West Oakland Mural Bulldozed

Original mural on Mandela Parkway. Photo by Oaktown Art

A familiar West Oakland mural (formerly on Mandela Parkway and 12th Street) commemorating the 1968 Olympics “power salute” was razed last week. In 1968, Olympic medal winners Tommie Smith and John Carlos, gold and bronze medalists in the 200m run, stood during the national anthem with their heads down and black-gloved fists raised.

At a press conference after the event Tommie Smith, who holds seven world records, said: “If I win I am an American, not a black American. But if I did something bad then they would say ‘a Negro’. We are black and we are proud of being black. Black America will understand what we did tonight.” Smith said he had raised his right fist to represent black power in America, while Carlos raised his left fist to represent black unity. Together they formed an arch of unity and power. He said the black scarf represented black pride and the black socks with no shoes stood for black poverty in racist America.- BBC

1968 Olympics Power Salute

The West Oakland mural, sitting on a private lot, paid respects to this historical moment. It served a double purpose for the owner who commissioned the piece to prevent tagging. It seemed to have worked. No one who has graph-writing ethics would dishonor it. The city’s priorities don’t match graffiti artists’…but that’s common knowledge. Oakland Councilmember Lynnette McElheney tried to get constituent points on her Facebook when she heard the news:

Speaking with the contractors, this was removing State water testing tanks that were installed to monitor WO groundwater contamination levels at this site which was once a gas station. They told me that the water is now testing within normal ranges so the state ordered the removal of the tanks and testing equipment and the demolition of the shed. The mural was commissioned by the owner to keep the shed from being tagged.

She continued that she wasn’t notified and didn’t get there quickly enough to stop the demolition.

Facebook screenshot

Nice try, McElheney. You hold the pen in drafting the demolition of West Oakland, aka the West Oakland Specific Plan [Read about WOSP here]. (And yes, they actually named that shit “wosp.”) Do you think you’re gonna convince us that the preservation of anything that is part of this historical neighborhood or a tribute to the struggle is suddenly your top priority? We already know what your priority is. It is not preservation of history or community. It is development.

McElhaney also says that people are unrealistic about development prospects. Developers want to build in San Francisco, but they do not want to build in Oakland, she said. The only one willing to build in the city are Oakland-based developers…“Oakland can’t beg a developer to come to the city right now. But the reality is that you can’t get (developers) to come here without incentivizing the development.” – The Post News Group, 17 July 2014

Development, by overlapping institutions of state, capitalism and white supremacy, destroys community. And the successful destruction of a community requires a short memory of the resistance that went before us. Whether every moving part of the gentrification process is deliberate or not, these small events are certainly part of the nature of the beast. A politician is a politician is a businesswoman. This is the mural after the message was changed a few years back. The image stayed the same:

West Oakland kids before the mural was torn down

This more recent wording came from Rage Against the Machine’s “Know Your Enemy:”

…Born with insight and a raised fist A witness to the slit wrist, that’s with As we move into ’92 Still in a room without a view Ya got to know Ya got to know That when I say go, go, go Amp up and amplify Defy I’m a brother with a furious mind Action must be taken We don’t need the key We’ll break in Something must be done About vengeance, a badge and a gun…  

Feb 12, 2015: Important Hearing in SHU Lawsuit

From prisonabolition.org

From Hunger Strike Solidarity

In Ashker v. Brown, we will prove that ten years in solitary confinement in the Pelican Bay SHU is cruel and unusual punishment (violating the 8th Amendment).

In an end-run around our lawsuit, CDCR has been transferring hundreds of prisoners out of that SHU.  This is good news for some, but many prisoners are simply being transferred to other SHUs, most notably to Tehachapi.  Four of our ten named plaintiffs have been moved there.  Because the judge previously defined our 8th Amendment class as prisoners presently at Pelican Bay SHU for ten years or more, these plaintiffs and others are no longer considered part of the class.

In response, we recently filed a motion to expand the reach of the solitary confinement lawsuit to include prisoners who have spent 10 years or more at Pelican Bay SHU but have recently been transferred to other California SHUs.
As we wrote:

“the cruel and unusual treatment they experienced, and its debilitating effects, have not abated, but instead continue under a different name in a different prison.”

CDCR should not be able to thwart our 8th Amendment claim by transferring these long-suffering prisoners to a different SHU.  These prisoners should be released from SHU, not moved to a different SHU.  Granting our motion will give the court jurisdiction over these prisoners so that, when we succeed at trial, they will be included in the relief that the court orders.

Please attend the hearing on Plaintiffs’ (Prisoners’) Motion to Amend the Complaint.  Your presence in the courtroom shows the judge that we care and are paying attention to decisions made about the torture in the SHU.

DATE: Thursday,  Feb. 12, 2015
TIME: 2:00 p.m.
ADDRESS: U.S. District Court in Oakland, 1301 Clay Street(federal courthouse)
COURTROOM: Dept. #2,  4th Floor, Hon. Claudia Wilken, presiding

Note:  The judge could take the hearing off calendar or postpone it.  We will post any changes on this site immediately.

Information explaining the motion came from Carol Strickman,Staff Attorney, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children and Co-Counsel for Plaintiffs in Ashker v. Brown

Letter from Dr. Mutulu Shakur: On Seeking Parole

Forwarded from the Freedom Archives

[Who is Mutulu Shakur? Read more here

Dear family and friends,

Thank you for giving me your support and resources during the recent parole hearing process. May (Allah) God bless you in the spirit of our ancestors. I deeply thank you.

As you may know, my parole hearing took place on August 12th in USP Victorville.  My attorneys, Tarif Warren and Peter Schey felt hopeful after the hearing examiner notified us that she would recommend to the US Parole Commission to grant me parole.

On September 15, 2014, I received a notice of action from the National Appeals Board rejecting the parole examiner’s recommendation to advance my release to April 2015. This rejection of the examiner’s opinion and recommendation is not the first time that we have had this experience dealing with the US Parole Board. Last week, we appealed this rejection and asked the Board to reconsider and provide reasons for its decision. The appeal is now pending and we will keep all friends, family and supporters advised of developments.

Protestors to Police: No Christmas For You!

Flier for X-Mas Day FTP March (Oakland)

Police unions around the country are cashing in on the deaths of two NYPD officers by guilt-tripping the masses, attacking protestors (and even blaming the mayor, attorney general and president) for having “blood on their hands.” Tonight New Yorkers defied the calls of the mayor and the police unions to “suspend” all protests by taking to the streets in Manhattan and the Bronx. Here in the Bay Area, residents of Oakland are sharing that sentiment by holding a FTP (Fuck The Police) march on Christmas day with one stated goal: No Time Off.

A handful of organizations and self-appointed leaders, like the well-known FBI informant Rev. Al Sharpton, have rushed to condemn the killings in an attempt to “preserve the moral high ground.” However, many long time anti-police activists and residents of Oakland are remembering Lovell Mixon — a local villain to some, but a hero to others– who killed four OPD officers during the height of the Oscar Grant rebellions.

Brooklyn Man Dead After Killing Two Cops for Eric Garner

Post by Emani and Jabari

These photos were found on the Instagram of the man who killed two Brooklyn police officers Saturday. Right before the shootings, he posted his plans on social media. These posts were blocked immediately after we screenshot from his profile.

For background, videos and pictures click: Here

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Jalil Muntaqim Requests Call-In

From PrisonJustice.ca

NYC Jericho [more on the org here] received the following request from Jalil Muntaqim former Black Panther Party/Black Liberation Army/ Cointelpro Victim (known in the system as Anthony Bottom #77A4283). (Read about Jalil Muntaqim’s case here.):

I am preparing the Article 78 petition to the Court, however, I am still requesting friends to call Tina Stanford, Commissioner of the Board of Parole, and urge her to reverse the parole denial due to erroneous information in the parole folder: the COMPAS Report and their receipt and review of racist letters opposing …my release.I anticipate that, if several people make these calls, perhaps they will reverse the denial and order a new hearing. I ask that you all make phone calls to Tina Stanford’s office (518-473-9400) urging a decision in my administrative appeal. … In the hopefully short term, it is expected that the NYS Court of Appeals will decide two cases on parole that could establish a precedent on future parole decisions. It is expected the Court will make their decision before the end of the year, which will, if favorable, support my arguments. We shall see!? Yours in Struggle, Jalil A. Muntaqim

From Survivors at Iguala: Call to Action in 43 Cities

From USTired2

Other cities joining in December 3rd action here.

Today’s blog from the USTired2 website here.

Check out their Facebook page for updates on the call to action here.

We Can Pretend Mexico’s War Isn’t ‘Made in the U.S.A.’, But the Numbers Don’t Lie

From #USTired2: Stop the US Government’s Deadly Plan Mexico

For too many people living in the United States, it has been easy to ignore what’s happening in Mexico. But the plain truth is that the money that’s fueling this war is coming from one place: the United States. And it’s our job to stop it.

First, of course, there is the amount of money that drug traffickers make selling narcotics, marijuana, and amphetamines here in the U.S.: even conservative estimates put this at $30 billion each year. The drug trade is so profitable that one UN official argued that during the global banking crisis in 2008, drug money was the only thing keeping the world banking system afloat. So the drug habits of people here in the U.S. are making billions of dollars for the cartels—and therefore for the big international banks—every year, providing the monetary incentives for the kind of graft and corruption that has infected the Mexican state from top to bottom. Our love of cocaine and pot is fueling the disintegration of the entire Mexican political structure.

Read the rest of the article here.

Take action here.

Join the December 3rd National Mobilization for Peace in Mexico here.

Read more about Plan Mexico here.

break the laws/break the chains: political reflections on Mike Brown and White Supremacy from Oakland CA

Reposted from Kissing in the Dark

To be free is to break the law

“Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.”

-assata shakur

 I write to you from a humbled place. Striving to be a warrior for my people; looking and listening. This is an attempt to share some political reflections as a Black womyn in the struggle since I left the womb. The last two days Turtle Island (united states) has been on fire in solidarity with Mike Brown’s family and Ferguson, Missouri to protest the murder of Mike Brown by pig Darren Wilson, who continues to live freely with no charges filed against him. Mike Brown, like many of my brothers and sisters before me, was murdered for being a Black man in the White mans system. A system built out of the genocide of Black and Native folks. No justice will ever be served in their courts. This week in particular is a powerful week to be remembering and honoring native resistance, and Indigenous resistance all over this earth to white supremacy and state violence. Nothing has changed including the lies and bullshit holidays they try to feed us to distract us from these truths. We honor by continuing to resist.

Deferred (In)Action: Where’s the solidarity with indigenous people facing militarization?

From Alex Soto, 

Komkch’ed e Wah ‘osithk (Sells) 

Tohono O’odham Nation

Reposted from the O’odham Solidarity Across Borders Collective.

To all those unaware of the fine print of Obama’s immigration plan:

First and foremost, it will direct more resources to border security. Meaning…further militarization of Indigenous communities who are divided by the so-called border, such as my home community of the Tohono O’odham Nation. Our O’odham him’dag (way of life) will once again be attacked by settler border politics, as it was in 1848 and 1852 when the so-called border was illegally imposed. Attacked like we were in 1994 when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was enacted. These borderland policies are being devised and implemented without any settler consciousness to the Indigenous peoples who will be most negatively impacted by such policies. The Indigenous nations who pre-date so called Mexico and the United Snakkkes end up almost voiceless.

Basically Obama’s 2014 Immigration plan = border militarization = 21st century colonization.

So in light of Obama’s latest immigration plan, I’m writing this to say “DON’T BELIEVE THE HYPE”. The plan is anti-Indigenous and anti-Migrant. Please look at the bigger picture (NAFTA). Please see the trade off. Please see the state’s 2014 divide and conquer tactics.
Then ask yourself, what does an anti-colonial migrant/Indigenous response to this all look like? What does a world without NAFTA borders look like? What does collective liberation look like in O’odham lands? Lipan Apache Lands? Yoeme Lands? Kickapoo Lands? Indigenous homelands which are now in the so-called border region?

Where’s the solidarity with Indigenous people facing militarization?

I recognize this is a complex issue. I do not want fellow Indigenous migrants coming from the southern hemisphere to be criminalized by racist laws. I do not want families to be separated, loved ones to be deported, or for them to ever have to walk the hot desert in the first place, just to have a “chance” in this neo-liberal, NAFTA world we are forced to slave in. But at the same time, I do not want my homeland to be a police state. I do not want our ceremonies to be disrupted. I do not want our jewed (land) destroyed by border security apparatus. I do not want our sky to be polluted by more Border Patrol helicopters, cameras placed atop rotating cranes as tall as skyscrapers, or drones. I do not want freedom of movement for O’odham to be granted only to the holders of bio-metric colonial passports. I do not want CANAMEX/NAFTA corridors scarring our lands with freeways (Loop 202/Interstate 11). Ultimately I do not want, in the words of my late grandfather, who saw the Berlin Wall with his own eyes while being stationed in Germany, “an O’odham Berlin Wall” built at the border.

These are just a few thoughts I have at this time. Overall I maintain my hopes we can all get our shit together. We just have to weather the neo-colonial, mainstream migrant rights industrial complex funded by the creator knows who (but is worth a longer analysis), Dream ACTors and at the same time, we also have to weather the settler state, while empowering our own community. Either way, we got this… because we have to.

#ourdreamisyournightmare

#attacktheROOTnotEACHOTHER

#OodhamRiseUP

#eeewhatBorder

#browningofamerikkka

#akathebrowningofwhite supremacy

#smash21stcenturyColonialism

#eeewhatReform

#dontbelievethehype

#sayingtheshitthatyoucantsay

For additional resources please check:

http://www.indigenousaction.org/comprehensive-immigration-reform-is-anti-immigrant-anti-indigenous/

http://oodhamsolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/04/movement-demands-autonomy-oodham.html

http://inaborderworld.org/2014/03/13/colonization_immigrant_rights/http://survivalsolidarity.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/a-call-to-action-pdf1.pdf

http://stopcanamex.blogspot.com/