in the least, Joseph was at least half Latino, and looked the part.
Still a teenager, he on at least three separate occasions within only one year’s time, found himself, despite his being a native-born US citizen with only minimal Spanish language skills, snatched off the street by agents of La Migra, who with no hearing would whisk him off to the border at Tijuana and dump him in Mexico. Once there, he would call his father, who would drive down and pick him up. Once Joseph had to call us from Mexico to say he’d be late delivering his strip, because he had been snatched by La Migra.
Joseph’s problem was that he didn’t drive, and so he didn’t carry any ID. That was enough for the INS, which didn’t bother with any legal niceties, like granting the arrestee a phone call—which would have saved Joseph’s dad a long drive down to the border. Joseph, as it turned out, didn’t mind being deported that much. He liked Tijuana, and it was a free ride down, even if the INS guys could get a little rough putting him on the bus.
But that was then. Now things are much worse. Lawyers who have tried to defend some of the victims of INS roundups report that many detainees are subjected to what can only be termed torture—things like having themselves slammed into walls or pushed down stairs while arms and legs are manacled, having their teeth smashed out, being left outside in cold rain or blazing sun, kept from sleeping for days at a time. Sound like Guantanamo or Bagram? In fact, there is little difference.
But I really cannot think of anything much worse than being a US citizen, or a legitimate Green Card holder, and being snatched away from family and friends and job and, after being held incommunicado in some stinking cell, shipped off to some country to which I did not belong, and where I might not even be able to communicate.
The AP report quotes immigrant rights groups as saying that the erroneous arrest, detention and deportation of US citizens has been soaring, with one group saying that documented cases have gone from 129 in 2006 to 322 in 2007. But the numbers are going to really soar, because in addition to the INS, increasingly local police agencies are getting into the act. Last year over 950 law enforcement officers from 23 states attended brief training sessions run by the INS to learn about picking up and detaining alleged illegal aliens.
Not so surprisingly, an appalling one in 10 Hispanic Americans reported in 2007 that they had been stopped by law enforcement and asked to prove that they were citizens or were in this country legally.
Ahem. Those kinds of numbers are the description of a police state, folks.
There is a simple solution to this problem. It’s in the Constitution, actually. It is the Bill of Rights protection against “unreasonable searches and seizures (Fourth Amendment), and against arrest “without due process of law” (the Fifth Amendment), as well as the right to “a speedy and public trial” and to “assisstance of counsel” (The Sixth Amendment).
People really flipped out after 9-11, and many still think it’s okay to treat “furriners” differently than we treat our own citizens, but aside from the fact that the US Constitution doesn’t distinguish between citizen and tourist or illegal resident, the growing number of arrests, detentions and even deportations of American citizens by the IRS shows what can happen when we start saying that some people don’t deserve the protections afforded by that document.
In the end, any one of us could end up in an INS hellhole with no access to a phone.
Dave Lindorff is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist. His latest book is The Case for Impeachment (St. Martin’s Press, 2006 and now available in paperback). He can be reached at dlindorff@mindspring.com
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4/14/09
Incursión militar en Ocotepec, Morelos
Gilberto López y Rivas
La Jornada
La Comisión Independiente de Derechos Humanos de Morelos denunció la incursión militar al pueblo indígena de Ocotepec, Morelos, ubicado en el nororiente de la ciudad de Cuernavaca y regido por usos y costumbres como ayudantía municipal.
El domingo 22 de marzo, cerca de media noche, tres tanquetas artilladas y dos vehículos más del Ejército Mexicano de la 24 Zona Militar tomaron por asalto el centro del pueblo. Alrededor de 40 soldados –fuertemente armados y algunos de ellos encapuchados– detuvieron y sometieron a 15 elementos de la ronda de vigilancia, ocupando las instalaciones de la ayudantía, donde rompieron los candados de las puertas de la cárcel y pusieron en libertad a dos personas que habían sido detenidas por encontrarse ebrias en una calle donde se han cometido diversos robos. De manera prepotente, se negaron a identificarse y amenazaron a los policías comunitarios con que se “los iba a llevar la fregada” si se atrevían a detenerlos, ya que eran “muy influyentes”. No obstante, fueron conducidos a los separos, donde se les decomisaron cinturones, agujetas, un celular y un arma blanca.
Media hora después fueron liberados por la intervención castrense, según trascendió, porque uno de ellos es militar y el otro hijo de un alto oficial del Ejército. Las camionetas de los elementos de la ronda de vigilancia fueron rodeadas por militares, quienes con palabras altisonantes les decomisaron toletes, los encañonaron y catearon, los voltearon contra la pared, con las piernas separadas y los brazos abiertos, mientras el oficial al mando, encapuchado y sin mostrar las insignias de su grado, les dijo: “a ustedes les gusta pegarle a los soldados, ¿qué, se creen muy cabrones, indios ojetes?” Los tiraron al suelo, boca abajo y les dieron 10 segundos para entregar las pertenencias de los detenidos.
El oficial procedió a someter a interrogatorio a cada uno de los elementos de la ronda de vigilancia. Ahí separaron al que traía botas militares adquiridas en un tianguis, a quien se las decomisaron luego de golpearlo dos veces con la culata del rifle, “porque nadie debe usar artículos del Ejército porque es un delito”.
Detuvieron al comandante de la ronda, Gerardo Estrada Rosas, y a su cabo de cuarto, Francisco Javier Ragil Rangel, a quienes trataron de fotografiar, inútilmente, con un paquete que al parecer contenía mariguana y cocaína que los propios militares traían, por lo que procedieron a llevárselos.
El oficial del Ejército amenazó al resto de los policías comunitarios, diciéndoles que era la primera y única vez que se metían con militares, ya que “se debe respetar el uniforme”; les indicaron que no se levantaran hasta después de cinco minutos, partiendo el convoy con rumbo desconocido. Con todo, familiares de los detenidos siguieron a los militares, pero fueron intimidados con armas largas.
El convoy se dirigió hacia las instalaciones de la delegación Morelos de la Procuraduría General de la República, donde se negaron a recibir a los secuestrados porque las acusaciones fabricadas de “robo y lesiones” no son de índole federal, por lo que los militares se dirigieron a las instalaciones de la Procuraduría General Judicial del estado, resguardando sus instalaciones decenas de soldados armados y encapuchados hasta las cuatro y media de la tarde del 23 de marzo, cuando se retiraron, llevándose a los dos supuestos militares, y ahora tratando de fincar la acusación contra los policías comunitarios por el delito de “privación ilegal de la libertad”.
Con estas acciones, los militares violentan las garantías individuales amparadas en la Constitución y, en particular, el artículo 129 constitucional, el cual estipula que en tiempo de paz ninguna autoridad militar puede ejercer más funciones que las que tengan exacta conexión con la disciplina militar.
La agresión a Ocotepec violenta también el Reglamento General de Deberes Militares en su artículo 4, que prohíbe a los militares, cualquiera que sea su jerarquía, dar órdenes que sean contrarias a las leyes y reglamentos que lastimen la dignidad o decoro de sus inferiores, o que constituyan un delito; el 23, que exhorta a no cometer acción alguna que pueda traducirse en desprestigio del Ejército; el 28, que prohíbe a todo militar desempeñar funciones de policía urbana, o invadir las funciones de ésta. Inclusive, cuando intervenga en casos flagrantes de acuerdo con el artículo 16 constitucional, dicha intervención terminará desde el momento en que un miembro de la policía u otra autoridad se presente. Tampoco deberá, de modo alguno, impedir que la policía ejerza su autoridad, funciones y consignas.
Asimismo, se violenta el artículo 29 del mismo reglamento, que señala que los militares no intervendrán jamás en asuntos de la incumbencia de las autoridades civiles, cuyas funciones no les es permitido entorpecer, antes bien, respetarán sus determinaciones y les prestarán el auxilio necesario cuando sean requeridos. El artículo 45 prohíbe a los miembros del Ejército ayudar a otros militares en el caso que se trate de fomentar alguna falta o delito, como ocurrió en Ocotepec.
Estos hechos violentan también el artículo 2 constitucional, que reconoce y garantiza el derecho de los pueblos indígenas a la libre determinación y la autonomía y constituyen una transgresión al Convenio 169 de la Organización Internacional del Trabajo, firmado y ratificado por México, que obliga a los estados a garantizar el respeto a la integridad, identidad social y cultural, costumbres, tradiciones e instituciones de los pueblos indígenas, así como prohíbe el uso de la fuerza y la coerción que viole los derechos humanos y los que como pueblos les corresponden.
Señor general secretario: ¿Usted aprueba estas conductas de sus subordinados? ¿Pueden actuar con tal nivel de impunidad y deterioro de la disciplina?
La Jornada
La Comisión Independiente de Derechos Humanos de Morelos denunció la incursión militar al pueblo indígena de Ocotepec, Morelos, ubicado en el nororiente de la ciudad de Cuernavaca y regido por usos y costumbres como ayudantía municipal.
El domingo 22 de marzo, cerca de media noche, tres tanquetas artilladas y dos vehículos más del Ejército Mexicano de la 24 Zona Militar tomaron por asalto el centro del pueblo. Alrededor de 40 soldados –fuertemente armados y algunos de ellos encapuchados– detuvieron y sometieron a 15 elementos de la ronda de vigilancia, ocupando las instalaciones de la ayudantía, donde rompieron los candados de las puertas de la cárcel y pusieron en libertad a dos personas que habían sido detenidas por encontrarse ebrias en una calle donde se han cometido diversos robos. De manera prepotente, se negaron a identificarse y amenazaron a los policías comunitarios con que se “los iba a llevar la fregada” si se atrevían a detenerlos, ya que eran “muy influyentes”. No obstante, fueron conducidos a los separos, donde se les decomisaron cinturones, agujetas, un celular y un arma blanca.
Media hora después fueron liberados por la intervención castrense, según trascendió, porque uno de ellos es militar y el otro hijo de un alto oficial del Ejército. Las camionetas de los elementos de la ronda de vigilancia fueron rodeadas por militares, quienes con palabras altisonantes les decomisaron toletes, los encañonaron y catearon, los voltearon contra la pared, con las piernas separadas y los brazos abiertos, mientras el oficial al mando, encapuchado y sin mostrar las insignias de su grado, les dijo: “a ustedes les gusta pegarle a los soldados, ¿qué, se creen muy cabrones, indios ojetes?” Los tiraron al suelo, boca abajo y les dieron 10 segundos para entregar las pertenencias de los detenidos.
El oficial procedió a someter a interrogatorio a cada uno de los elementos de la ronda de vigilancia. Ahí separaron al que traía botas militares adquiridas en un tianguis, a quien se las decomisaron luego de golpearlo dos veces con la culata del rifle, “porque nadie debe usar artículos del Ejército porque es un delito”.
Detuvieron al comandante de la ronda, Gerardo Estrada Rosas, y a su cabo de cuarto, Francisco Javier Ragil Rangel, a quienes trataron de fotografiar, inútilmente, con un paquete que al parecer contenía mariguana y cocaína que los propios militares traían, por lo que procedieron a llevárselos.
El oficial del Ejército amenazó al resto de los policías comunitarios, diciéndoles que era la primera y única vez que se metían con militares, ya que “se debe respetar el uniforme”; les indicaron que no se levantaran hasta después de cinco minutos, partiendo el convoy con rumbo desconocido. Con todo, familiares de los detenidos siguieron a los militares, pero fueron intimidados con armas largas.
El convoy se dirigió hacia las instalaciones de la delegación Morelos de la Procuraduría General de la República, donde se negaron a recibir a los secuestrados porque las acusaciones fabricadas de “robo y lesiones” no son de índole federal, por lo que los militares se dirigieron a las instalaciones de la Procuraduría General Judicial del estado, resguardando sus instalaciones decenas de soldados armados y encapuchados hasta las cuatro y media de la tarde del 23 de marzo, cuando se retiraron, llevándose a los dos supuestos militares, y ahora tratando de fincar la acusación contra los policías comunitarios por el delito de “privación ilegal de la libertad”.
Con estas acciones, los militares violentan las garantías individuales amparadas en la Constitución y, en particular, el artículo 129 constitucional, el cual estipula que en tiempo de paz ninguna autoridad militar puede ejercer más funciones que las que tengan exacta conexión con la disciplina militar.
La agresión a Ocotepec violenta también el Reglamento General de Deberes Militares en su artículo 4, que prohíbe a los militares, cualquiera que sea su jerarquía, dar órdenes que sean contrarias a las leyes y reglamentos que lastimen la dignidad o decoro de sus inferiores, o que constituyan un delito; el 23, que exhorta a no cometer acción alguna que pueda traducirse en desprestigio del Ejército; el 28, que prohíbe a todo militar desempeñar funciones de policía urbana, o invadir las funciones de ésta. Inclusive, cuando intervenga en casos flagrantes de acuerdo con el artículo 16 constitucional, dicha intervención terminará desde el momento en que un miembro de la policía u otra autoridad se presente. Tampoco deberá, de modo alguno, impedir que la policía ejerza su autoridad, funciones y consignas.
Asimismo, se violenta el artículo 29 del mismo reglamento, que señala que los militares no intervendrán jamás en asuntos de la incumbencia de las autoridades civiles, cuyas funciones no les es permitido entorpecer, antes bien, respetarán sus determinaciones y les prestarán el auxilio necesario cuando sean requeridos. El artículo 45 prohíbe a los miembros del Ejército ayudar a otros militares en el caso que se trate de fomentar alguna falta o delito, como ocurrió en Ocotepec.
Estos hechos violentan también el artículo 2 constitucional, que reconoce y garantiza el derecho de los pueblos indígenas a la libre determinación y la autonomía y constituyen una transgresión al Convenio 169 de la Organización Internacional del Trabajo, firmado y ratificado por México, que obliga a los estados a garantizar el respeto a la integridad, identidad social y cultural, costumbres, tradiciones e instituciones de los pueblos indígenas, así como prohíbe el uso de la fuerza y la coerción que viole los derechos humanos y los que como pueblos les corresponden.
Señor general secretario: ¿Usted aprueba estas conductas de sus subordinados? ¿Pueden actuar con tal nivel de impunidad y deterioro de la disciplina?
4/13/09
Peru's Shining Example
Lessons From Latin America
CounterPunch
Peru’s Supreme Court sentenced former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori to twenty-five years in prison last week for creating death squads during his presidency – from 1990 to 2000 – which murdered dozens of people. More than seventy thousand people died during Fujimori’s reign in the war between his iron-fisted administration and Maoist guerilla groups, the “Shining Path,” and the “Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement.”
After a fifteen-month trial, the presiding judge, Cesar San Martin, said, “The charges have been proved beyond all reasonable doubt.” The court found that Fujimori targeted various political opponents for kidnapping and assassination. Fujimori was also found guilty of killing fifteen people, including an 8-year-old boy, at a suburban Lima barbecue.
Earlier Fujimori received a six-year prison term for ordering an illegal search. He still faces two corruption trials. He resigned from office while in Japan, which granted him political asylum because of his Japanese ancestry. In 2005 he left Japan for Chile, apparently to re-launch his Peruvian political career. He was detained there and extradited to Lima to face trial in 2007. Why did Fujimori abandon his Japanese safe haven? Was he deluded by a messianic belief that he could get away with anything, as he had for a decade as president?
The Lima judicial proceeding represents a major milestone, the first trial of a democratically elected head of state in his own country. It was also courageous, considering Peru’s violent past and Fujimori’s continuing popularity. His daughter is a member of the legislature and intends to run for the presidency in 2011. She has vowed to pardon her father if elected.
Equally courageous are the recent trials of Argentina’s former military leaders, who presided over the disappearances of up to thirty thousand Argentine citizens in the 1970s and 80s. In 2005 the government of President Nestor Kirchner removed legal protections that had shielded abusers of power from prosecution, allowing their cases to proceed.
Trials of former Argentine government officials accused of state-sponsored terror (kidnapping, torture and murder) have not simply stirred up painful memories. Trial witnesses have disappeared. Judges and prosecutors have been threatened with death unless the trials are stopped.
Apologists say the brutal tactics of the military regime were necessary to combat terrorist threats. That defense should chill the hearts of U.S. citizens, since that is precisely Dick Cheney’s rationale for the illegal kidnappings, torture and detentions without charge – our very own “dirty war” – that became U.S. policy in the Bush years.
Peru and Argentina understand that unless they identify and condemn the abuses of power committed by their own governments, their current and future regimes will lack legitimacy. “The past is not dead. It’s not even past,” as William Faulkner said. To pretend otherwise is to implicate current and future governments – of Peru, Argentina or the United States – in those crimes and abuses.
It took an outsider – a Spanish judge named Baltasar Garzon – to indict the notorious Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Enabled by Henry Kissinger and the CIA, Pinochet took power in a bloody coup on September 11, 1973, murdering the democratically elected President Salvador Allende. The Chilean justice system was too cowed and compromised by Pinochet’s bloody reign of torture and murder to act against him, even after he left office.
Garzon’s indictment caused Pinochet’s brief detention in England in 1998. He was finally indicted in his own country in 2000, but died of natural causes at 91 in 2006 before he went to trial. Accused of assassinations, kidnappings, tortures, murders and drug trafficking, Pinochet told investigating judges: “I don’t remember, but it’s not true. And if it were true, I don’t remember.” (His words are reminiscent of Ronald Reagan’s testimony during his Iran-Contra deposition.)
Garzon lamented that “justice was too slow,” in Pinochet’s case. Now he has written a 98-page complaint accusing former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five other ex-Bush officials (John Yoo, William Haynes, David Addington, Jay Bybee and Douglas Feith) of constructing a system that allowed torture in violation of international law. Garzon accepted jurisdiction because several Spanish citizens at Guantanamo allegedly suffered torture. Will justice be too slow in this case too? Will Americans be content to let Spanish courts do their legal dirty work?
Congressman John Conyers recently released a report entitled: “Reining in the Imperial Presidency,” detailing a long list of possible Bush executive branch violations of the Constitution, human rights and the public trust. The Conyers report says: “The Attorney General should appoint a Special Counsel… to determine whether there were criminal violations committed pursuant to Bush Administration policies that were undertaken under unreviewable war powers, including enhanced interrogation, extraordinary rendition, and warrantless domestic surveillance.” Conyers is very late with this, but better late than never.
As Mark Danner wrote recently in The New York Review of Books: “There is a sense in which our society is finally posing that ‘what should we do’ question. That it is doing so only now, after the fact is a tragedy for the country…”
How big a tragedy? Secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, noted earlier this month, that “the U.S. leadership became aware… very early on…that many of the [Guantanamo] detainees were innocent of any substantial wrongdoing, had little intelligence value and should be released.”
But Wilkerson says that – after the incompetence the administration displayed during 9/11 and the Iraq invasion – Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were adamant that no more mistakes be admitted. “Moreover,” writes Wilkerson, “the fact that among the detainees was a 13 year-old boy and a man over 90, did not seem to faze either man…” Wilkerson waited seven years to reveal these realities, a shameful injustice. But it would be a far greater injustice never to reveal them at all. Does anyone doubt that a serious investigation of human rights violations by Gonzalez, Woo, Feith, Bybee, Addington and Haynes will lead to Rumsfeld and Cheney?
As Danner says, “…even as the practice of torture by Americans has withered and died, its potency as a political issue has grown. The issue could not be more important, for it cuts to the basic question of who we are as Americans, and whether our laws and ideals truly guide us in our actions or serve, instead, as a kind of national decoration to be discarded in times of danger. The only way to confront the political power of the issue, and prevent the reappearance of the practice itself, is to take a hard look at the true ‘empirical evidence of the last five years, hard years,’ and speak out clearly and credibly, about what that story really tells.”
On her April 7 blog post, the estimable Digby spells out the stakes: “It’s not just about ending these practices. By refusing to investigate them, and even actively invoking claims like the “state secrets privilege” to shield and avoid any possibility of a reckoning, the Administration implicates itself. Because they must use the same extreme claims of executive power, in some cases more so, to facilitate the cover-up… In failing to wrestle with this, or letting Spain do it for us, we lose ourselves.”
Concepts such as “respect for human rights” and the “moral responsibility” of the United States have not been heard in Washington since the Carter years. Their re-emergence in our national discourse is long overdue. Nixon-era cynicism and abuse of power multiplied in the smiley-faced Reagan years, then exploded under Bush and Cheney.
We must redeem our national soul before it is too late. Peru and Argentina have shown that, with sufficient political will, despite great risks, it is possible to face the truth. Without facing the truth, and all its implications, we can have no self-respect as a nation, nor can we hope to regain respect and credibility within the world community.
We cannot count on our spineless, complicit Congress to drive this issue. They could and should have done so years ago. Demanding accountability is a job for us, we, the people. Not just in Peru. Here too.
James McEnteer is the author of Shooting the Truth: the Rise of American Political Documentaries (Praeger 2006). He lives in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
CounterPunch
Peru’s Supreme Court sentenced former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori to twenty-five years in prison last week for creating death squads during his presidency – from 1990 to 2000 – which murdered dozens of people. More than seventy thousand people died during Fujimori’s reign in the war between his iron-fisted administration and Maoist guerilla groups, the “Shining Path,” and the “Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement.”
After a fifteen-month trial, the presiding judge, Cesar San Martin, said, “The charges have been proved beyond all reasonable doubt.” The court found that Fujimori targeted various political opponents for kidnapping and assassination. Fujimori was also found guilty of killing fifteen people, including an 8-year-old boy, at a suburban Lima barbecue.
Earlier Fujimori received a six-year prison term for ordering an illegal search. He still faces two corruption trials. He resigned from office while in Japan, which granted him political asylum because of his Japanese ancestry. In 2005 he left Japan for Chile, apparently to re-launch his Peruvian political career. He was detained there and extradited to Lima to face trial in 2007. Why did Fujimori abandon his Japanese safe haven? Was he deluded by a messianic belief that he could get away with anything, as he had for a decade as president?
The Lima judicial proceeding represents a major milestone, the first trial of a democratically elected head of state in his own country. It was also courageous, considering Peru’s violent past and Fujimori’s continuing popularity. His daughter is a member of the legislature and intends to run for the presidency in 2011. She has vowed to pardon her father if elected.
Equally courageous are the recent trials of Argentina’s former military leaders, who presided over the disappearances of up to thirty thousand Argentine citizens in the 1970s and 80s. In 2005 the government of President Nestor Kirchner removed legal protections that had shielded abusers of power from prosecution, allowing their cases to proceed.
Trials of former Argentine government officials accused of state-sponsored terror (kidnapping, torture and murder) have not simply stirred up painful memories. Trial witnesses have disappeared. Judges and prosecutors have been threatened with death unless the trials are stopped.
Apologists say the brutal tactics of the military regime were necessary to combat terrorist threats. That defense should chill the hearts of U.S. citizens, since that is precisely Dick Cheney’s rationale for the illegal kidnappings, torture and detentions without charge – our very own “dirty war” – that became U.S. policy in the Bush years.
Peru and Argentina understand that unless they identify and condemn the abuses of power committed by their own governments, their current and future regimes will lack legitimacy. “The past is not dead. It’s not even past,” as William Faulkner said. To pretend otherwise is to implicate current and future governments – of Peru, Argentina or the United States – in those crimes and abuses.
It took an outsider – a Spanish judge named Baltasar Garzon – to indict the notorious Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Enabled by Henry Kissinger and the CIA, Pinochet took power in a bloody coup on September 11, 1973, murdering the democratically elected President Salvador Allende. The Chilean justice system was too cowed and compromised by Pinochet’s bloody reign of torture and murder to act against him, even after he left office.
Garzon’s indictment caused Pinochet’s brief detention in England in 1998. He was finally indicted in his own country in 2000, but died of natural causes at 91 in 2006 before he went to trial. Accused of assassinations, kidnappings, tortures, murders and drug trafficking, Pinochet told investigating judges: “I don’t remember, but it’s not true. And if it were true, I don’t remember.” (His words are reminiscent of Ronald Reagan’s testimony during his Iran-Contra deposition.)
Garzon lamented that “justice was too slow,” in Pinochet’s case. Now he has written a 98-page complaint accusing former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and five other ex-Bush officials (John Yoo, William Haynes, David Addington, Jay Bybee and Douglas Feith) of constructing a system that allowed torture in violation of international law. Garzon accepted jurisdiction because several Spanish citizens at Guantanamo allegedly suffered torture. Will justice be too slow in this case too? Will Americans be content to let Spanish courts do their legal dirty work?
Congressman John Conyers recently released a report entitled: “Reining in the Imperial Presidency,” detailing a long list of possible Bush executive branch violations of the Constitution, human rights and the public trust. The Conyers report says: “The Attorney General should appoint a Special Counsel… to determine whether there were criminal violations committed pursuant to Bush Administration policies that were undertaken under unreviewable war powers, including enhanced interrogation, extraordinary rendition, and warrantless domestic surveillance.” Conyers is very late with this, but better late than never.
As Mark Danner wrote recently in The New York Review of Books: “There is a sense in which our society is finally posing that ‘what should we do’ question. That it is doing so only now, after the fact is a tragedy for the country…”
How big a tragedy? Secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, noted earlier this month, that “the U.S. leadership became aware… very early on…that many of the [Guantanamo] detainees were innocent of any substantial wrongdoing, had little intelligence value and should be released.”
But Wilkerson says that – after the incompetence the administration displayed during 9/11 and the Iraq invasion – Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were adamant that no more mistakes be admitted. “Moreover,” writes Wilkerson, “the fact that among the detainees was a 13 year-old boy and a man over 90, did not seem to faze either man…” Wilkerson waited seven years to reveal these realities, a shameful injustice. But it would be a far greater injustice never to reveal them at all. Does anyone doubt that a serious investigation of human rights violations by Gonzalez, Woo, Feith, Bybee, Addington and Haynes will lead to Rumsfeld and Cheney?
As Danner says, “…even as the practice of torture by Americans has withered and died, its potency as a political issue has grown. The issue could not be more important, for it cuts to the basic question of who we are as Americans, and whether our laws and ideals truly guide us in our actions or serve, instead, as a kind of national decoration to be discarded in times of danger. The only way to confront the political power of the issue, and prevent the reappearance of the practice itself, is to take a hard look at the true ‘empirical evidence of the last five years, hard years,’ and speak out clearly and credibly, about what that story really tells.”
On her April 7 blog post, the estimable Digby spells out the stakes: “It’s not just about ending these practices. By refusing to investigate them, and even actively invoking claims like the “state secrets privilege” to shield and avoid any possibility of a reckoning, the Administration implicates itself. Because they must use the same extreme claims of executive power, in some cases more so, to facilitate the cover-up… In failing to wrestle with this, or letting Spain do it for us, we lose ourselves.”
Concepts such as “respect for human rights” and the “moral responsibility” of the United States have not been heard in Washington since the Carter years. Their re-emergence in our national discourse is long overdue. Nixon-era cynicism and abuse of power multiplied in the smiley-faced Reagan years, then exploded under Bush and Cheney.
We must redeem our national soul before it is too late. Peru and Argentina have shown that, with sufficient political will, despite great risks, it is possible to face the truth. Without facing the truth, and all its implications, we can have no self-respect as a nation, nor can we hope to regain respect and credibility within the world community.
We cannot count on our spineless, complicit Congress to drive this issue. They could and should have done so years ago. Demanding accountability is a job for us, we, the people. Not just in Peru. Here too.
James McEnteer is the author of Shooting the Truth: the Rise of American Political Documentaries (Praeger 2006). He lives in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
4/11/09
Narcos compran armas a tiendas y fabricantes de Texas y Arizona
Autoridades de ambos países buscan concretar un plan para combatir el contrabando
Gustavo Castillo García
La Jornada
. Autoridades de México y Estados Unidos negocian la puesta en marcha de un programa binacional de combate al tráfico de armas y lavado de dinero, donde ambos gobiernos investiguen las transferencias de recursos que los cárteles de la droga realizan a fabricantes y distribuidores de armamento en Texas y Arizona, pues se ha detectado que 95 por ciento de los pertrechos que utiliza el crimen organizado no es adquirido sólo en tiendas, sino en las compañías productoras que ahí se asientan, revelaron dos funcionarios mexicanos que participan en las mesas de negociación.
Los entrevistados dijeron que durante este miércoles representantes de los dos países expusieron la problemática en materia de tráfico de armas, operaciones con recursos de procedencia ilícita, cárteles de la droga y tráfico de personas.
Desde antes del mediodía, los equipos de trabajo se reunieron para avanzar en el acuerdo binacional, en espera del arribo de la secretaria de Seguridad Interior de Estados Unidos, Janet Napolitano; el fiscal general, Eric Holder; los secretarios de Gobernación, Fernando Gómez Mont, y de Seguridad Pública federal, Genaro García Luna, así como el titular de la Procuraduría General de la República (PGR), Eduardo Medina Mora.
Férreo dispositivo de seguridad
Mientras, autoridades locales y federales montaron un cerco de seguridad alrededor del hotel sede del encuentro, que incluyó un retén militar y patrullajes con motocicletas en la periferia.
En ese contexto, las negociaciones en materia de lavado de dinero se dieron en dos vertientes: el dinero que ingresa a Estados Unidos por la venta de armas y lo que obtienen los grupos criminales que operan en México por distribución de enervantes, extorsiones y tráfico de personas. Para ello, se propuso que ambos gobiernos investiguen lo que se denominó cuentas foráneas en ambos territorios, para establecer los flujos de dinero que se consolidan como depósitos en armerías y empresas fabricantes de arsenales.
El tema del tráfico de armas constituye uno de los puntos que los funcionarios estadunidenses y mexicanos buscan perfeccionar para alcanzar un acuerdo y sea uno de los rubros principales en la agenda del encuentro que sostendrán los presidentes Felipe Calderón y Barack Obama, el próximo 16 de abril, en el que se tratarán los compromisos binacionales en materia de combate al crimen organizado.
El punto, indicaron los entrevistados, es que los gobiernos de México y Estados Unidos buscarán restar fuerza a los cárteles mexicanos, ya que los organismos de inteligencia de ambas naciones coincidieron este miércoles en que las operaciones de los capos de la droga se han extendido a Centroamérica, Sudamérica, Europa y el propio territorio estadunidense.
De acuerdo con la información obtenida, durante los encuentros de este miércoles se mencionó que Estados Unidos se ha convertido en el principal abastecedor de armas y cartuchos para los cárteles mexicanos, ya que se ha detectado que 90 por ciento de los pertrechos asegurados provienen de esa nación y otro cinco por ciento es de fabricación china. Así, los reportes de las instituciones mexicanas han estimado que diariamente ingresan al país unas 50 armas de todo tipo y calibre, y que las compañías y tiendas que las abastecen se localizan principalmente en Arizona y Texas.
Aunque las autoridades mexicanas mantuvieron la postura de que en nuestro país no se ha detectado la existencia de un zar del tráfico de armas, se pidió a los estadunidenses que investiguen en su territorio, pues se cree que en esa nación existe un grupo que es intermediario entre los grupos criminales y las empresas fabricantes.
Lo anterior, explicaron, se debe a que no sólo se han asegurado en territorio nacional armas convencionales –que se pueden comprar en las armerías–, sino explosivo plástico conocido como C-4. En ese sentido se ha establecido por parte del gobierno mexicano que los cárteles con mayor poder de fuego por las compras realizadas son el del Pacífico y el del Golfo-Zetas, que además revende arsenales a grupos en Centro y Sudamérica.
Entre las principales armas que se adquieren por parte de los grupos delictivos mexicanos están: rifles AK-47 y AR-15; pistolas de todos los calibres; granadas de mano, de fragmentación, calibre 40 defensivas, de destello, de humo, de sonido y de gas, así como fusiles Barret calibre 50, lanzadores de granadas calibre 37 milímetros, ametralladoras y lanzacohetes Law. Estos últimos tienen capacidad para perforar incluso un tanque de guerra.
La parte mexicana explicó que Napolitano y Holder conocerán los informes de los grupos de trabajo para perfilar el acuerdo binacional, cuyo proyecto será detallado durante la visita que realizará a México el presidente Barack Obama.
En suma, indicaron los entrevistados, todas las reuniones han estado encaminadas a fijar una cooperación bilateral para evitar el tráfico de armas, donde ambos países se comprometan a mejorar los puntos de revisión aduanales, no sólo terrestres, sino también marítimos y aéreos.
Hasta el momento, los funcionarios estadunidenses no se han querido comprometer a regular ni las fábricas de armas ni las tiendas que las venden.
Gustavo Castillo García
La Jornada
. Autoridades de México y Estados Unidos negocian la puesta en marcha de un programa binacional de combate al tráfico de armas y lavado de dinero, donde ambos gobiernos investiguen las transferencias de recursos que los cárteles de la droga realizan a fabricantes y distribuidores de armamento en Texas y Arizona, pues se ha detectado que 95 por ciento de los pertrechos que utiliza el crimen organizado no es adquirido sólo en tiendas, sino en las compañías productoras que ahí se asientan, revelaron dos funcionarios mexicanos que participan en las mesas de negociación.
Los entrevistados dijeron que durante este miércoles representantes de los dos países expusieron la problemática en materia de tráfico de armas, operaciones con recursos de procedencia ilícita, cárteles de la droga y tráfico de personas.
Desde antes del mediodía, los equipos de trabajo se reunieron para avanzar en el acuerdo binacional, en espera del arribo de la secretaria de Seguridad Interior de Estados Unidos, Janet Napolitano; el fiscal general, Eric Holder; los secretarios de Gobernación, Fernando Gómez Mont, y de Seguridad Pública federal, Genaro García Luna, así como el titular de la Procuraduría General de la República (PGR), Eduardo Medina Mora.
Férreo dispositivo de seguridad
Mientras, autoridades locales y federales montaron un cerco de seguridad alrededor del hotel sede del encuentro, que incluyó un retén militar y patrullajes con motocicletas en la periferia.
En ese contexto, las negociaciones en materia de lavado de dinero se dieron en dos vertientes: el dinero que ingresa a Estados Unidos por la venta de armas y lo que obtienen los grupos criminales que operan en México por distribución de enervantes, extorsiones y tráfico de personas. Para ello, se propuso que ambos gobiernos investiguen lo que se denominó cuentas foráneas en ambos territorios, para establecer los flujos de dinero que se consolidan como depósitos en armerías y empresas fabricantes de arsenales.
El tema del tráfico de armas constituye uno de los puntos que los funcionarios estadunidenses y mexicanos buscan perfeccionar para alcanzar un acuerdo y sea uno de los rubros principales en la agenda del encuentro que sostendrán los presidentes Felipe Calderón y Barack Obama, el próximo 16 de abril, en el que se tratarán los compromisos binacionales en materia de combate al crimen organizado.
El punto, indicaron los entrevistados, es que los gobiernos de México y Estados Unidos buscarán restar fuerza a los cárteles mexicanos, ya que los organismos de inteligencia de ambas naciones coincidieron este miércoles en que las operaciones de los capos de la droga se han extendido a Centroamérica, Sudamérica, Europa y el propio territorio estadunidense.
De acuerdo con la información obtenida, durante los encuentros de este miércoles se mencionó que Estados Unidos se ha convertido en el principal abastecedor de armas y cartuchos para los cárteles mexicanos, ya que se ha detectado que 90 por ciento de los pertrechos asegurados provienen de esa nación y otro cinco por ciento es de fabricación china. Así, los reportes de las instituciones mexicanas han estimado que diariamente ingresan al país unas 50 armas de todo tipo y calibre, y que las compañías y tiendas que las abastecen se localizan principalmente en Arizona y Texas.
Aunque las autoridades mexicanas mantuvieron la postura de que en nuestro país no se ha detectado la existencia de un zar del tráfico de armas, se pidió a los estadunidenses que investiguen en su territorio, pues se cree que en esa nación existe un grupo que es intermediario entre los grupos criminales y las empresas fabricantes.
Lo anterior, explicaron, se debe a que no sólo se han asegurado en territorio nacional armas convencionales –que se pueden comprar en las armerías–, sino explosivo plástico conocido como C-4. En ese sentido se ha establecido por parte del gobierno mexicano que los cárteles con mayor poder de fuego por las compras realizadas son el del Pacífico y el del Golfo-Zetas, que además revende arsenales a grupos en Centro y Sudamérica.
Entre las principales armas que se adquieren por parte de los grupos delictivos mexicanos están: rifles AK-47 y AR-15; pistolas de todos los calibres; granadas de mano, de fragmentación, calibre 40 defensivas, de destello, de humo, de sonido y de gas, así como fusiles Barret calibre 50, lanzadores de granadas calibre 37 milímetros, ametralladoras y lanzacohetes Law. Estos últimos tienen capacidad para perforar incluso un tanque de guerra.
La parte mexicana explicó que Napolitano y Holder conocerán los informes de los grupos de trabajo para perfilar el acuerdo binacional, cuyo proyecto será detallado durante la visita que realizará a México el presidente Barack Obama.
En suma, indicaron los entrevistados, todas las reuniones han estado encaminadas a fijar una cooperación bilateral para evitar el tráfico de armas, donde ambos países se comprometan a mejorar los puntos de revisión aduanales, no sólo terrestres, sino también marítimos y aéreos.
Hasta el momento, los funcionarios estadunidenses no se han querido comprometer a regular ni las fábricas de armas ni las tiendas que las venden.
Obama's Crossover Dribble on Marijuana Policy
Fakes Left, Goes Right
By FRED GARDNER
CounterPunch
Executive summary: Obama fakes left, goes right. Passes to Holder at the head of the key. Holder holds the ball, looking for a cutter. Looks in to Brown posting up, then swings it over to Russoniello on the wing. The Warriors veteran finds Obama behind a screen from Holder. Obama launches from beyond the arc... Off back iron. Rebound, Sibelius.
It has been business as usual for the Drug Enforcement Administration since Barack Obama took office. Attorney General Eric Holder has decreed a "policy change," and some PC (as in Pro-Cannabis) lobbyists and lawyers have hailed that "policy change" as a major victory. But try explaining it to workers at any of the six dispensaries that have been raided by the Obama-era DEA.
"I would have let them in if they would have showed me something," said John W., 35, who came to the front door of Emmalyn's on Howard St. in San Francisco on the afternoon of March 25. "They were dressed kind of like me," according to John, who was garbed in a football jersey. "Once they actually got in I could see that they had bulletproof vests that said DEA on the back. But I couldn't see that from the door. The only thing I could see was a person with a gun. I asked for a search warrant or a badge but they didn't show me either one, they just battered down the gate.
"They rushed in and pushed us down -me, two or three patients, a lady who doesn't work here anymore, and Rose [a beautiful woman of 30 who was behind the counter when your correspondent visited Emmalyn’s a week after the raid]. There were between 15 and 20, all DEA. The man lying next to me didn't put up any kind of struggle but he kept saying, 'I'm a patient.' And 'Why are you doing this?'"
"They never asked me no questions. They just went through the whole place and took the medicine we had and the little bit of money." Some heavy machinery was deployed to rip out a safe that had been bolted to the floor. The agents hauled it off, past a passionate group of protesters on the sidwalk chanting, "This medicine is marijuana. Listen to Obama." Did they know that Obama has said no such thing?
"To me it was robbery," John said of the raid. "That's how it feels. I was scared at first but then I just started listening to their conversations. They were in such a good mood, like they'd just won a championship or something. Then when they didn't find very much they started saying, 'There should be more. There should be more.' We tried to tell them that upstairs was just a tenant who had nothing to do with us but they went up there and broke in and actually took their stereo equipment out of their apartment.
"A lot of their conversation was really sarcastic. Like poking shots at us and the whole movement. 'You guys are pretending that dope is medicine...' It was really disturbing but I just stayed quiet. They saw a headline on the West Coast Leaf (a tabloid that covers the medical marijuana movement/industry) about Obama ending the raids and that gave them a big laugh: 'We didn't get that memo.'
"One agent asked me if I had a card. I said yes. He said 'Well, what's wrong with you?' I said "Better than me tell you, I could show you. And I showed him. I have a disease called Blount's Disease. One of the bones in the bottom portion of my leg didn't grow. See, if I stand up straight, you can see how much shorter one of my legs is. (About two-three inches.) He said, 'Well that medicine is not going to help your leg grow.' That's highly disrespectful. But you know, I was like, 'Why am I even debating with this person?'
"I figured that it wasn't the time or the place to tell them the truth. A lot of people come through here. People in wheelchairs, young people in wheelchairs, the handicapped. Different problems. Sometimes people won't have cards, they'll have their letter of recommendation. Even though I try not to read 'em, the information is on there. It makes me feel bad for them: AIDS patients, hepatitis patients, cancer patients. Sometimes people come in here and they just start to cry because they're appreciative that we're here because out of all the medications that they take, this is one that they really get relief from."
The raid was typical in that no arrests were made. Emmalyn's reopened the next day with product lent by a nearby dispensary. Beautiful Rose says, "We wanted to make sure that our patients would be taken care of. That we would be here for them and for everybody."
Cannabis dispensaries tend to serve poor people. Rich people have land in the country, and middle-class people have friends with land in the country.
The raid occurred one week after Eric Holder's statement that DEA would target only dispensaries that violated state as well as federal law. "What state law did they violate?" wonders attorney Brendan Hallinan (Terence's son), who is representing Emmalyn's. "They were permitted by the city. They were in the process of changing their layout to provide wheelchair access. They take pride in their low prices. They were one of the smallest clubs in San Francisco in terms of how many patients they served."
Documents laying out the DEA's case against Emmalyn's are under seal because the investigation is supposedly ongoing. If it turns out that the operators were laundering money or importing BC bud, then dispensaries that don't engage in such practices can continue to believe that the Obama Administration will leave them alone. But if Emmalyn's is charged with nothing more than unpaid taxes -which should provoke a warning from the state board of equalization, not a rip-and-run from DEA- then the terror level will rise back to blood orange, as in the time of Bush.
Don't be surprised if Obama's approval rating begins slipping in California and beyond. Millions of people felt offended when he made light of the marijuana question during his on-line press conference.
Desperately Seeking Clarification
With acting DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart (a Bush appointee) by his side, Attorney General Holder told reporters March 18 that the Department of Justice would henceforth target "people, organizations, that are growing, cultivating substantial amounts of marijuana and doing so in a way that's inconsistent with federal law and state law." In the week that followed, proceedings in three federal cases were put on hold pending clarification of the supposed "policy change."
In Los Angeles, U.S. District Court Judge George Wu delayed the sentencing of Charles Lynch and asked the U.S. Attorney to provide a written summary of the new DOJ policy. Lynch, who operated a dispensary in Morro Bay, had been convicted on cultivation-for-sale charges. He contended that he was operating legally under California law and with the support of city officials.
In San Jose, U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel asked the US Attorney to produce a written version of the new policy, which could affect a case now called Santa Cruz v. Holder. The case stems from the September, 2002 raid on WAMM (The Wo/Man's Alliance for Medical Marijuana). The city and County of Santa Cruz subsequently sued the Attorney General for blocking the implementation of California's medical marijuana law.
In San Francisco, attorney Bill Panzer asked U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer for 30 days to seek an explanation from AG Holder of the reported “policy change.” Panzer represents Ken Hayes in a case dating back to 2002. At the time Hayes was indicted (along with Ed Rosenthal and Rick Watts), he was in Canada, having moved there with his wife and one-year-old son. He remained out of the country until late 2008. Panzer wrote a letter in February and another in March to US Attorney Joseph Russoniello asking how the DOJ “policy change” would affect settlement of the case against Hayes. After getting no reply, Panzer told Judge Breyer that the US Attorney had a conflict of interest because he was pursuing a policy contrary to that of his client, the United States of America. Breyer said he didn’t want to get in the middle of a discussion between the AG and the US Attorney, and gave Panzer his 30-day delay. “Holder already has my letter,” Panzer told PotShots April 9.
Russoniello: Nothing’s Going to Change
Another attempt to get clarification of current federal policy was made by defense specialist Joe Elford when he and Northern District US Attorney Joe Russoniello debated at Hastings School of Law April 8. Elford recounts:
Another problem is, what Elford calls "rogue cops" are most cops.
“The audience,” Elford went on, “was less polite than I would have expected from a room full of law students. In response to a student's comment about marijuana being less harmful than alcohol or cigarettes, Russoniello actually interrupted her and said, ‘No, alcohol is more harmful than both of those substances.’ That had a significant number of the students actually jeer him.”
At one point Russoniello put down the medical marijuana industry for not having a self-policing trade association. Elford pointed out that the threat of federal prosecution was an obstacle to forming such an organization. “The dispensaries are trying to self-regulate and impose standards, but you don't know how many people at these meetings are DEA agents posing as operators, so you might be setting yourself up for federal prosecution by trying to organize a trade association.”
The overriding irony is that arch-capitalists like Joe Russoniello –your basic Mean White Man— have to define making a profit as a criminal act in order to take down medical marijuana growers and dispensaries.
Fred Gardner edits O’Shaughnessy’s, the Journal of Cannabis in Clinical Practice. He can be reached at fred@plebesite.com
By FRED GARDNER
CounterPunch
Executive summary: Obama fakes left, goes right. Passes to Holder at the head of the key. Holder holds the ball, looking for a cutter. Looks in to Brown posting up, then swings it over to Russoniello on the wing. The Warriors veteran finds Obama behind a screen from Holder. Obama launches from beyond the arc... Off back iron. Rebound, Sibelius.
It has been business as usual for the Drug Enforcement Administration since Barack Obama took office. Attorney General Eric Holder has decreed a "policy change," and some PC (as in Pro-Cannabis) lobbyists and lawyers have hailed that "policy change" as a major victory. But try explaining it to workers at any of the six dispensaries that have been raided by the Obama-era DEA.
"I would have let them in if they would have showed me something," said John W., 35, who came to the front door of Emmalyn's on Howard St. in San Francisco on the afternoon of March 25. "They were dressed kind of like me," according to John, who was garbed in a football jersey. "Once they actually got in I could see that they had bulletproof vests that said DEA on the back. But I couldn't see that from the door. The only thing I could see was a person with a gun. I asked for a search warrant or a badge but they didn't show me either one, they just battered down the gate.
"They rushed in and pushed us down -me, two or three patients, a lady who doesn't work here anymore, and Rose [a beautiful woman of 30 who was behind the counter when your correspondent visited Emmalyn’s a week after the raid]. There were between 15 and 20, all DEA. The man lying next to me didn't put up any kind of struggle but he kept saying, 'I'm a patient.' And 'Why are you doing this?'"
"They never asked me no questions. They just went through the whole place and took the medicine we had and the little bit of money." Some heavy machinery was deployed to rip out a safe that had been bolted to the floor. The agents hauled it off, past a passionate group of protesters on the sidwalk chanting, "This medicine is marijuana. Listen to Obama." Did they know that Obama has said no such thing?
"To me it was robbery," John said of the raid. "That's how it feels. I was scared at first but then I just started listening to their conversations. They were in such a good mood, like they'd just won a championship or something. Then when they didn't find very much they started saying, 'There should be more. There should be more.' We tried to tell them that upstairs was just a tenant who had nothing to do with us but they went up there and broke in and actually took their stereo equipment out of their apartment.
"A lot of their conversation was really sarcastic. Like poking shots at us and the whole movement. 'You guys are pretending that dope is medicine...' It was really disturbing but I just stayed quiet. They saw a headline on the West Coast Leaf (a tabloid that covers the medical marijuana movement/industry) about Obama ending the raids and that gave them a big laugh: 'We didn't get that memo.'
"One agent asked me if I had a card. I said yes. He said 'Well, what's wrong with you?' I said "Better than me tell you, I could show you. And I showed him. I have a disease called Blount's Disease. One of the bones in the bottom portion of my leg didn't grow. See, if I stand up straight, you can see how much shorter one of my legs is. (About two-three inches.) He said, 'Well that medicine is not going to help your leg grow.' That's highly disrespectful. But you know, I was like, 'Why am I even debating with this person?'
"I figured that it wasn't the time or the place to tell them the truth. A lot of people come through here. People in wheelchairs, young people in wheelchairs, the handicapped. Different problems. Sometimes people won't have cards, they'll have their letter of recommendation. Even though I try not to read 'em, the information is on there. It makes me feel bad for them: AIDS patients, hepatitis patients, cancer patients. Sometimes people come in here and they just start to cry because they're appreciative that we're here because out of all the medications that they take, this is one that they really get relief from."
The raid was typical in that no arrests were made. Emmalyn's reopened the next day with product lent by a nearby dispensary. Beautiful Rose says, "We wanted to make sure that our patients would be taken care of. That we would be here for them and for everybody."
Cannabis dispensaries tend to serve poor people. Rich people have land in the country, and middle-class people have friends with land in the country.
The raid occurred one week after Eric Holder's statement that DEA would target only dispensaries that violated state as well as federal law. "What state law did they violate?" wonders attorney Brendan Hallinan (Terence's son), who is representing Emmalyn's. "They were permitted by the city. They were in the process of changing their layout to provide wheelchair access. They take pride in their low prices. They were one of the smallest clubs in San Francisco in terms of how many patients they served."
Documents laying out the DEA's case against Emmalyn's are under seal because the investigation is supposedly ongoing. If it turns out that the operators were laundering money or importing BC bud, then dispensaries that don't engage in such practices can continue to believe that the Obama Administration will leave them alone. But if Emmalyn's is charged with nothing more than unpaid taxes -which should provoke a warning from the state board of equalization, not a rip-and-run from DEA- then the terror level will rise back to blood orange, as in the time of Bush.
Don't be surprised if Obama's approval rating begins slipping in California and beyond. Millions of people felt offended when he made light of the marijuana question during his on-line press conference.
Desperately Seeking Clarification
With acting DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart (a Bush appointee) by his side, Attorney General Holder told reporters March 18 that the Department of Justice would henceforth target "people, organizations, that are growing, cultivating substantial amounts of marijuana and doing so in a way that's inconsistent with federal law and state law." In the week that followed, proceedings in three federal cases were put on hold pending clarification of the supposed "policy change."
In Los Angeles, U.S. District Court Judge George Wu delayed the sentencing of Charles Lynch and asked the U.S. Attorney to provide a written summary of the new DOJ policy. Lynch, who operated a dispensary in Morro Bay, had been convicted on cultivation-for-sale charges. He contended that he was operating legally under California law and with the support of city officials.
In San Jose, U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel asked the US Attorney to produce a written version of the new policy, which could affect a case now called Santa Cruz v. Holder. The case stems from the September, 2002 raid on WAMM (The Wo/Man's Alliance for Medical Marijuana). The city and County of Santa Cruz subsequently sued the Attorney General for blocking the implementation of California's medical marijuana law.
In San Francisco, attorney Bill Panzer asked U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer for 30 days to seek an explanation from AG Holder of the reported “policy change.” Panzer represents Ken Hayes in a case dating back to 2002. At the time Hayes was indicted (along with Ed Rosenthal and Rick Watts), he was in Canada, having moved there with his wife and one-year-old son. He remained out of the country until late 2008. Panzer wrote a letter in February and another in March to US Attorney Joseph Russoniello asking how the DOJ “policy change” would affect settlement of the case against Hayes. After getting no reply, Panzer told Judge Breyer that the US Attorney had a conflict of interest because he was pursuing a policy contrary to that of his client, the United States of America. Breyer said he didn’t want to get in the middle of a discussion between the AG and the US Attorney, and gave Panzer his 30-day delay. “Holder already has my letter,” Panzer told PotShots April 9.
Russoniello: Nothing’s Going to Change
Another attempt to get clarification of current federal policy was made by defense specialist Joe Elford when he and Northern District US Attorney Joe Russoniello debated at Hastings School of Law April 8. Elford recounts:
"He said their policy didn't change in 1996. He said that they had treated marijuana offenses the same before and after California passed its medical marijuana law. They have a limited budget and so they have to prioritize. His claim was that they've always gone after the bigger dealers who make a lot of money. Which is not completely true...
"He revealed that after Attorney General’s announcement, the four US attorneys in the state met and they decided that nothing was going to change. That the policy would be what it has always been. He said that there would be little likelihood of a legitimate medical marijuana provider -a grower or a dispensary-being prosecuted by the federal authorities so long as people complied with the [state] attorney general's guidelines. He didn't go so far as to say they wouldn't be prosecuted, but he came close to saying that. Which is how Americans for Safe Access feela that Obama's new policy should play out.
"He had his copy of the [state] attorney general's guidelines with highlighted passages. He actually said that of the 300 dispensaries in California are profiteering dispensaries which are making a bunch of money and violate the attorney general’s guidelines... All dispensaries are fair game because they violate state law as well as federal law. That's scary.
“I asked, ‘Who are you to judge what's a violation of state law?’ There's a real problem here —a process problem. A federal agent who is not supposed to be interpreting state law makes a determination that a dispensary is not complying with state law. So then they bust the person and drag them into federal court where state law is not an issue. So this person will never get a jury to pass on whether they violated state law. They will end up getting very severe mandatory minimum sentences.
“It would be good if the U.S. Attorney talked to the [state] attorney general about whether there's a violation of state law before taking down a grower or dispensary. The problem is, they're going to rely on what some rogue cop who doesn't believe in it [California’s medical marijuana law] in the first place says is a violation of state law."
Another problem is, what Elford calls "rogue cops" are most cops.
“The audience,” Elford went on, “was less polite than I would have expected from a room full of law students. In response to a student's comment about marijuana being less harmful than alcohol or cigarettes, Russoniello actually interrupted her and said, ‘No, alcohol is more harmful than both of those substances.’ That had a significant number of the students actually jeer him.”
At one point Russoniello put down the medical marijuana industry for not having a self-policing trade association. Elford pointed out that the threat of federal prosecution was an obstacle to forming such an organization. “The dispensaries are trying to self-regulate and impose standards, but you don't know how many people at these meetings are DEA agents posing as operators, so you might be setting yourself up for federal prosecution by trying to organize a trade association.”
The overriding irony is that arch-capitalists like Joe Russoniello –your basic Mean White Man— have to define making a profit as a criminal act in order to take down medical marijuana growers and dispensaries.
Fred Gardner edits O’Shaughnessy’s, the Journal of Cannabis in Clinical Practice. He can be reached at fred@plebesite.com
Grenoble, Atenco y el secuestro equiparado
Carta a Eduardo Galeano
Adolfo Gilly
La Jornada
Eduardo Galeano, el lunes pasado, acompañado de Carmen Lira, directora general de La Jornada, Elena Gallegos, Blanche Petrich y Rosa Elvira VargasFoto José Núñez
Querido Eduardo:
Ahora que junto con Helena estás otra vez de paso en estas tierras nuestras, quiero contarles unas historias.
Esta mañana, allá en Grenoble, Francia, los trabajadores de Caterpillar, empresa estadunidense que fabrica máquinas para construcción, retuvieron en las oficinas a cinco ejecutivos: el director general, Nicolas Poulnik, el de recursos humanos y tres cuadros más. La empresa ha decidido despedir a 733 trabajadores (sobre un total de 2 mil 500). El sindicato pide reanudar la negociación interrumpida por la empresa. No puedo negociar mientras no tenga libertad de movimientos, declaró a la prensa el director. Tendrá libertad si acepta reabrir la negociación. Lo retenemos para discutir, sólo pedimos desbloquear las tratativas, dice el delegado sindical de la Confederación General del Trabajo.
Así se están poniendo las cosas en Europa y en Francia, y no sólo en Grenoble.
Una retención similar de algunas horas, recurso poco habitual pero extremo cuando la desidia, la burla y la prepotencia de quienes tratan con el pueblo rebasan todo límite, según la reciente legislación penal mexicana y los jueces que la aplican es un secuestro, equiparable al secuestro de persona con fines de extorsión monetaria. La ley penal lo llama secuestro equiparado.
Nuestro colega (tuyo y mío) Miguel Ángel Granados Chapa dice que esa figura penal es una infamia. En Proceso, 8 marzo 2009, la describió así: Se le diseñó para castigar con fiereza a activistas solicitantes, gente con derechos a salvo, en suma ciudadanos en movimiento que, colmada su paciencia al exigir servicios o medidas que la ley les provee y al calor propio de las discusiones con funcionarios, los retienen por horas en sus propias oficinas o en locales donde se ventilaban asuntos de competencia de los retenidos. A quienes con verdad o sin ella resultan acusados de acciones de ese tipo, agrega Miguel Ángel, se les asestan castigos semejantes o aún mayores que los del secuestro mercenario.
*
Dos historias entonces te cuento.
Una
La señora Jacinta Francisco Marcial, indígena del estado de Querétaro, ñahñú, apresada el 26 de marzo de 2006 durante un asalto brutal y pretextuoso de la policía contra los puestos de las vendedoras del mercado de Santiago Mexquititlán, ha sido condenada a 21 años de cárcel después de un proceso de tres años en el cual no contó siquiera con traductor a su idioma, el otomí. La señora Jacinta tiene 42 años de edad. Cometió, dice el juez, un secuestro equiparado, cuando ni siquiera participó en los hechos sino que sólo fue su víctima. Pero alguien tiene que pagárnoslas, dicen la policía y la justicia.
Dos
El 3 de mayo de 2006, rompiendo un acuerdo previo, el gobierno municipal de Texcoco impidió con su policía que los floristas del mercado local vendieran sus flores en lugares especiales en esa fecha, Día de la Santa Cruz, cuando los trabajadores de la construcción celebran y hacen bendecir sus trabajos. El Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra (FPDT), que años antes (2001) había frenado con su movilización la expropiación a precio vil de sus tierras en San Salvador Atenco para construir un nuevo aeropuerto (y frustrado así un gigantesco negocio de funcionarios y desarrolladores), se movilizó ese día en apoyo de los floristas. Unos funcionarios del municipio, en el forcejeo, fueron retenidos breves horas.
El gobernador del estado de México (Enrique Peña Nieto) y el gobierno federal (Vicente Fox) lanzaron entonces, el 4 de mayo de 2006, un operativo policial conjunto sobre el pueblo de San Salvador Atenco. Detuvieron a 207 personas con golpizas, fracturas, violencia de todo tipo, vejaciones y humillaciones. Entraron en las casas, rompieron los enseres y los recuerdos, mataron a dos muchachos, cometieron violación sexual en los camiones policiales que llevaban mujeres y hombres apresados, todo esto documentado con creces por organismos de defensa de los derechos humanos, internacionales y nacionales. Nadie fue castigado por estos delitos.
Hoy, Eduardo, tres años después, 12 de aquellas personas siguen presas, acusadas de secuestro equiparado. Algunos son miembros del FPDT, otros simples pobladores de la zona que no habían participado en ningún movimiento social o político. Pero hay que hacer un escarmiento.
Nueve han sido condenados a 31 años de prisión. Están en la cárcel de Molino de Flores, en el estado de México. Los otros tres: Ignacio del Valle, Héctor Galindo y Felipe Álvarez, están en un penal de alta seguridad (para narcotraficantes y especies símiles) en el Altiplano, bajo condiciones de prisión mucho más rigurosas. Ignacio del Valle tiene una condena de 112 años; los otros dos, nomás 67 años cada uno.
Ninguno de los 12 cometió delito alguno. Son presos políticos, es decir, están encarcelados por motivos puramente políticos. En una recta aplicación de justicia deberían salir ahora mismo. Y deberían ser procesados los funcionarios mandantes y los policías ejecutantes de las golpizas, las violaciones, las muertes y los destrozos de viviendas del 4 de mayo de 2006 en el poblado de San Salvador Atenco.
Ya sé, Eduardo, no te estoy contando nada nuevo. Pero sucede que hace más de 40 años, allá por 1966, yo era preso político en la cárcel de Lecumberri (en condiciones más liberales que los de Atenco, debo decirlo, aunque el presidente fuera Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, en cuya alma anidaba ya –lo prueban los archivos– el Tlatelolco de 1968). Entonces un día me llevaron al Polígono, la torre central desde donde se vigilaban todas las crujías del viejo panóptico (modelo Jeremy Bentham, ¿recuerdas?). Y en el Polígono me esperabas tú, que andabas por México y las autoridades de Lecumberri te habían dado permiso para visitarme. Allí estuvimos un buen rato conversando, supongo que de modo no muy diferente de como ahora en libertad sería, incluso en el hecho de que tú te ibas y yo me quedaba. Me quedaba, sí, pero con el recuerdo imborrable, ya otra vez te lo he dicho, de que extranjero y todo habías venido a verme a la cárcel, jóvenes ambos entonces y compañeros de oficio y otros afanes en aquellas dos invenciones montevideanas: el semanario Marcha, de don Carlos Quijano, y el diario Época, tuyo.
Adolfo Gilly
La Jornada
Eduardo Galeano, el lunes pasado, acompañado de Carmen Lira, directora general de La Jornada, Elena Gallegos, Blanche Petrich y Rosa Elvira VargasFoto José Núñez
Querido Eduardo:
Ahora que junto con Helena estás otra vez de paso en estas tierras nuestras, quiero contarles unas historias.
Esta mañana, allá en Grenoble, Francia, los trabajadores de Caterpillar, empresa estadunidense que fabrica máquinas para construcción, retuvieron en las oficinas a cinco ejecutivos: el director general, Nicolas Poulnik, el de recursos humanos y tres cuadros más. La empresa ha decidido despedir a 733 trabajadores (sobre un total de 2 mil 500). El sindicato pide reanudar la negociación interrumpida por la empresa. No puedo negociar mientras no tenga libertad de movimientos, declaró a la prensa el director. Tendrá libertad si acepta reabrir la negociación. Lo retenemos para discutir, sólo pedimos desbloquear las tratativas, dice el delegado sindical de la Confederación General del Trabajo.
Así se están poniendo las cosas en Europa y en Francia, y no sólo en Grenoble.
Una retención similar de algunas horas, recurso poco habitual pero extremo cuando la desidia, la burla y la prepotencia de quienes tratan con el pueblo rebasan todo límite, según la reciente legislación penal mexicana y los jueces que la aplican es un secuestro, equiparable al secuestro de persona con fines de extorsión monetaria. La ley penal lo llama secuestro equiparado.
Nuestro colega (tuyo y mío) Miguel Ángel Granados Chapa dice que esa figura penal es una infamia. En Proceso, 8 marzo 2009, la describió así: Se le diseñó para castigar con fiereza a activistas solicitantes, gente con derechos a salvo, en suma ciudadanos en movimiento que, colmada su paciencia al exigir servicios o medidas que la ley les provee y al calor propio de las discusiones con funcionarios, los retienen por horas en sus propias oficinas o en locales donde se ventilaban asuntos de competencia de los retenidos. A quienes con verdad o sin ella resultan acusados de acciones de ese tipo, agrega Miguel Ángel, se les asestan castigos semejantes o aún mayores que los del secuestro mercenario.
*
Dos historias entonces te cuento.
Una
La señora Jacinta Francisco Marcial, indígena del estado de Querétaro, ñahñú, apresada el 26 de marzo de 2006 durante un asalto brutal y pretextuoso de la policía contra los puestos de las vendedoras del mercado de Santiago Mexquititlán, ha sido condenada a 21 años de cárcel después de un proceso de tres años en el cual no contó siquiera con traductor a su idioma, el otomí. La señora Jacinta tiene 42 años de edad. Cometió, dice el juez, un secuestro equiparado, cuando ni siquiera participó en los hechos sino que sólo fue su víctima. Pero alguien tiene que pagárnoslas, dicen la policía y la justicia.
Dos
El 3 de mayo de 2006, rompiendo un acuerdo previo, el gobierno municipal de Texcoco impidió con su policía que los floristas del mercado local vendieran sus flores en lugares especiales en esa fecha, Día de la Santa Cruz, cuando los trabajadores de la construcción celebran y hacen bendecir sus trabajos. El Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra (FPDT), que años antes (2001) había frenado con su movilización la expropiación a precio vil de sus tierras en San Salvador Atenco para construir un nuevo aeropuerto (y frustrado así un gigantesco negocio de funcionarios y desarrolladores), se movilizó ese día en apoyo de los floristas. Unos funcionarios del municipio, en el forcejeo, fueron retenidos breves horas.
El gobernador del estado de México (Enrique Peña Nieto) y el gobierno federal (Vicente Fox) lanzaron entonces, el 4 de mayo de 2006, un operativo policial conjunto sobre el pueblo de San Salvador Atenco. Detuvieron a 207 personas con golpizas, fracturas, violencia de todo tipo, vejaciones y humillaciones. Entraron en las casas, rompieron los enseres y los recuerdos, mataron a dos muchachos, cometieron violación sexual en los camiones policiales que llevaban mujeres y hombres apresados, todo esto documentado con creces por organismos de defensa de los derechos humanos, internacionales y nacionales. Nadie fue castigado por estos delitos.
Hoy, Eduardo, tres años después, 12 de aquellas personas siguen presas, acusadas de secuestro equiparado. Algunos son miembros del FPDT, otros simples pobladores de la zona que no habían participado en ningún movimiento social o político. Pero hay que hacer un escarmiento.
Nueve han sido condenados a 31 años de prisión. Están en la cárcel de Molino de Flores, en el estado de México. Los otros tres: Ignacio del Valle, Héctor Galindo y Felipe Álvarez, están en un penal de alta seguridad (para narcotraficantes y especies símiles) en el Altiplano, bajo condiciones de prisión mucho más rigurosas. Ignacio del Valle tiene una condena de 112 años; los otros dos, nomás 67 años cada uno.
Ninguno de los 12 cometió delito alguno. Son presos políticos, es decir, están encarcelados por motivos puramente políticos. En una recta aplicación de justicia deberían salir ahora mismo. Y deberían ser procesados los funcionarios mandantes y los policías ejecutantes de las golpizas, las violaciones, las muertes y los destrozos de viviendas del 4 de mayo de 2006 en el poblado de San Salvador Atenco.
Ya sé, Eduardo, no te estoy contando nada nuevo. Pero sucede que hace más de 40 años, allá por 1966, yo era preso político en la cárcel de Lecumberri (en condiciones más liberales que los de Atenco, debo decirlo, aunque el presidente fuera Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, en cuya alma anidaba ya –lo prueban los archivos– el Tlatelolco de 1968). Entonces un día me llevaron al Polígono, la torre central desde donde se vigilaban todas las crujías del viejo panóptico (modelo Jeremy Bentham, ¿recuerdas?). Y en el Polígono me esperabas tú, que andabas por México y las autoridades de Lecumberri te habían dado permiso para visitarme. Allí estuvimos un buen rato conversando, supongo que de modo no muy diferente de como ahora en libertad sería, incluso en el hecho de que tú te ibas y yo me quedaba. Me quedaba, sí, pero con el recuerdo imborrable, ya otra vez te lo he dicho, de que extranjero y todo habías venido a verme a la cárcel, jóvenes ambos entonces y compañeros de oficio y otros afanes en aquellas dos invenciones montevideanas: el semanario Marcha, de don Carlos Quijano, y el diario Época, tuyo.
How to Starve (or Feed) a River
The Virtues of Brush
By JANET KAUFFMAN
CounterPunch
This time of year it’s great to work outside, clean up the place and mow. But if you’re lucky enough to have a stream on your property, think again before clearing that tangle of brush and trees. You’re looking at something good.
Brush and debris are dirty words to many people, who think it’s a mess, a problem. They prefer the “estate” look, with tall trees, groomed green grass, water with nothing in it but water. They chop or spray or clear everything else.
But if you know what brush is — how rich and diverse it is, how valuable — it’s beautiful. To the stream it is life-saving.
Recent research shows that if a stream looks “cleaned up” to the human eye, it’s a disaster for the stream and everything in it. A stream needs a natural mix of shrubs, a layering of foliage and root systems, and leaf litter and woody debris in the water to stay healthy and thrive.
The worst thing for a stream is chopped brush, a cleared bank, a mowed floodplain. That’s a bare-naked stream. Unnatural.
It’s well known how trees and shrubs hold stream banks in place with their roots, how vegetation holds back sediment. But trees and shrubs do more than that. The tangle, the overhanging branches and leaves, literally feed the river.
Study in recent decades by the Stroud Water Research Center in Avondale, Pa., in conjunction with U.S. Forest Service scientists, has revolutionized our understanding of streams, especially forested headwaters. Their research led to the River Continuum Concept, which shows how microbes and aquatic invertebrates brew fallen leaves and other organic matter into an energy-rich “watershed tea" that nourishes everything downstream, including parts of rivers too wide to have leaves overhead.
In America east of the Plains, before trees were cleared, upland streams always flowed through forests. Floodplains were forests. That was their natural state.
We need to protect our small upper streams that remain natural and preserve their natural function.
Mowing lawns to the water’s edge, chopping brush from the banks, pulling out woody debris from the water — all these can starve a stream.
“Brush” isn’t one thing at all, but hundreds of species of native plants — wild cranberry, prickly ash, nannyberry, red-twig dogwood, hornbeam, greenbrier, witch hazel. These shrubs, as well as large trees like sycamore and cottonwood, thrive in the moist soils of stream banks and floodplains.
Grass alone isn’t good enough. Its roots are shallow and don’t hold soil in a flood.
So instead of mowing or clearing the edge of a stream, let the brush tangle. Let it lean and dip. Let leaves fall into the water. Maybe clip a walking path so you can wind your way through the pawpaws or wingstem for a natural view of the water.
When you know how rivers and natural streams work, you see them differently. Instead of a tangle of brush to chop or remove, you’ll see roots holding soil, a cooling canopy. Instead of seeing woody debris in the water as a mess or a problem, you’ll see organic material that feeds fish and everything downstream as well.
You’ll see new views, new beauty — purple nannyberry seeds, the golf ball-size blooms of carrion flower and the weird sci-fi flowers, like computerized explosions, of buttonbush. You’ll protect your own stream banks, your neighbor’s water and the river downstream. “Brush” is good for a stream, and it’s great for the Great Lakes, for the Gulf of Mexico, for the life of all our rivers.
Janet Kauffman has restored wetlands on her farm in Hudson, Mich., and works with the Bean/Tiffin Watershed Coalition. Her most recent book is Trespassing: Dirt Stories & Field Notes, a half-story, half-essay examination of industrial livestock operations. She wrote this comment for the Land Institute's Prairie Writers Circle, Salina, Kan.
By JANET KAUFFMAN
CounterPunch
This time of year it’s great to work outside, clean up the place and mow. But if you’re lucky enough to have a stream on your property, think again before clearing that tangle of brush and trees. You’re looking at something good.
Brush and debris are dirty words to many people, who think it’s a mess, a problem. They prefer the “estate” look, with tall trees, groomed green grass, water with nothing in it but water. They chop or spray or clear everything else.
But if you know what brush is — how rich and diverse it is, how valuable — it’s beautiful. To the stream it is life-saving.
Recent research shows that if a stream looks “cleaned up” to the human eye, it’s a disaster for the stream and everything in it. A stream needs a natural mix of shrubs, a layering of foliage and root systems, and leaf litter and woody debris in the water to stay healthy and thrive.
The worst thing for a stream is chopped brush, a cleared bank, a mowed floodplain. That’s a bare-naked stream. Unnatural.
It’s well known how trees and shrubs hold stream banks in place with their roots, how vegetation holds back sediment. But trees and shrubs do more than that. The tangle, the overhanging branches and leaves, literally feed the river.
Study in recent decades by the Stroud Water Research Center in Avondale, Pa., in conjunction with U.S. Forest Service scientists, has revolutionized our understanding of streams, especially forested headwaters. Their research led to the River Continuum Concept, which shows how microbes and aquatic invertebrates brew fallen leaves and other organic matter into an energy-rich “watershed tea" that nourishes everything downstream, including parts of rivers too wide to have leaves overhead.
In America east of the Plains, before trees were cleared, upland streams always flowed through forests. Floodplains were forests. That was their natural state.
We need to protect our small upper streams that remain natural and preserve their natural function.
Mowing lawns to the water’s edge, chopping brush from the banks, pulling out woody debris from the water — all these can starve a stream.
“Brush” isn’t one thing at all, but hundreds of species of native plants — wild cranberry, prickly ash, nannyberry, red-twig dogwood, hornbeam, greenbrier, witch hazel. These shrubs, as well as large trees like sycamore and cottonwood, thrive in the moist soils of stream banks and floodplains.
Grass alone isn’t good enough. Its roots are shallow and don’t hold soil in a flood.
So instead of mowing or clearing the edge of a stream, let the brush tangle. Let it lean and dip. Let leaves fall into the water. Maybe clip a walking path so you can wind your way through the pawpaws or wingstem for a natural view of the water.
When you know how rivers and natural streams work, you see them differently. Instead of a tangle of brush to chop or remove, you’ll see roots holding soil, a cooling canopy. Instead of seeing woody debris in the water as a mess or a problem, you’ll see organic material that feeds fish and everything downstream as well.
You’ll see new views, new beauty — purple nannyberry seeds, the golf ball-size blooms of carrion flower and the weird sci-fi flowers, like computerized explosions, of buttonbush. You’ll protect your own stream banks, your neighbor’s water and the river downstream. “Brush” is good for a stream, and it’s great for the Great Lakes, for the Gulf of Mexico, for the life of all our rivers.
Janet Kauffman has restored wetlands on her farm in Hudson, Mich., and works with the Bean/Tiffin Watershed Coalition. Her most recent book is Trespassing: Dirt Stories & Field Notes, a half-story, half-essay examination of industrial livestock operations. She wrote this comment for the Land Institute's Prairie Writers Circle, Salina, Kan.
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