Letter to Obama - Read and Pass Along to Those in Doubt!
Date: Sat, 23 Feb 2008
Open Letter to Senator Obama
Mr. Barack Obama:
Born in Panama and while still living there, our family achieved
American citizenship in 1985. My sisters and I remained there until
1989. Immediately preceding Operation Just Cause, the invasion of
Panama by the United States, we were fortunate enough to migrate to the
U.S. where we have since lived.
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By NACLA
Intro: While mainstream media have covered candidates’ pursuit of the Latino vote, the mostly white pundits on MSNBC, CNN, and other networks now articulate a narrative that sows racial division by explaining Obama’s lower Latino vote percentages as evidence of racial division and tensions between African Americans and Latinos.
Author: Leonard M. Baynes
The 2008 election has made history with the racial and gender diversity of the Democratic Party’s presidential candidates: a white woman, Hillary Rodham Clinton; an African American man, Barack Obama; and a Latino man, Bill Richardson. From the beginning, the media have promoted a two-person contest between Clinton and Obama, virtually excluding all other candidates.
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HHEAL [Hip-Hop Educates and Advances Lives!] Fest!
A Celebration of Culture, Education, and Social Justice
During NYC’s Immigrant Heritage Week
New York, NY—The Hip-Hop Association, in conjunction with the Social Services of Hip Hop, We Got Issues!, Afro-Latin@ Project, and the New York State Youth Leadership Council present HHEAL Fest, a three-day celebration during NY’s Immigrant Heritage Week. HHEAL Fest will include interactive workshops, panels, film screenings, and performances that will focus on Hip-Hop as a tool for education, immigrant history, media literacy, and life skills and youth empowerment.
Taking place from April 18-20 at the Raphael Hernandez School of the Performing Arts (IS 217) in the Bronx, HHEAL Fest combines the Freshest Youth Program, Hip-Hop Education (H2Ed) Summit, and a third day dedicated to a town hall meeting and a special tribute dedicated to the Founder of Hip-Hop - Kool Herc and the First Lady of Hip-Hop - Cindy Campbell in homage of their Jamaican roots.
Some of the presenters and speakers include Erica Ford (Life Camp), Dr. Daniel Banks (NYU- Hip-Hop Theater Lab), Minister Server (Hip-Hop Life Coach), Peter the Rapmathician, Maria Rubio, (NYCORE), B-Girl GI Jane, Capital X (Death Penalty Abolitionist), Sarah Montgomery-Glinski (Hip-Hop Association), Andrew Landers (Hip-Hop Association), Dr. David Kirkland (NYU-Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development), Nicole Duncan-Smith, Author, I am Hip-Hop), Cristina Jimenez (New York State Young Leadership Council), Dr. George Priestley (Afro-Latino Project), and Sandy Shin (Breakthrough: Building Human Rights Culture).
In addition to the progressive facilitators representing at the HHEAL Fest, many community organizations will have tables full of information on their programs and initiatives. Organizations participating include Hip-Hop 4 Life, Life Beat, and
Make sure to register by April 1 at www.hiphopassociation.org/hheal08
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Letter from African American activists in solidarity with Mexican guest workers organizing against slave-like conditions
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Dear Friends,
We are writing to ask you to contribute to a strike fund for thirty Mexican "guest workers" who are courageously organizing against the slave-like conditions in the strawberry fields of Amite, Louisiana. Their boss has seized their passports, is paying them sometimes as little as $2 an hour, and has threatened them with deportation if they stretch or use the bathroom.
On Valentine’s Day, workers walked off the fields to reclaim their dignity. In solidarity, a delegation of African Americans attempted to conduct a citizen’s arrest of their boss, Charles "Bimbo" Relan, because he is violating the federal laws that define slavery, peonage, human trafficking, and servitude in the United States. We read him his rights, and told him he was violating the laws our ancestors fought for. Bimbo struck back: he was forced to return the passports but fired the workers and illegally evicted them. The workers are continuing their fight. And they need our support.
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