Friday, August 29, 2008

Diverse plants and wildlife call World Peace Wetland Prairie home on August 29, 2008

Please click on images to ENLARGE photos of butterflies and flowers and tall grass on August 29, 2008, on World Peace Wetland Prairie.



First and second photos above feature a monarch butterfly nectaring on native thistles on World Peace Wetland Prairie. Native thistles are NOT outlawed and are exceptionally valuable to butterflies, bees and numerous species of birds.
The following two photos (below) feature Centaurea Americana, the American basketflower, surrounded by Demaree's gaura or Gaura demareei, and Dematree's gaura is seen up close in the fifth photo.




Gaura demareei above.
A small, pale butterfly rests on tall grass in the sixth photo (below).





Florida lettuce above (Latuca floridana) above.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Land institute protects the soil on which our lives depend

Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu

From: Scoop [mailto:scoop@landinstitute.org]
Sent: Wednesday, August 27, 2008 5:20 PM
To: Land Institute Friends
Subject: Scoop from The Land Institute, August 27, 2008

Scoop

from The Land Institute

Issue 26, August 27, 2008

* Send email addresses for others who would like to receive SCOOP in a reply.
* Offer improvements to SCOOP with your reply to scoop@landinstitute.org
* Request a complimentary copy of our Land Report, email to olsen@landinstitute.org.
· National Geographic’s SOIL article
· Properties for sale
· Prairie Festival: Barbara Kingsolver!
· Coming events, Land Institute speakers
· National Geographic issue, cover story “Where Food Begins”
Page 146 of the September 2008 issue mentions our scientist, Jerry Glover “On assignment: He Knows All the Dirt.” Jerry is at work excavating roots, photographed by our neighbor Jim Richardson (who also illustrated the article with photos). We hear that non-Geographic staff members do not show up on the “Inside Geographic” page—but Jerry’s work behind the scenes “to share his knowledge of soil”… “was indispensable to this issue’s soil story.”
The article, “Our Good Earth,” pages 80-111, also includes a photo of long roots that any Land Institute friend will have seen before—more than once.
One of the highlighted comments: “By 2030, 8.3 billion people will walk the Earth, and farmers will have to grow 30 percent more grain.”
Additional photographs of Jim’s work with us appear at: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/09/soil/richardson-photography.
· Properties for sale
The Land Institute is selling its real estate holdings in Matfield Green, Kansas—in the region of the Flint Hills tallgrass prairie. Two houses are offered by a local realtor. For more information, call Griffin Realty, 620-273-6421, or see www.emporia.com/griffin. The Matfield Green Grade School will also soon be listed for sale.
· Prairie Festival: Barbara Kingsolver and Steven Hopp!
A tentative schedule is on our Web site, www.landinstitute.org, (check for changes). Click on home page banner, or Calendar. Join us Friday evening to Sunday noon, September 26-28, 2008.
You may know Barbara Kingsolver for her novels Poisonwood Bible and Prodigal Summer a few years ago and for her recent book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. Her co-authors on the latest book are husband Steven Hopp, co-presenter at the Festival, and daughter Camille Kingsolver.
Brief bios of the presenters will be on our Web site soon. They are: Dana Beach, Terry Evans, Steven Hopp, Barbara Kingsolver, Conn Nugent Mark Parkinson, Curt Meine, Doug Tompkins, Don Worster and Angus Wright—plus a cast of staff members.
Motels are filling up--reserve a room soon. Salina will be busy with other events, too.
Free primitive camping is, as usual, an option.
See VISIT info at www.landinstitute.org.
Coming events--2008
Aug. 29-Sep 1, San Francisco—Slow Food Nation ’08, Come to the Table. Open to the Public, online registration: www.slowfoodnation.org. Wes Jackson speaking Saturday, Aug 30, Noon at Herbst Theatre, Veterans Bldg, 401 Van Ness Ave.
Sept 4, Salina, KS—Smoky Hill Museum First Thursday program. 5:30 pm, Ken Warren Presenting. Contact: Nona Miller, 785.309.5776.
Sept 5-7, Portland OR—Muddy Boot Organic Festival. Wes Jackson presenting Friday Sept 5, 7:00 pm, St. Philip Neri Catholic Church. Details: Julie Gefroh, 503-544-3470. Open to public. Advance tickets: brownpapertickets.org.
Sept 25-26, Salina, KS—Short Course on Natural Systems Agriculture at The Land Institute. Staff scientists will lead an intensive exploration of The Land Institute's work in developing an agriculture patterned after natural ecosystems. We are pleased to receive applications from students and others with diverse backgrounds and interests. (See Calendar, “Short Course” at www.landinstitute.org.)
Sept 26-28, Salina, KS—Prairie Festival at The Land Institute, www.landinstitute.org.
Oct. 6, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada—Seventh Annual Bentley Lecture in Sustainable Agriculture, University of Alberta. Wes Jackson presenting, What will the ecosphere require of us? Info: john.spence@ualberta.ca or rochelle.jackson@afhe.ualberta.ca.
Oct. 17, Hickory Corners, MI—Michigan State University’s Kellogg Biological Station. Presenting, Jerry Glover. Open to the public. Info: wilkebro@msu.edu.
Oct 30-31, Anderson, SC—23rd Annual Sustainable Agriculture Conference. Carolina Farm Stewardship Association, Wes Jackson presenting, time and date tba..

Ron Wilson, 864.605.1000, wilsonr@atlanticbuillionandcoin.com.
SCOOP back issues are at www.landinstitute.org, “What’s New?”

The Land Institute
2440 E. Water Well Road, Salina, KS 67401
785.823.5376
www.landinstitute.org
Contact: olsen@landinstitute.org

Senator Mark Pryor's mobile office in Fayetteville from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.

FW: Reminder: Pryor's Mobile Office Coming To Town, please forward in area‏
From: Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
Sent: Wed 8/27/08 8:15 AM

OUR congressional representatives are possibly no better than their staff, so let's educate Pryor's staff a little on important issues of which they seem uncritical, ignorant, blind, or even perverse. Today Wed. 1 to 2:30 at Court House. Bring a pie. (Well, we tried that with Boozman's staff, had a lovely long pie lunch, he even sent a staff member down from DC, and I confess they seem unchanged. But since they do not understand or refuse to understand concepts outside the US Corporate/National Security Imperial Warming State cocoon, we must patiently persist, as good teachers do.)

Get their names. Follow up.

Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu

Time to go ask this senator's staff about the environment and the war--at the very least---and ask why he seems so hesitant to do right on either score. Fran Alexander
Tuesday, August 26, 2008


Mobile Office Coming To Town
Senator Mark Pryor’s Mobile Office is coming to town to help local residents resolve problems they may be having with the Veterans Administration, Medicare, Social Security and other services involving the federal government. He invites you to visit with his staff at the following stops:
Wednesday, August 27:
9-10:30 am: Fort Smith Public Library, 3201 Rogers Avenue, Fort Smith, AR
1-2:30 pm: Washington County Courthouse, 280 North College Avenue, Fayetteville, AR
3:30-5 pm: Benton County Senior Center, 3501 SE L Street, Bentonville, AR

Offices
Arkansas Office
The River Market
500 Clinton Ave, Suite 401
Little Rock, AR 72201
Phone: (501) 324-6336
Fax: (501) 324-5320

Washington, D.C. Office
255 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone: (202) 224-2353
Fax: (202) 228-0908

Monday, August 18, 2008

Peace movement and 2008 presidential campaign

PEACE MOVEMENT AND PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN 2008‏
From: Omnicenter Communications (omninews@listserv.uark.edu) on behalf of Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
Sent: Mon 8/18/08 11:27 AM
Reply-to: Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
To: OMNINEWS@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU


PRESIDENCY, CONGRESS, AND THE PEACE, JUSTICE, and ECOLOGY MOVEMENT

The pje organizations are not sitting on their hands during these last days of the presidential campaigns, but have plunged into the middle of them. The several pje organizations I have checked recently have intensified their “educate the candidates and Parties” campaigns.
Most dramatic is Amnesty International, which will display a full-scale replica of a Guantanamo prison cell at both nominating conventions, to demand of the candidates and Parties emphatic opposition to torture, to prolonged detainment without charge, to unaccountability of high-level officials, and other human rights abuses. (from a letter from AI). Larry Cox is Exec. Dir. of AI.

Like AI, Friends of the Earth believes that we cannot take for granted that a change of Administration or of Congress will change the carbon regime to the degree that must happen if we are to bring down CO2 to 350 PPM quickly enough. The Lieberman-Warner energy bill was proposed, but defeated, and anyway it was deeply flawed and would not require the real changes needed to stop climate change. So FOE is keeping the pressure on not only the Bush Admin. but also on Congress and the presidential candidates, to make sure they face facts and seek real solutions, not the greenwashing now pervading corporate tactics. Brent Blackwelder if President of FOE. (from a letter from FOE). www.foe.org

For a third example, the Friends Committee on National Legislation, in their July/Aug. 2008 Newsletter focusing on nuclear weapons, will not “wait until January,” but are “urging presidential and congressional candidates to embrace a vision of a world free of nuclear weapons.” They and we cannot count on the next president and Congress to reverse US nuclear weapons policy, but we must show them we want that change to be much more than generalities—complete nuclear disarmament, no first use policy, renegotiate START, ratify the CTBT, and rescue the NPT. www.fcnl.org
Of course these campaigns are not new, for these organizations and hundreds of peace, justice, and ecology organizations have always been in the middle of politics by informing the citizenry against the special interests and elites that control information and politicians, especially during presidential campaigns. Let us join with other peace organizations with courage and hope in educating our candidates and our Cong. delegation about human rights, global warming, nuclear weapons, and other urgent matters, including the power of corporations to determine national policies. If we do not, we can be sure the forces in politics for profit and empire will fill our vacancy.
Remember that not only our politicians but the staff members that do research, advise, and coach them must be better informed also. Are you yet on a first name basis with the staffs?

SENATOR LINCOLN (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371.

Fayetteville office: 251-1380; www.lincoln.senate.gov; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/index.cfm; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/webform.html

SENATOR Mark Pryor: Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908. www.pryor.senate.gov ; http://pryor.senate.gov/contact/

CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.

DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.

Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu
(479) 442-4600

Friday, August 15, 2008

OMN bibliography number 31 by Dr. James Richard Bennett

\
OMNI BIBLIO #31‏
From: Omnicenter Communications (omninews@listserv.uark.edu) on behalf of Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
Sent: Fri 8/15/08 1:18 PM
Reply-to: Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
To: OMNINEWS@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU
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OMNI BOOKS, VIDEOS, MUSIC BIBLIO #31

WE, THE PEOPLE BUILDING A CULTURE OF PEACE THROUGH KNOWLEDGE, August 15, 2008, Compiled by Dick Bennett



We , the People: A popular government without popular knowledge is a farce. Madison.





Propaganda as a major source of social control in the U. S. is inseparable from the culture of the U.S. –it’s everywhere, in symbols, myths, entertainment, the capitalist system, the militarized economy, the two-party politics. And in public relations/advertising—commercial and political. In his public relations manual of 1928, Edward Bernays explained the “very essence of the democratic process” to be “the freedom to persuade and suggest” by “the engineering of consent.” “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society.” The business community and the executive branch of government with their enormous powers have put Bernays’ lessons to decisive use.



But in many niches one can find autonomous, independent alternatives, opposition, protest, values, and pathways pointing to a more free, just, caring, and peaceful world. (See at end for a summary of values espoused by OMNI.) The books and films in these bibliographies are one of those openings. They expose the controls and controllers, and they lead to a different country. To follow up this argument, read the books by Noam Chomsky (three mentioned below), my bibliographies Control of Information in the U.S. and Control of the Media in the U.S, and the many books on Activism and Hope in my preceding OMNI Bibliographies.



So all you autonomous OMNI members who enjoy reading books, create or join an OMNI Book Forum, tell about a book or books on OMNI’s 5-minute Book Sampler over CAT. Start a book discussion group. Gather a children's group for a true history of the USA. And if you can afford them, buy books: we won’t have books supporting Gandhi/King nonviolence, world peace, social and economic justice, human rights, and environmental stewardship unless we buy them. FREADOM.



Needed: someone to gather these biblios. into one.



Our representatives are dominated by the Corporate/Military State and will not seek meaningful changes unless we insist.

SENATOR LINCOLN (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371.

Fayetteville office: 251-1380; www.lincoln.senate.gov; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/index.cfm; http://www.lincoln.senate.gov/webform.html

SENATOR Mark Pryor: Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908. www.pryor.senate.gov ; http://pryor.senate.gov/contact/

CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.

DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.



(You might have noticed that I never use the word "America," but only North America or USA. We have arrogantly stolen the word America from the many countries of the Americas, so I invite you to join me.)



ACTIVISM FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE

--Sirota, David. The Uprising. A book that challenges the status quo, questions the media and political Establishment and asks tough questions.

The Uprising by David Sirota - Hardcover - Random House

In his invigorating new book, David Sirota investigates whether this uprising can be transformed into a unified, lasting political movement. ...






--Hertel, Shareen. Unexpected Power: Conflict and Change Among Transnational Activists. Cornell UP, 2006. Rev. Peace and Change (April 2006). Expands the work of Keck and Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders (1998) to add to Northern/Western rights frame the Souther economic and structural analysis.

--Lisa Witter, COO of Fenton Communications and co-author of The She Spot: Why Women are the Marketing for Changing the World - And How to Reach Them www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-witter

--Reich, Charles. Opposing the System. Crown, 1995. A prescient writer, arguing for constitutional curbs on corporate tyranny, a restored social contract for economic justice, and a resurgent protest movement guided by a new map of values.



AFGHANISTAN (see: Imperialism, Iraq)

Kolhatkar, Sonali. Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence. 2006. (See Biblio. 30.)



ANIMAL PROTECTION
Some older books:

Linzey, Andrew. Christianity and the Rights of Animals. Has an extensive “Guide to Further Reading.”

Nichol, John, The Animal Smugglers; Harriet Ritvo, The Animal Estate…in the Victorian Age; C. David Coats, Old MacDonald’s Factory Farm; Marjorie Spiegel, The Dreaded Comparison—Human and Animal Slavery; Collard w Contrucci, Rape of the Wild: Man’s Violence Against Animals and the Earth; George Wenzel, Animal Rights, Human Rights…Canadian Arctic.



ANTI-WAR

The 2 combined nos. of WIN (Spring/Summer 2008) resemble a book. They report interviews with 90 Peace and Justice Organizers who respond to Where to From Here? An Assessment of Antiwar Organizing and Activism. Sections on: What is lacking in the peace and antiwar movement? What constraints do we face in organizing? What are the biggest openings and opportunities for organizing today? How do we build a more multiracial and cross-class antiwar movement? What roles can veterans, soldiers and military families play in ending war? What is the relevance of nonviolence today? How do we link peace and justice issues and build alliances? What does base-building look like in antiwar organizing?

ASSASSINATION (see: National Security State)





BIGOTRY (see: Racism)



BUSH (see: Afghanistan, Iraq, Nuremberg)

--Suskind, Ron. The Way of the World: The Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism. How the US relinquished the moral leadership it needs to deal with the world’s problems constructively, and how some people are struggling to reclaim it. A “blow-by-blow, inside-the-administration account.” Interv. Amy Goodman on CAT, 8-13 and 8-14-08.

--Callahan, Francis. Does W Stand for Worst? The Record of G. W. Bush.

--Bugliosi, Vincent. The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder. Bush’s lies about WMD in Iraq deceived Congress and caused tens of thousands of deaths.

Vincent Bugliosi: The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder

The above is an excerpt from the book The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder by Vincent Bugliosi Published by Vanguard Press; ...
www.huffingtonpost.com/vincent-bugliosi/the-prosecution-of-george_b_102427.html - 211k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this

YouTube - Hearing on Limits of Executive Power: Vincent Bugliosi

Jul 25, 2008 ... Vincent Bugliosi's opening statements during the House Judiciary Committee hearing on the constitutional limits of executive power.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDAFozFn4kU - 126k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this

The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder

Famed prosecutor and #1 New York Times bestselling author Vincent Bugliosi has written the most powerful, explosive, and thought-provoking book of his ...
www.prosecutionofbush.com/ - 6k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this



Undoing the Bush/Cheney Legacy: A Tool Kit for Congress" by Ann Fagan Ginger. 2008.

The new Congress has the power -- and the duty -- to repeal or amend all

"laws" put into effect in the Bush Administration that ignore basic U.S. law.

These "laws" run from A to W -- from Agriculture/land/crops to Water

Rights and Welfare Rights. There are so many of these "laws" that each one must be described briefly in order to make this booklet handy to use -- in making presentations to Congress, to the public, and to the media.

Many of these "laws" are statutes proposed by Bush/Cheney, passed by the

House and Senate, signed by Bush, then funded in the next Bush budget passed by Congress. The basic law ignored in Bush "laws" is found in the U.S. Constitution, particularly the "promote the general welfare" clause, the Ninth Amendment “protection of other [...] rights retained by the people,” and in the Bill of Rights. "Bush laws" also contradict the United Nations Charter articles for promoting human rights and against war. And they do not enforce the three treaties ratified by the U.S. in 1992 and 1994: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR); Convention

Against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT); the Convention on Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD). Under the Constitution, Article IV, clause 2, all of these treaties are "the supreme law of the land." (see at end for more)



CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.

DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.



CAPITALISM USA (see: Climate Change, NSS, Wars)

--Greider, William. Come Home, America. 2008. See his essay in The Nation (August 18-25, 2008), “Economic Free Fall?” “We are flirting with catastrophe, a danger compounded by dependence on foreign creditors,” a “peril…vastly larger than…the savings and loan bailout of the late 1980s.”

Two looks back in time:

--Waldman, Michael. Who Robbed America? A Citizen’s Guide to the Savings and Loan Scandal. Intro. by Ralph Nader. Random House, 1990. See Also: Richard Kluger, Ashes to Ashes: America’s Hundred-Year Cigarette War, the Public Health, and the Unabashed Triumph of Philip Morris. Knopf, 1996.



CHOMSKY

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (with Edward Herman).

Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies.

Deterrring Democracy.



CHRISTIANITY AND WAR

“Constantine’s Sword” doc. film, 95 min. Storyville Films, 2008. Rev. PeaceWork (July-Aug 2008). Broadly “a discerning exploration of Christian-influenced political power, violence, and war” that explains “how Christian hegemony institutionally feeds militarism.” Film draws from the life and work of James Carroll and his 2001 book, Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews. It “focuses on the roots of Christian zealotry in US political affairs—and the consequences for Jews,” reviewing “how contemporary Christian militarism in the US fits into the long centuries of violent Christian anti-Semitism.” Carroll is also the author of the greatest critical history of the Pentagon, House of War.



FOR THE ENTIRE BIBLIO GO TO www.omnicenter.org


Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu
(479) 442-4600
2582 Jimmie Ave.
Fayetteville, AR 72703


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Monday, August 11, 2008

Waste Management to Dedicate Arkansasʼ First Landfill Gas to Energy Plant and

WASTE MANAGEMENT NEWS RELEASE

Waste Management to Dedicate Arkansasʼ First Landfill Gas to Energy Plant and
Announce New Partnership with Audubon Arkansas

Senator Blanche Lincoln, Governor Mike Beebe and Congressman Vic Snyder Scheduled to Attend Event


State and local leaders will join Waste Management executives on Tuesday, August 12, 9:30 am at the Two Pine Landfill to officially dedicate Arkansasʼ first and only landfill gas-to-energy plant. This plant is part of Waste Managementʼs sustainable commitment to Arkansas as well as North America, unveiled this past October as part of Waste Managementʼs 2020 plan.
Additionally, Waste Management officials will announce a new first-of-its-kind partnership with Audubon Arkansas.

What: Landfill Gas to Energy Plant Dedication and Announcement of New Partnership with Audubon Arkansas
When: Tuesday, August 12 at 9:30 am
Where: Two Pine Landfill
100 Two Pine Drive
North Little Rock, AR 72117
Who: Senator Blanche Lincoln
Governor Mike Beebe
Congressman Vic Snyder
Waste Management Executives
Arkansas Audubon Director Ken Smith
The Two Pine Landfill gas-to-energy plant is a 4.8 megawatt facility, providing power for approximately 4,500 homes in North Little Rock. Consisting of six large engines, it was constructed in 2006 and recently achieved full generation. The engines are powered by methane gas, which forms in the landfill as a result of the decomposition of waste.
Approximately two years ago, Waste Management and Audubon Arkansas began discussions regarding the development of a wildlife management plan for the Two Pine Landfill. This first-of-its-kind program between Waste Management and Audubon Arkansas has the potential to expand to other Waste Management landfills. At Tuesdayʼs event, Waste Management officials and leaders from Audubon Arkansas will unveil the vision for Two Pine Landfill.
This past April, Waste Management received the stateʼs approval to expand the Two Pine Landfill. In the coming years, Waste Management plans to build an additional landfill gas-to-energy plant in the expanded landfill area.
These two projects are part of the companyʼs environmental sustainability initiative. Waste Management has committed to the following actions by 2020: doubling its waste based energy generation from the equivalent of generating enough energy for one million to two million homes, quadrupling the number of its sites certified by the Wildlife Habitat Council to 100 as well as set aside 25,000 acres for conservation, nearly tripling the amount of recyclables it manages to 20 million tons; and reducing its vehicle fleet emissions by 15 percent and increasing fuel efficiency by 15 percent.
Waste Management, based in Houston, Texas, is the leading provider of comprehensive waste management services in North America. Our subsidiaries provide collection, transfer, recycling and resource recovery, and disposal services. We are also a leading developer, operator and owner of waste-to-energy and landfill gas-to-energy facilities in the United States. Our customers include residential, commercial, industrial, and municipal customers throughout North America.
For more information, visit www.wm.com or www.thinkgreen.com

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Monarch butterfly on World Peace Wetland Prairie on August 10, 2008

Please click on image to ENLARGE photo of monarch butterfly August 10, 2008, on World Peace Wetland Prairie.

Hiroshima Commemoration to be indoors at 902 West Maple if rain appears this afternoon

Hiroshima/Nagasaki Commemoration


WHAT: Omni Center for Peace, Justice and Ecology Annual Hiroshima/Nagasaki Commemoration: Remembering Victims of War/Celebrating Workers for Peace

WHEN: Sunday, August 10, 2008, Gather at 4:45p.m. for pre-procession activities. Program at the Fulbright Peace Fountain begins at 6:00p.m.

WHERE: Begin the evening at the intersection of Arkansas Avenue and Lafayette with special pre-procession family activities, music from the Dickson Street Ramblers. Cold drinks will be provided. At 5:45, the procession will follow the giant peace crane up the sidewalk leading toward the front of Old Main, and around the building to the Fulbright Fountain.

PROGRAM CONTENT INCLUDES:
Proclamation from the Mayor’s Office read by Mayor Dan Coody
Music
Hiroshima Memoirs

Keynote Speaker: Adolph Reed Jr., Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of several books, including Class Notes: Posing as Politics and Other Thoughts on the American Scene and Stirrings in the Jug: Black Politics in the Post-Segregation Era. He has a reputation as one of the most intelligent, controversial essayists writing about politics today.

We will close the evening with a special early kick-off of Video Underground with the showing of “A New Island” produced and directed by University of Arkansas professor Dale Carpenter that tells the story of the people of the Marshall Islands who have settled in Springdale, Arkansas. Dr. Carpenter will be on hand for discussion following the film. Video Underground is at Disciples United Campus Ministry, 902 W. Maple.

Tables from organizations promoting peace, justice and environmental protection will be set up near the Fulbright Fountain. Set up time: 4:00p.m.

CONTACTS: For Sunday, August 10 Event Melanie Dietzel 442-8600 or melaniedietzel@cox.net www.omnicenter.org

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

COMMODIFYING 'SUSTAINABILITY'

COMMODIFYING 'SUSTAINABILITY'

On 7-30-08 in The Morning News, the “Novozymes” company, “Doing Business in Bentonville,” purchased a half-page ad in TMN to announce a free breakfast and lunch at the Clarion Hotel to introduce its “Sustainable Solutions—Designing Your Products for the Better.”
Experts in biofuels, sustainable detergents and textiles, food and nutrition, biological cleaning, and organic plant care will be on hand.
It’s a claim familiar since the beginning of advertising a hundred years ago: Better! The old undefined comparative: better than what or to what degree? Better .00000000000001%?
Takes your breath away to see Novozmes think they can fool anybody with that trick today. But what I enjoyed the most was the Latin. All of us who like words—and that’s everybody with a critical lobe — will be stopped by “novozymes.” That’s arresting. New Ferment. How do they define it in the ad: Rethink Tomorrow.
You can almost see the ad team brainstorming and getting all excited as they imagined us getting all excited over the words and hurrying out to buy. For as the ad also says: Novozymes just wishes to “share their expertise on sustainable technology — why and what you can do to design and manufacture your products to meet the needs and wants of consumers — and retailers alike!” And what are the needs and wants of consumers and retailers? Living in a world, living life-styles of significantly reduced CO2?! A genuinely new ferment? A true rethinking for 350 PPM? It’s better to not mention any of that. Dick 8-5-08

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Dick Bennett's second newsletter on terrorism

WAR ON TERRORISM NEWSLETTER #2‏
From: Omnicenter Communications (omninews@listserv.uark.edu) on behalf of Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
Sent: Mon 8/04/08 12:39 PM
Reply-to: Dick Bennett (jbennet@uark.edu)
To: OMNINEWS@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU
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OMNI NEWSLETTER #2 ON THE WAR ON “TERRORISM,” August 4, 2008, FOR WE, THE PEOPLE AND A CULTURE OF PEACE, COMPILED BY DICK BENNETT (Number 1 Jan. 8, 2008)



OMNI SEEKS A WORLD FREE OF WAR AND THE THREAT OF WAR, A SOCIETY WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL, A COMMUNITY WHERE EVERY PERSON’S POTENTIAL MAY BE FULFILLED, AN EARTH RESTORED. GRASSROOTS NONVIOLENCE, WORLD PEACE, HUMAN RIGHTS, SOCIAL and ECONOMIC JUSTICE, ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP PROTECTING SPECIES AND THE EARTH. These are OMNI’s ideals. Read our brochure and our newsletters, attend our Steering Committee, become an active member of one or more of our committees, participate in our dozens of activities to see how these broad goals are realized in action.



SEE IMPERIALISM AND TORTURE NEWSLETTERS.

SENATOR LINCOLN (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371.

Fayetteville office: 251-1380

Senator Mark Pryor: Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908

CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.

DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.



CONTENTS

Political Prisoners

Prison Ships

Blum’s Anti-Empire Reports

Permanent War

Rigged Trials at Gitmo

An Innocent Man in Guantanamo

Al-Qaeda Myth

Blame Anthrax on Al-Queda

“War on Terror”: 5 Years of US Terror

US War Crimes/Wars of Aggression

Repression USA: Martial Law

Al-Marri

Homegrown Terrorist

Two Books

War Crimes



80,000 POLITICAL PRISONERS FOR US WAR ON TERRORISM?

[See my Political Prisoners and Trials: A Worldwide Annotated Bibliographjy, 1900 through 1993. If you ask the average U.S. citizen if the US has or had political prisoners, the reply is likely to be no. But our leaders have imprisoned thousands of our fellow citizens for their beliefs—trade unionists, suffragettes, communists, socialists, conscientious objectors, anti-war demonstrators, civil rights protestors, and many more. Since the beginning of WWII, concern for morality and rights have often collapsed before one illegal invasion and intervention after the other against one fabricated enemy after the other. The rhetoric of morality and rights remained but the reality was war and empire. The latest enemies are the “terrorists.”]



Subject: US rendition, detention of suspected terrorists
Date: Tue, 3 Jun 2008 12:32:13 +0200

"By its own admission, the US government is currently detaining at least 26,000 people without trial in secret prisons, and information suggests up to 80,000 have
been 'through the system' since 2001..."

from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jun/02/usa.humanrights

“US accused of holding terror suspects on prison ships”
· Report says 17 boats used, · MPs seek details of UK role, · Europe attacks 42-day plan
By Duncan Campbell and Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian, Monday June 2 2008

The United States is operating "floating prisons" to house those arrested in its war on terror, according to human rights lawyers, who claim there has been an
attempt to conceal the numbers and whereabouts of detainees.

Details of ships where detainees have been held and sites allegedly being used in countries across the world have been compiled as the debate over detention
without trial intensifies on both sides of the Atlantic. The US government was yesterday urged to list the names and whereabouts of all those detained.

Information about the operation of prison ships has emerged through a number of sources, including statements from the US military, the Council of Europe and
related parliamentary bodies, and the testimonies of prisoners.

The analysis, due to be published this year by the human rights organisation Reprieve, also claims there have been more than 200 new cases of rendition since 2006, when President George Bush declared that the practice had stopped.

It is the use of ships to detain prisoners, however, that is raising fresh concern and demands for inquiries in Britain and the US.
[These are the opening paragraphs of a longer article.]
This article appeared in the Guardian on Monday June 02 2008 on p1 of the Top stories section. It was last updated at 00:01 on June 02 2008.


WILLIAM BLUM

Anti-Empire Report, March 3, 2008
http://killinghope.org/aer55.htm

Blum authored Rogue State and Killing Hope on the long history of illegal US aggressions/invasions. See Imperialism newsletters for more of Blum’s Reports.



PERMANENT WAR

“Tom Ridge, the former chief of the Homeland Security Department, said… that the war on terror is likely to last for decades, much like the Cold War, adding: ‘For every [Osama] bin Laden, there’s a bin Laden wannabe. And for every al-Qaida, there’s a like organization.” ADG (6-23-08).



“Rigged Trials at Gitmo” by Ross Tuttle, The Nation (March 10, 2008). This is a powerful indictment of the moral and legal outrages committed by the Bush Admin. at Guantanamo. Google: Tuttle Ross Rigged Trials and Gitmo. Call our Congressional deleg. Write a letter to editor. Raise the necessary noise until this cancer is excised and the perpetrators, beginning at the top, are removed from the government and exposed for war crimes.



“Five Years of My Life” by Peter Meroth and Uli Rauss in Amnesty International (Spring 2008), about the innocent German national Murat Kurnaz kidnapped in Pakistan , sold as a terror suspect to the U.S. military for $3000, and sent to Guantanamo, where en suffered 5 years of torture and not released until in 2006 even though US and German authorities had determined in 2002 that he was innocent. Watch for his memoir, soon to be published in the U.S. For news and action opportunities from AI USA’s Denounce Torture campaign, visit www.amnestyusa.org/torture.



THE AL-QAEDA MYTH

“The Power of Nightmares”: Excellent BBC production dissecting the Al Quaeda myth. Bo



http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2081592330319789254&q=the+power+of+nightmares&total=582&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=2



“FBI was told to blame Anthrax scare on Al Qaeda by White House officials,”BY JAMES GORDON M EEKS, DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU

Saturday, August 2nd 2008, 6:32 PM

WASHINGTON - In the immediate aftermath of the 2001 anthrax attacks, White House officials repeatedly pressed FBI Director Robert Mueller to prove it was a second-wave assault by Al Qaeda, but investigators ruled that out, the Daily News has learned.

After the Oct. 5, 2001, death from anthrax exposure of Sun photo editor Robert Stevens, Mueller was "beaten up" during President Bush's morning intelligence briefings for not producing proof the killer spores were the handiwork of terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden, according to a former aide.

"They really wanted to blame somebody in the Middle East," the retired senior FBI official told The News.

On October 15, 2001, President Bush said, "There may be some possible link" to Bin Laden, adding, "I wouldn't put it past him." Vice President Cheney also said Bin Laden's henchmen were trained "how to deploy and use these kinds of substances, so you start to piece it all together."

But by then the FBI already knew anthrax spilling out of letters addressed to media outlets and to a U.S. senator was a military strain of the bioweapon. "Very quickly [Fort Detrick, Md., experts] told us this was not something some guy in a cave could come up with," the ex-FBI official said. "They couldn't go from box cutters one week to weapons-grade anthrax the next."jmeek@nydailynews.com


“WAR ON TERROR”: FIVE YEARS of SL AUGHTER

Speech by Abel Tomlinson March 6, 2008, at UA Student Union for OMNI UA’s Drop Books Not Bombs rally.





CONSEQUENCE OF “WAR ON TERROR”: MARTIAL LAW USA



“Martial Law, Inc.: KBR: A Halliburton Subsidiary

By Andrew G. Marshall

URL of this article: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8258

Global Research, March 5, 2008 (from Tom M)

KBR, or Kellogg Brown & Root, was a subsidiary of the Halliburton Corporation until 2007, when bad publicity and indictments against KBR forced Halliburton to sell its shares in KBR.

"As the preparations of martial law are being put in place, it is of vital important to identify the specific corporations involved in this process. Administrations change, politicians go in and out of power, but the corporation is a consistent powerhouse. In this case, KBR has been a force to be reckoned with since the rise of Lyndon Johnson. Today, it has reached new heights. It was necessary to examine the recent history of this company’s activities, much the same as identifying a person’s own history and experiences to account for their present personality: so as to better understand their actions today. Given KBR’s history related to war and violence, more light should be shed on their current activities with the Department of Homeland Security, as morality is not a concept KBR seems to understand."





AL-MARRI HELD FOR SIX YEARS IN A MILITARY BRIG
By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer

If his cell were at Guantanamo Bay, the prisoner would be just one of hundreds of suspected terrorists detained offshore, where the U.S. says the Constitution does not apply.

But Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri is a U.S. resident being held in a South Carolina military brig; he is the only enemy combatant held on U.S. soil. That makes his case very different.

Al-Marri's capture six years ago might be the Bush administration's biggest domestic counterterrorism success story. Authorities say he was an al-Qaida sleeper agent living in middle America, researching poisonous gasses and plotting a cyberattack.

To justify holding him, the government claimed a broad interpretation of the president's wartime powers, one that goes beyond warrantless wiretapping or monitoring banking transactions. Government lawyers told federal judges that the president can send the military into any U.S. neighborhood, capture a citizen and hold him in prison without charge, indefinitely. [I excised a large section from this point on to the last par.]

Whatever the decision, the case seems destined for the Supreme Court. In the meantime, the first military trials are set to begin soon against detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Al-Marri may get one, too. Or he may get put back into the civilian court system. For now, he waits. On the Net: Documents and information from al-Marri's defense team: http://tinyurl.com/6kp58o (from Mike T)




(From Tom M)

Are You a Homegrown Terrorist?





TWO BOOKS
War with No End by John Berger, et al., protesting the “war on terror.” Verso, 2008.
The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq by Patrick Cockburn. Verso, 2008. Recounts the devastation of post-Saddam Iraq, new edition through 2007.
US administrations have scattered cluster bombs throughout the world, where they continue to kill. Work to ban all use in civilian areas. Templates at www.fcnl.org
War Crimes: Goose and Gander
By Marjorie Cohn
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Monday 13 March 2006
Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was found dead in his jail cell at The Hague Saturday. Since 2001, he had been on trial for genocide in Bosnia, and war crimes and crimes against humanity in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo. Although many have already adjudged him guilty, we will never hear the official verdict of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY).
We will also never see a trial in the ICTY for Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright or Wesley Clark for the 1999 US-led NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Nor will George W. Bush, Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld be prosecuted by an international tribunal for their war crimes in Iraq.
NATO's invasion of Yugoslavia was a war of aggression that violated the United Nations Charter. It was not undertaken in self-defense nor did it carry the approval of the Security Council. Between 1500 and 2000 civilians were killed and many thousands injured. When I visited Belgrade a year after the NATO bombing, I saw schools, hospitals, bridges, libraries and homes reduced to rubble. The ICTY statute prohibits the targeting of civilians. And even though it also forbids the use of poisonous weapons calculated to cause unnecessary suffering, NATO used depleted uranium and cluster bombs, whose devastating character is widely known. NATO also targeted a petrochemical complex, releasing carcinogens into the air that reached 10,600 times the acceptable safety level.
The American Association of Jurists and a group of Canadian lawyers and law professors filed a war crimes complaint against NATO leaders in the ICTY. Yet that tribunal conducted only a perfunctory investigation of the serious charges. Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch criticized the ICTY for failing to thoroughly investigate.
By denouncing the International Criminal Court, Team Bush has ensured that US leaders will never be held to account for war crimes. Although virtually every Western democracy has ratified the statute under which the Court operates, the United States has thumbed its nose at this monumental international justice system.
Bush has reason to fear prosecution. He has used cluster bombs, depleted uranium, white phosphorous and napalm. And the torture of prisoners in US custody also constitutes a war crime. His war on Iraq is a war of aggression.
After the Holocaust, the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg called the waging of aggressive war "essentially an evil thing ... to initiate a war of aggression ... is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." Associate United States Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, one of the prosecutors at the Nuremberg Tribunal, labeled the crime of aggression "the greatest menace of our times."
For the first time, at Nuremberg, individuals were held criminally accountable for war crimes and waging a war of aggression. Japanese leaders were also tried for atrocities committed during World War II, in the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.
Yet US leaders who were responsible for some of the most heinous war crimes ever committed - the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the fire bombings of Dresden, Tokyo and 66 other Japanese cities - were never brought to justice.
Only the vanquished Germans and Japanese were put on trial. Justice Radhabinod Pal of India, dissenting at the Tokyo Tribunal, called this "victor's justice."
Indeed, Robert McNamara, who participated in the bombing of Japan during World War II, admitted in the film Fog of War that he and General Curtis LeMay would have been tried for war crimes if the US had lost the war. He said, "LeMay said if we lost the war that we would have all been prosecuted as war criminals. And I think he's right. He ... and I'd say I ... were behaving as war criminals."
It is no accident that the Iraqi Special Tribunal where Saddam Hussein is currently on trial only has jurisdiction over Iraqi citizens for acts committed prior to May 1, 2003, the day the US-UK occupation of Iraq began. The United States opposed sending Hussein to an international tribunal, and manipulated the Iraqi tribunal to prevent any US leaders from being tried for their war crimes in Iraq.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. But the leaders of the world's most powerful country continue to enjoy "victor's justice."
Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, President-elect of the National Lawyers Guild, and the US representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists. She writes a weekly column for t r u t h o u t.









SENATOR LINCOLN (202) 224-4843 Fax: (202) 228-1371.

Fayetteville office: 251-1380

Senator Mark Pryor: Phone: (202) 224-2353 Fax: (202) 228-0908

CONGRESSMAN Boozman: Lowell office: 479-725-0400.

DC address: 1708 Longworth House Office Bldng., Washington, DC 20515; 202-225-4301.

END OF NEWSLETTER #2 ON “War” on “Terror”


Dick Bennett
jbennet@uark.edu

Friday, August 1, 2008

CNN scoffs at White House critics

CNN Scoffs at White House Critics

Anchor with Bush ties dismisses abuse-of-power hearings as 'stagecraft'

7/31/08

CNN's Election Center program devoted a July 25 report to mocking a
hearing of the House Judiciary Committee investigating White House abuses
of power.

"Believe it or not, there was a congressional hearing today about
impeaching the president," scoffed host Campbell Brown, who added: "It was
all stagecraft, though."

Brown went on to introduce the report by CNN correspondent Erica Hill by
saying, "Tell us about this piece of Kabuki theater, Erica."

Hill explained: "From the beginning it was pretty clear this was all just
stagecraft, for what one Republican lawmaker deemed impeachment light."

Hill underscored this notion by claiming: "The Democratic leadership made
it clear impeachment is not on the table at this hearing today for two
reasons. Not only is there not enough time left in President Bush's term,
but also they know any real impeachment hearings at this point could cause
a major backlash."

It's difficult to know exactly who Hill is referring to; at the hearings
she was apparently covering, there was scarce mention of a potential
"backlash" from voters, nor was there much time spent determining precisely
when it might be too late to bring impeachment hearings.

More typical were comments from Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), responding to
the sentiment that impeachment would be "overzealous partisanship":

But I ask, would impeachment be a vehicle to restore life and vitality to
the delicate system of checks and balances, which is the hallmark of our
Constitution and which this administration has shattered--aided and abetted
by the do-nothing, Republican-controlled, rubber-stamp Congress which
failed to exercise its constitutional responsibility to oversee the
operations of the executive branch of our government?


Johnson went on enumerate the criticisms of the White House:

Warrantless wiretapping of Americans; torturing and kidnapping and
detaining numerous prisoners, foreign enemy combatants, prisoners, whatever
they could be classified as; the fact that we have become a severely
surveilled population now with the abuses of the Patriot Act--all done
under the cloak of government secrecy. Political spying; the attacks on
academic freedom; the politicization of the Justice Department; selective
prosecutions--so many areas fertile for inquiring by this Congress.


Host Campbell Brown closed the report by saying: "All right. So this is
really just stagecraft, not to mention a real waste of taxpayer money and
Congress' time." Needless to say, the suggestion that looking into the
weighty matters addressed by the hearing is a "waste of taxpayer money" is
a remarkable statement from a supposedly unbiased anchor.

It is worth noting that Brown is married to Dan Senor, who was a deputy
press secretary for George W. Bush before becoming the chief spokesperson
for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. (He's currently a Fox News
analyst.) Given that much of the discussion of executive malfeasance
concerns the Iraq War, it is inappropriate for Brown to even be covering an
investigation of abuses of power that involve her husband's former
associates--let alone for her to dismiss such inquiries as a waste of time
and money. If CNN had been around in 1974, would it have allowed the spouse
of a former Nixon spokesperson to report on the Watergate hearings?

The report closed with Hill assuring voters that George W. Bush was not
threatened by any of this: "As for the president today, clearly, not too
worried about this hearing. He was in Peoria, Illinois. As you can see
here, kissing babies, smiling, taking pictures." The two CNN reporters then
mused about the difficulties in getting babies to wear sunglasses--all of
this mere moments after they derided Congress for wasting time with a
investigation of White House abuses of power.

ACTION:

Ask CNN why an investigation of abuses of power by elected officials was
treated as fodder for humor and not serious reporting. And ask Campbell
Brown why she didn't recuse herself from commenting on an inquiry into
wrongdoing by her husband's political associates.

CONTACT:

CNN Election Center
Webform: http://www.cnn.com/feedback/forms/form4.html?125

Anchor Campbell Brown
Email: Campbell@cnn.com

CNN President Jonathan Klein
212 275 8263

envelopeEmail to a friend

Watch clip from CNN's July 25 Election Center program at:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bzx6ttmbTbs



TAKE ACTION!

* Ask CNN why an investigation of abuses of power by elected officials was
treated as fodder for humor and not serious reporting.


* And ask Election Center anchor Campbell Brown why she didn't recuse
herself from commenting on an inquiry into wrongdoing by her husband's
political associates.

Dick's Wars and Warming KPSQ Radio Editorials (#1-48)

Dick's Wars and Warming KPSQ Radio Editorials (#1-48)