War in Afghanistan and lessons from Vietnam Should the U.S. send more troops or get out of Afghanistan or choose some other course? That’s the decision facing President Obama and his advisers in the next few weeks. General Stanley McChrystal, in a thoughtful, grim report, has said that more troops are needed, but that there is no hope of success without a major change of strategy, and that no U.S. strategy can succeed unless the Afghan government and security forces take responsibility adn win the support of their people. Continue reading
Tag Archives: race
NEWS DAY | Vietnam’s lessons for Afghanistan war / Racist beatings in Brooklyn Park / UST censorship
Filed under news
NEWS DAY: Metro Gang Strike Force hearing / New LRT station in St. Paul / State Fair opens today
Metro Gang Strike Force: Abuse, theft, racism
Legislators heard testimony on criminal activity by some Metro Gang Strike Force officers yesterday, with investigators describing a pattern of abuse of citizen rights, unjustified seizure of property, and taking seized property for private use. The investigative reports and testimony described a pattern of seizure of cash from anyone carrying large amounts of money when stopped by MGSF officers and noted that “these encounters almost always involved a person of color.”
Even with the testimony offered, Ruben Rosario writes, the committee did not hear about some of the more troubling aspects of MGSF behavior: the pursuit of immigrants with no gang or criminal ties, just because of their brown skin. MGSF instructed Minneapolis impound lot employees to call them when “Mexicans” came to claim their cars, and 29-year-old Dagoberto Rodriguez-Cardona was among their victims. The MGSF cops came to the impound lot on July 31, 2008, searched and questioned the two “Mexican” families there, seized more than $4,000 from Rodriguez-Cardona, and searched the cars of the two families:
No drugs were found.
None of those bagged that night had gang ties. Rodriguez-Cardona had no arrests, not even a parking ticket. Other than an acknowledgment that a little more than $4,000 was seized, Luger’s report found minimal information on the encounter in strike force records. No crime was alleged or prosecuted against those arrested and held in custody that night.
Yet, police contacted federal immigration officials in violation of a Minneapolis ordinance that prohibits officers from doing so unless a crime has been committed.
Now Rodriguez-Cardona faces deportation, and is suing to get his money back, showing what his attorney calls “raw courage” in coming forward.
The legislators heard from investigators yesterday. They heard about seizure of a wood chipper and stump grinder, and wondered how these could possibly have been thought to be involved in gang activity. They heard about seizures of flat screen TVs and sloppy accounting methods, and the need to change state seizure laws — never mind that many of the seizures seemed to be in blatant disregard of existing laws. The testimony that they did hear was damning, but they did not hear from victims. Rosario writes:
But the one thing lacking in Wednesday’s legislative hearing was testimony of someone like Rodriguez-Cardona. He would have driven home the human experience of someone placed in handcuffs in front of a sobbing relative and stripped of money earned by the sweat of his brow. Throw in the fact that his alleged muggers were officers of the law.
For additional accounts of yesterday’s hearing, see Metro Gang Strike Force: “Bad actions overshadow the good actions” in the TC Daily Planet, Metro Gang Strike Force hearing: Plenty of blame, but no answers in the Pioneer Press, Forfeiture law questioned after gang force misuse in the Star Tribune.
Big win for Central Corridor communities? The City of St. Paul will pay for an LRT station between Snelling and Rice Street under a tentative agreement reached Wednesday, reports the Pioneer Press:
St. Paul will put up $5.2 million for a new station — probably at the intersection of Western, Victoria or Hamline, according to a vote by the Central Corridor Management Committee.
In exchange, the Metropolitan Council will purchase an $8 million downtown property at East Fourth and Cedar streets, which would allow trains to make an easier turn. A prior agreement required St. Paul to foot the bill. …
The vote also prioritized the construction of two more east metro stations using money from a capital reserve built into the project — provided all goes well.
That’s huge for the community about to be disrupted by Central Corridor construction, as previous plans called for the trains to zoom along with stops a mile or more apart in low-income areas along the eastern part of the University Avenue line, though stops are closer together in other areas. However, the change still offers little to University Avenue small businesses. MPR reports:
A group of business owners met today to discuss their ongoing concerns. They say their voices aren’t being heard.
Lysa Bui, who owns the Saigon restaurant, says her business and many others won’t be able to survive the four-year construction project.
Central Corridor spokesperson Laura Baenen responded to business concerns by saying, “There’s absolutely no money in the project budget for handouts,” but she said that limited funds are available for “mitigation,” such as signage to tell customers where to look for parking, and free business consulting to offer advice to business owners.
State Fair opens today! What more can you say? Lots, actually, but I’m out of time this morning. So get your State Fair news here and here and most of all at the official source, right here
Filed under news
News Day: Chicken towns / Hot property / Lutherans come to MN / Police violence on video
Chicken towns St. Paul may soon have more chickens, reports the Star Tribune. A proposed new ordinance would allow St. Paul residents to keep three or fewer hens without getting permission from their neighbors, and with a reduced license fee of $25. The Strib quotes St. Paul city environmental manager Bill Gunther: “I’m a city kid, and I’m thinking they’re an agrarian animal that belongs on a farm,” he said. “But there’s a shift in thinking. Chickens are nothing more than a big bird.”
Of course, St. Paul already has some backyard chickens. So do Minneapolis, Anoka and Burnsville (but not Hastings.) Minneapolis even has a chicken rescue operation. And, unlike St. Paul, Minneapolis allows roosters in its backyard flocks.
Hot property The Star Tribune tagged Lake and Knox in Minneapolis as a “hot property:”
Details: Minneapolis property owners Nick Walton and Daniel Oberpriller have gotten approvals for a two-part development at a highly visible “gateway” into the Uptown neighborhood.
The article did not mention the strong community opposition to the development, or the protest resignation of Lara Norkus-Crampton, ECCO resident and Minneapolis Planning Commission member for the past three years, when the Planning Department and Planning Commission overruled the Uptown Small Area Plan (USAP).
More unallotments Late on Friday, Governor Tim Pawlenty released notice of another round of unallotments. The $13.6 million comes from agency operating budgets for FY 2011. Budget Commissioner Tom Hanson’s letter and accompanying documents (PDF) list all of the agencies that will be affected.
MPR reports that the biggest cuts come from a Revenue Department account, the Human Services Department, and Metro Transit aid. The cuts are widespread, ranging from the governor’s office to public health outreach and education. the Natural Resources Department also received more than a million dollars in cuts.
Lutherans come to MN You thought they were already here? Well, that’s true, but this week, Minnesota’s home-grown Lutherans will be supplemented by 1,000+ delegates to the national gathering of the 4.8 million member ELCA, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. The most controversial item on the agenda is “rostering” of openly gay, non-celibate pastors. While some gay and lesbian pastors already serve congregations, the synod does not officially recognize them.
The Minnesota Independent reported on leading voices on both sides of the issue last week, and the Star Tribune reported yesterday that, although a close vote is expected, the Lutherans insist that a tradition of politeness will prevail.
Episcopalians also face issues over gay and lesbian clergy, with breakaway groups trying to recruit more congregations to their ranks, as dioceses in Minnesota and Los Angeles plan to consecrate gay or lesbian bishops.
So far, the defections represent only about 5 percent of the 2.3 million total membership. But in July, the spinoff denominations announced an aggressive plan to launch 1,000 congregations in the next five years. …
On Aug. 1 — less than a month after the end of a moratorium on the consecration of gay bishops that was put in place to appease restive congregations — the Diocese of Minnesota announced that one of its three nominees for bishop is the Rev. Bonnie Perry, a Chicago priest who is in a long-term same-sex relationship. The next day, the Diocese of Los Angeles included two openly gay priests on its list of nominees for assistant bishop.
Circus tumble The young performers at Circus Juventas flew through the air with their usual aplomb, but spectators tumbled to the ground last night as half of the bleachers collapsed at the end of the performance. Half of the audience of 900 fell with the bleachers, and seven people were hospitalized. Broken wrist or ankles were the most serious injuries expected, according to the Pioneer Press. The collapse happened as the audience rose to applaud the end of the final performance of the three-week run of “YuLong: The Jade Dragon” at the Circus Juventas academy’s Big Top, in St. Paul’s Highland Park.
Violent police video Minneapolis police say that they used reasonable force in a February traffic stop, but the defendant, David Jenkins, his lawyer, and the squad car video tell another story, according to a report in the Star Tribune. The county attorney’s office dropped assault charges against Jenkins “in the interest of justice” after they reviewed the video, which can be viewed on the Star Tribune website. Jenkins was stopped for allegedly going 15 miles over the speed limit. He was also charged with refusing to submit to a blood or urine test, but a judge dismissed those charges.
After being thrown to the ground by the first police officer on the scene, Jenkins was beaten and kicked and tasered three times by police.
He required seven stitches above his eye after six officers punched and kicked him while he was face-down in a snowbank. He was treated at the hospital and then jailed for four days.
Jenkins said he was the victim of an unprovoked attack simply because he had vigorously questioned Officer Richard Walker about why he was stopped and asked to talk to his supervisor.
Police chief Tim Dolan said he would review the video on Monday.
World/National News
Public option going down? The New York Times says that the “public option” for health care reform may be abandoned by the administration in favor of nonprofit health care co-ops.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate Finance Committee is expected to produce a bill that features a nonprofit co-op. The author of the idea, Senator Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota and chairman of the Budget Committee, predicted Sunday that Mr. Obama would have no choice but to drop the public option.
Former Vermont governor and Democratic party chair Howard Dean disagrees, reports AP:
“You can’t really do health reform without [a public option],” he said. Dean maintained that the health insurance industry has “put enormous pressure on patients and doctors” in recent years.
He called a direct government role “the entirety of health care reform. … We shouldn’t spend $60 billion a year subsidizing the insurance industry.”
Gaza Some 13 people were killed in clashes between Hamas government forces and an extremist religious sect, reports the Washington Post:
According to wire service and eyewitness reports of Moussa’s sermon, the cleric said the group drew its inspiration from al-Qaeda, demanded that a strict Salafi form of Islam be imposed in Gaza, and criticized Hamas for its occasional meetings with Europeans and Americans, including former president Jimmy Carter.
Hamas officials said they dealt with the sect as an illegal group possessing guns and weapons.
Suicide bombing in Russia A suicide bomber in the violence-plagued North Caucasus region attacked a police station in the city of Ingushetia, killing 20 and wounding many more, reports the New York Times:
The attack seemed to further undermine the authority of Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, Ingushetia’s populist president who came to power last October vowing a softer approach in dealing with rebel violence than Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of neighboring Chechnya. It was the bloodiest single attack to hit Ingushetia for some time, though violence against police and government officials in this and other North Caucasus republics occurs almost daily. Mr. Yevkurov himself announced last week that he would soon return to work after he was seriously wounded in a suicide attack on his convoy in June. Ingushetia’s construction minister, Ruslan Amirkhanov, was assassinated in his office last week.
Iran Accusations of jailhouse violence, beatings and sexual abuse continue, reports the New York Times. Reformist cleric and presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi refuses to back down despite calls for his arrest by conservative clerics and politicians.
War Reports
Afghanistan Five days before national elections, reports the Washington Post, s suicide bombing in Kabul killed seven people and wounded dozens more.
Iraq A “witch hunt” against gay men in Baghdad has killed 90 since January, reports BBC, which says that “Mehdi army spokesmen and clerics have condemned what they call the ‘feminisation’ of Iraqi men and have urged the military to take action against them.”
Afghanistan drug money A new Senate report says that the Taliban is getting only about $70 million of the estimated $400 million in drug profits each year, reports the Los Angeles Times. According to the Times:
Al Qaeda’s dependence on drug money is even less, according to the report by the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which found that “there is no evidence that any significant amount of the drug proceeds go to Al Qaeda.” …
In one of its most disconcerting conclusions, the Senate report says the United States inadvertently contributed to the resurgent drug trade after the Sept. 11 attacks by backing warlords who derived income from the flow of illegal drugs. The CIA and U.S. Special Forces put such warlords on their payroll during the drive to overthrow the Taliban regime in late 2001.
Filed under Uncategorized
News Day: Beer Summit / Gangs of St. Paul / Police gang / Harassment by pizza / Iran repression
Beer Summit Red Stripe for Henry Louis Gates, Blue Moon for the police officer, and Bud Light for the president: beer choices at the White House were all over the news yesterday, along with Congressional admonitions to the president to drink American.
Continue reading
Filed under news
News Day: The Usual Suspects / Second chance / Credit unions in trouble / Twitter, iPhone dangers / Blue Dog deal
Soja Andrzej - Fotolia.com
Waterfall dries up Minnehaha Falls has fallen victim to the drought (precipitation is 16 inches below normal for the past 14 months), and now is only a trickle of its former self, reports the Pioneer Press. Minnehaha Falls dries up when the Minnehaha Creek Watershed District closes the Grays Bay Dam. That happened on June 2 this year, though the dam usually stays open until September. Other recent years when Minnehaha Falls was dried up: 2000, 1988 and 1964. The average precipitation by this time in the year is 17.36 inches, but the Twin Cities has received only 9.49 inches this year.
Second chance for MN refugees Three Salvadoran teens who fled their home country because of threats from the MS-13 gang may get a second chance at asylum in Minnesota, reports the TC Daily Planet:
They were recently jailed for about 17 days and faced imminent deportation. Then they scored a major victory. Not only were they released from jail, but the U.S. Department of Homeland Security also has joined with their attorneys to ask the Board of Immigration Appeals to reopen their case. Ben Casper, one of their attorneys, called DHS’s decision very unusual. “I have never heard of it before,” he said.
Conflict of interest for U of M doc? U of M Dr. David Polly received more than a million dollars from Medtronic, and U.S. Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) thinks that may be a conflict of interest. Grassley is asking for an investigation, because “Polly went before Congress in 2006 and testified about a program that had ties to Medtronic, but Polly didn’t disclose his own ties to Medtronic,” reports MPR. U of M officials are reviewing the matter, and Polly remains on the Medtronic payroll.
Credit unions follow banks into deep water The Thumper Pond development is emblematic of new risks taken by some credit unions, reports the Star Tribune. When credit unions strayed from their traditional customers and loans to members, they courted the same trouble that banks have seen in the current economic crisis.
Losses on risky loans, from Twin Cities housing projects to out-of-state ethanol plants, are one reason why nearly half of the state’s 156 credit unions lost money in the most recent quarter, compared to 35 percent of credit unions nationwide. Seven of Minnesota’s credit unions are near or below capital levels the government deems adequate. And two were in such bad shape they had to be sold.
Want to check your credit union’s asset rating? The Strib has a list.
World/National news
Twitter danger BBC reports that a Chicago real estate company is suing a former tenant who tweeted about mold in her apartment. Horizon Group Management says her tweet was defamatory, and sued. Jeffrey Michael, whose family has run Horizon for decades, told the Chicago Sun-Times they didn’t talk to her about the tweet and didn’t ask her to take it down, saying, “We’re a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organisation.” Tenant Amanda Bonnen had 20 Twitter followers at the time that she posted the tweet, and has since closed her Twitter account.
iPhones in peril? Forbes.com reports on an iPhone hack that could “give a hacker complete power over any of the smart phone’s functions,” and then propagate itself to take over every iPhone in the world. Two cyber-security experts say that they notified Apple about the problem more than a month ago, but that it hasn’t released a patch.
If you receive a text message on your iPhone any time after Thursday afternoon containing only a single square character, Charlie Miller would suggest you turn the device off. Quickly.
The researchers have also found bugs in Windows Mobile and Google Android phones.
Beer today! BBC reports: “Cambridge police sergeant Jim Crowley and Henry Louis Gates, the Harvard scholar he arrested after responding to a report of a possible break-in at Mr Gates’s home, will sit down with Mr Obama on Thursday for a conciliatory beer.”
Is this the way to better race relations in America? If not, it is at least the way to a summer’s worth of late-night TV fodder. From across the pond, BBC thinks it is tempting to view the whole episode as the “ultimate conflation of the age of Obama and the age of Oprah,” adding that, “Aside from the choice of beverage, there is something very daytime television, something very soft focus, something very soft sofa, about this attempt to defuse the controversy.”
For a truly hysterical look at the entire flap, tune in to Colbert Nation on race and farts.
Refugees drown Some 200 people fleeing the poverty and starvation of Haiti crammed a homemade sailboat, enduring hunger and thirst for two days — and then the boat sank. NPR interviewed survivors, who said:
The boat was jam-packed with people. Men filled the deck, exposed to the hot sun, while women and men alike filled the dark, nearly airless hold below, survivors later told rescuers. Pierre said the hold was packed so tight that nobody could lie down.
118 people were rescued, after 17 hours in the water.
Pierre was among those returned to Haiti:
Pierre, who was reunited with his mother, said for all the horrors of the voyage he was still desperate to get out of Haiti, where 80 percent of the people survive on less than $2 a day.
Health care fact-of-the-day Courtesy of Paul Krugman: “Since 1970 Medicare costs per beneficiary have risen at an annual rate of 8.8% — but insurance premiums have risen at an annual rate of 9.9%. … if insurance premiums had risen “only” as much as Medicare spending, they’d be 1/3 lower than they are.”
Blue Dog deal Minnesota Budget Bites has an analysis of the deal struck by Blue Dog Democrats to allow the health care reform bill to move to the House floor. The deal allows a public option to remain, but limits tax increases and employer mandates. According to the New York Times:
The House changes, which drew immediate opposition from liberal lawmakers, would reduce the federal subsidies designed to help lower-income families afford insurance, exempt additional businesses from a requirement to offer insurance to their workers and change the terms of a government insurance option.
Filed under news
News Day: Gangs of St. Paul? / Coleman: Not yet / Peltier parole hearing today / Sectarian violence in Nigeria
© Maluson - Fotolia.com
The Pioneer Press quoted Cryer:
“I’m a college student,” he said. “I don’t have a tattoo on my body. I don’t meet any of the criteria. It really doesn’t make sense.” Asked how it made him feel to be called a gang member, Cryer said, “Horrible.”
“I believe some people out there are gang banging and police need to take drastic measures, but there are others out there like myself that are being labeled,” he said. “They’re singling out everybody. If they get the wrong person, it doesn’t matter to them.”
Coleman: Not yet A spokesperson for former Senator Norm Coleman announced that he is not currently running for governor, and that he probably will wait until March or April to announce any future political plans. That would be too late for a run for governor under most scenarios. Republicans are taking a straw poll in October, precinct caucuses are in February, and the party convention will be April 30 and May 1, according to the Star Tribune.
Peltier parole date Leonard Peltier is up for parole, with a hearing scheduled for July 28. Peltier is serving two life sentences, after conviction in 1977 of killing two FBI agents in 1975. Democracy Now reports:
The Parole Commission originally denied Peltier parole in 1993 based on their finding that he, quote, “participated in the premeditated and cold blooded execution of those two officers.” However, the Parole Commission has since said it, quote, “recognizes that the prosecution has conceded the lack of any direct evidence that [Peltier] personally participated in the executions of the two FBI agents.”
Peltier’s defenders say the conviction was a product of FBI persecution of the American Indian Movement, with pitched battles between the AIM and federal agents at places including the 71-day occupation of Wounded Knee in 1973. The FBI cracked down on AIM, violently. That was the context for the 1975 gun battle and the Peltier prosecution. Two others accused of killing the agents were acquitted in a separate trial.
The FBI adamantly opposes parole, saying Peltier was guilty of executing two FBI agents. Other groups, including Amnesty International, have called for his release, and say he did not receive a fair trial.
World/National News
Sectarian violence in northern Nigeria A small Islamist sect opposed to “Western education” attacked police stations in two states in mostly-Muslim northern Nigeria on Sunday and Monday. About 55 people, including 39 of the attackers, and at least one police officer and one fire officer, have been killed, according to the New York Times. The region has frequently seen outbreaks of religious violence, often between Muslims and Christians.
BBC puts the death toll at more than 100, and reports that a group of the militants is barricaded inside part of the city of Maiduguri, and shooting at anyone who approaches. The militants are known locally as the “Taliban,” but are not believed to have any ties to Taliban groups elsewhere in the world, and some say the “Taliban” label was applied as a term of derision by other Muslims who consider the group “crazy.”
Reich on health care reform Robert Reich warns that health care reform is in danger, and says action before the August recess is vital:
First, the House must enact a bill before August recess even if the Senate is unable to — and the House bill should include the four key elements that have already emerged from House committees: (1) a public plan option, (2) a mandate on all but the smallest employers to provide their employees with health insurance or else pay a tax or fee (so-called “pay or play”), (3) a requirement that every individual and family buy health insurance, coupled with subsidies for families up to 300 or 400 times the poverty level in order to make sure it’s affordable to them; and (4) a small surtax on the top 1 percent of earners or families to help pay for this subsidy (“tax the wealthy so all Americans can stay healthy.”)
Iran prison deaths BBC reports that Supreme Leader Ayatolla Ali Khameini has ordered the closure of a detention center at Karizhak, because of violations of detainee rights. Whether protesters held there will be transferred to other facilities or released is unclear. Many protesters are still held in the main prison:
There are also continuing reports of grim conditions inside Tehran’s main prison, Evin, which seems unable to cope with the large number of opposition supporters rounded up since the election, says the BBC Tehran correspondent Jon Leyne.
In recent days the opposition has reported almost every day new deaths of protestors held in prison.
War Reports
Afghanistan After the Afghanistan government announced an election truce in the north-western province of Badghis, a Taliban spokesperson said no such truce exists, reports BBC. In fact, the run-up to next month’s presidential elections is marked by violence, with an attack on the car of the campaign manager of Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah severely wounding the campaign manager and killing the driver in Laghman province, and a separate assassination attempt on President Karzai’s running mate on Sunday. In another incident in Helmand province, eight security guards were killed by a remotely detonated bomb.
Filed under news
News Day: Green leaving MPS / Ellison fires back / No new bushes – and get those eagles out of here / more
Green leaving MPS Schools superintendent William Green announced that he will leave the Minneapolis Public School system at the end of his four-year term in 2010, continuing what many see as a trend to one-term superintendents in major metroplitan school districts. According to the Star Tribune, “Green will have spent 4 1/2 years with the district when he leaves — 50 percent longer than the national average for urban districts.”
Continue reading
Filed under news
News Day: Health care reform / MN pushes Medicare reform / Beautifying garbage / Honduras crisis continues / more
Health care reform President Obama used the “bully pulpit” of last night’s press conference ( transcript here) to push harder on health care reform. He denounced insurance companies, saying “”Right now, at the time when everybody’s getting hammered, they’re making record profits and premiums are going up,” and said that much of the cost of the health care reform package will be paid by saving “over one hundred billion dollars in unwarranted subsidies that go to insurance companies as part of Medicare.”
Continue reading
Filed under news
News Day: Who’s running now? / Metro growing / WalMart in the news / SPPS school closings / Latest from Harvard
Who’s running now? With filing for municipal offices now closed, you can find the complete list of candidates for Minneapolis municipal offices on the city website. Among the candidates:
Continue reading
Filed under news
Poynter Big Idea: Building community through journalism
Did you know that most of the black press contingent was barred from the Staples Center Michael Jackson memorial? Neither did I – but The Skanner did, and so did thousands of people who clicked on their story.
The Skanner news group is a 34-year-old African American newspaper in Portland and Seattle, an area that editor Lisa Loving described as overwhelmingly and demographically white, white, white,” adding that The Skanner is one of the few avenues in Seattle and Portland for the African American community to get their message out to a wider (and whiter) audience. Among The Skanner’s Big Ideas:
• A Google cold case map, created in cooperation with Portland police, which gets “mega hits” — and four of the cases have been solved.
• A mission to build web-based community service projects “rooted in our local communities but with an appeal to wider audience.” Two examples: an emergency preparedness page and a soon-to-launch project to help bridge the digital divide, that has led to a partnership with local Sabin CDC to run computer skills training at five community locations targeting job seekers, senior citizens, teen parents, and more. The Skanner also has a job search page with tips and links to help for resume-building, computer skills classes and more.
Filed under Uncategorized
Mary Turck