Anti-Globalization's topics - tribe.net

Why Globalization?

2008-06-11T05:58:12Z

Back in the day, the day when internet forums were mainly on Usenet instead of bulletin boards like this one, and mostly unmoderated, the following piece of spam showed up constantly. It was a chain letter, usually posted under a title like “MAKE MONEY FAST,” that promised that one could receive tens of thousands of dollars for an investment of $6 and six postage stamps. In recent years it seems to have become extinct, because of the strict spam control on bulletin board forums today. I actually had to search pretty hard to find the text of the letter. Which I have done because, one day, I had an epiphany: this letter was the perfect microcosmic illustration of the economic system, and why it MUST continue to grow, even if it is committing suicide in the process. I saw that this letter was the lie that was being sold to “developing” countries in the process of globalization.

Chain letters asking for money are considered fraud and are illegal. Even if they work exactly as described and no one cheats, chain letters are frauds

Yet, while most people seemed to recognize this spam as a scam whenever it showed up in a Usenet forum, very few people seemed to be able to explain exactly WHY it was a scam, or WHY chain letters are frauds. .

But if you understand just WHY chain letters are frauds, then that is a key to understanding why the promise that globalization will make poor countries rich is a fraud, why corporations are compelled to expand to every corner of the globe, and why the system is COMPELLED to rip the Earth apart for every possible resource, and is unable to stop until it collapses, and why it is doomed to collapse.

So it is worth studying this letter and comprehending the flaw.

Here is the text of the spam, edited, with explanatory comments added in brackets.

=================================================================

[BEGINNING OF TEXT]

READING THIS WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE!

I found this on a bulletin board and decided to try it. A little while back, I was browsing through newsgroups, just like you are now, and came across an article similar to this that said you could make thousands of dollars within weeks with only an initial investment of $6.00! So I thought, "Yeah right, this must be a scam", but like most of us, I was curious, so I kept reading. Anyway, it said that you send $1.00 to each of the 6 names and address stated in the article. You then place your own name and address in the bottom of the list at #6, and post the article in at least 300 newsgroups. (There are thousands) No catch, that was it. So after thinking it over, and talking to a few people first, I thought about trying it. I figured: "What have I got to lose except 6 stamps and $6.00, right?" Then I invested the measly $6.00. Well GUESS WHAT!!... within 7 days, I started getting money in the mail! I was shocked! I figured it would end soon, but the money just kept coming in. In my first week, I made about $25.00. By the end of the second week I had made a total of over $1,000.00! In the third week I had over $10,000.00 and it's still growing. This is now my fourth week and I have made a total of just over $42,000.00 and it's still coming in rapidly. It's certainly worth $6.00, and 6 stamps, I have spent more than that on the lottery!! Let me tell you how this works and most importantly, why it works. I promise you that if you follow the directions exactly, that you will start making more money than you thought possible by doing something so easy!

Here are the 4 easy steps to success:

STEP 1: Get 6 pieces of paper and write your name and address on them. Get 6 US $1.00 bills and place ONE inside each piece of paper (to prevent thievery). Place one paper in each of the 6 envelopes and seal them. You should now have 6 sealed envelopes, each with a piece of paper with your name and address and a $1.00 bill. Mail the 6 envelopes to the following addresses:[/b]

[Note: The list of addresses, of course, would be different in every spam. Let's use the following list:

#1) Alice A. Affable, Box 1, Appletree, Alabama
#2) Betty B. Boop, Box 2, Buffalo, Benin
#3) Carlos C. Casteneda, Box 3, Caterpillar, California
#4) Daffy D. Duck, Box 4, Doodlebug, Denmark
#5) Emily E. Everclear. Box 5, Essence, Ecuador
#6) Francis F. Frankenstein, Box 6, Foofoo, France

Following the instructions, you send $1.00 to each person on the list.]

STEP 2: Now take the #1 name off the list that you see above, move the other names up (6 becomes 5, 5 becomes 4, etc...) and add YOUR Name as number 6 on the list.

[Note: Say your name is Gus G. Gopher. When you following the instructions the list now reads:

#1) Betty B. Boop, Box 2, Buffalo, Benin
#2) Carlos C. Casteneda, Box 3, Caterpillar, California
#3) Daffy D. Duck, Box 4, Doodlebug, Denmark
#4) Emily E. Everclear. Box 5, Essence, Ecuador
#5) Francis F. Frankenstein, Box 6, Foofoo, France
#6) Gus G. Gopher, Box 7, Goopy, Greece.]

STEP 3: Copy this article into your computer, but substitute the altered list of names.

STEP 4: Now, post this article to at least 300 newsgroups. (I think there are close to 25,000 groups). All you need is 300, but remember, the more you post, the more money you make!

STEP 5: Wait for the money to start coming in!

HOW DOES THIS WORK?

Let us say that when I post this message with my name in position #6, only 5 persons reply (a very low example). So then I make $5.00. Now, each of those 5 persons sends this message with my name in position #5 and say that only 5 persons respond to each of those 5, that is 5x5 or 25 persons responding, and another $25.00 for me. Now those 25 people sends this message with my name in position #4 and say there are only 5 replies each -- that is 25x5 people or 125 people, an additional $125.00 for me! Now, each of those 125 persons turns around and send this message with my name at position #3, and if they only receive 5 replies each, that is 125x5 or 625 people responding, I will make an additional $625.00! OK, now here is the fun part, each of those 625 persons send this message with my name at position #2 and they each only receive 5 replies, that is 625x5 or 3,125 people each sending me $1, that just made me $3,125.00!!! Then those 3,125 persons send this message to 300 newsgroups with my name at #1 and if still only 5 persons respond to each of those 3,125 persons and send $1, that is 3,125 x 5 or $15,625,00 for me! With an original investment of only $6.00! AMAZING!

When your name is no longer on the list, you just start all over again -- find the latest version with the latest version of the list of names, and send out another $6.00 to names on the list, putting your name at number 6 again, and start posting again.

It's easy. It's legal. [Note: that is a lie, it is illegal.] And, your investment is only $6.00 (Plus postage) Follow these directions EXACTLY, and $50,000 or more can be yours in 20 to 60 days. [/b]

[END OF TEXT]

=============================================================

The chain letter is also the model for multi-level marketing, like Amway. Multi-level marketing is not illegal because actual products are being sold, but they recruit through the same fraudulent claim: THESE folks here (look at their pictures!) have now retired with steady incomes of hundreds of thousands of dollars (true enough) and (here is the lie) if you join us you can do that too.

Although most companies are not multi-level marketers, the global capitalist system as a whole operates like a multi-level marketing scheme or a chain letter.

The pyramid scheme, as this is called, is a funnel designed to get money from the many and concentrate it in the hands of the few.

And, just as the chain letter must keep expanding or collapse, so must the global capitalist system keep expanding or collapse.

The continued income of the people higher up in the chain depends on continually expanding the base. After all, you only sent the people $1.00 once. But, through you, others are recruited to send their dollars, and they in turn recruit others.

Why is the chain doomed to collapse? Why is it fraud?

Because you are being recruited under the false promise that you can make as much money as the people on the top of the list. And even if you make some money (by getting in near the top) the people you recruit in turn will not, and with each generation of recruitment it becomes more impossible.

Although likely all six names in the first level are the same person, because Alice A. Affable would not have sent it out with only her one name, let us pretend that all six people on the list are different people.

Let us also pretend that everyone recruits exactly 5 people, all different people, no duplicate recruitments.

So Alice sends the letter to five people whose names start with B, asking them each to send her $1, and to each recruit five people whose names start C with who will send them both $1, who will each recruit five people whose names start with D who will each send $1 to C, B, and A, etc., until there are six levels on the list. Whereupon you, Gus G. Gopher, receive it.

This is what has happened:

A (1 person on level 1)

BBBBB (5 people on level 2)

CCCCC CCCCC CCCCC CCCCC CCCCC (25 [5x5] people on level 3)

DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD DDDDD (125 people [25x5] on level 4)

EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE EEEEE (625 [125x5] people on level 5)

FFFFF etc (3,125 [625x5] people on level 6)

You, Gus Gopher, are of one 15,625 (3,125 x 5) lucky recipients of a letter from one of the 3,125 Level Fs. When you and your 15,624 fellow Gs send your dollar, that, along with the dollars sent by the Fs, Es, Ds, Cs, and Bs, adds to a total of $19,530 for Alice Affable, who sits at the top of the pyramid. (As I said, the pyramid is a =funnel= that funnels money upward.)

After sending your dollar to each of the six people on the list, you change the list by taking Alice off the list and moving Betty B. Boop into position 1, and then send the letter on to try to recruit more people. When the people you recruit join and send their dollars, it is Betty B. Boop's turn to receive $19,530. In each level, another name moves to the top of the list and has its turn to receive $19,530.

(In real life, of course, those at the top continue at the top, as the pyramid base keeps expanding. But the chain letter has to be kept simple.)

You eagerly await your turn to move to the top of the list and receive your $19,530. You, along with the other 15,624 Gs, have each recruited five more people (15,625 x 5 = 78,125 people in the level below you), who dutifully each recruit five more, and in only six more levels of recruitment (since there are six positions on the list) you finally move to the top of the list!

But look at what has happened in six levels:

Level G: 15,625
Level H: 78,125
Level I: 390,625
Level J: 1,953,125
Level K: 9,765,625
Level L: 48,828,125

Of course, Level L was recruited under the same fraud as the other, and they keep on recruiting, so the growth continues. The next six levels:

Level M: 244,140,625
Level N: 1,220,703,125
Level O: 6,103,515,625
Level P: 30,517,578,125
Level Q: 152,587,988,275
Level R: 762,939,941,375

(If you never got anything else out of math class, understanding exponential math is essential to understanding what is happening with our world at a lot of levels.)

Now, you may have noticed that the entire human population of Earth has been exceeded over a hundred times over by this point, including babies and the portion of our species for whom the $6 investment would represent many days' income. This is why chain letters are fraudulent and illegal.

But in the real world, the pyramid scheme that is the capitalist system has gone beyond the human base, and into the Earth herself. The Earth, fossil fuels, the energy that runs the system -- this is the base of the pyramid now. The human species has, on the average, moved up a rung or two on the “standard of living” ladder (in the conventional sense of standard of living, know what I mean) because fossil fuels and the Earth's resources as a whole are serving as the base of the pyramid, from which wealth is funneled upward. I have heard it said that the average person in the wealthy countries of the "developed" world has the equivalent of 300 human slaves, thanks to technology and energy. That is why the system is frantically, compulsively consuming the Earth (aka “developing resources” and “creating wealth”). If the pyramid stops growing, it collapses.

Basically, a profit system requires this. Because profit means that you expect to receive more than you gave. In fact, you try to maximize profits -- you try to MAXIMIZE the differential between what you gave and what you receive. You try to maximize IMBALANCE.

As long as the use of resources is seen as an investment, which must return more than what was invested, the pyramid MUST keep on expanding its base, some people MUST be lower on the pyramid in order to funnel wealth to those higher, and the pyramid MUST keep frantically digging into the Earth as it tries to expand.

This is one way in which indigenous economics and modern capitalism are built on fundamentally different premises. (“Indigenous” I use to mean: following the leadership of the land.) Indigenous economic and social systems are built on the fundamental notion of =reciprocity.= Not tit for tat, I'll give you something worth exactly the same as what you gave me, but a generalized reciprocity and balance, a network of reciprocity in the community. Rather than feeling like a winner if you have received more value than you have given, you would feel uncomfortable. Everyone wants to be more on the “giving” than the “receiving” side of the equation -- not because they are somehow specially “virtuous,” but because generosity and sharing is rewarded with prestige and respect. People do not intrinsically want “stuff”; we are constantly told that wanting more and more “stuff” is just human nature, but even a cursory examination of anthropological data demonstrates this is a lie. What people =do= want is prestige, respect, and acceptance by their peers. Whatever behavior is rewarded with prestige and respect, that is the behavior that people will follow. And indigenous tribal systems give prestige and respect to certain kinds of behavior that prove to be both socially and ecologically sustainable, and that is why they have succeeded for thousands of years.

============================================================

It turns out that I am far from the first to have had this epiphany -- googling capitalism + "pyramid scheme" had 22,000 hits -- but that's not a huge number, either. But then, it is surprising how few people, when you ask, seem to understand exactly =why= the chain letter is a scam, either.

Yet understanding the chain letter gives a clear understanding about the fraudulent promises of capitalism that it can make everyone rich. Like, there is an implicit promise that all of us, if we had the smarts, could become the head of a wealthy corporation and become billionaires. It is only due to our personal lack of ambition and ability that you and I are not billionaires, each running a corporation with thousands of employees. Or at least be millionaires running corporations with hundreds of employees.

Of course, for everyone on Earth to become a millionaire with hundreds of employees... there would have to be an endless source of employees somewhere. Where would we find the employees if everyone is a millionaire with their own corporation? Aha! Machines and technology run by fossil fuels take the place of much of the labor, making it possible for substantial numbers of people to move up a rung, off the very bottom. Capitalism has "lifted people out of poverty." Wow, look, Taiwan jumped on, and look at their "economic miracle." They have lots of rich people now. (Lots of poor factory workers too -- way more of them than rich people -- and they will =never= share in the riches, no matter what the promises.)

The very premise of profit is that you get more than you put in. If you manufacture a product, then you must sell it for more than it cost you to manufacture it. And that cost includes labor. Therefore, you =must= sell the product for more than your employees can afford to pay. Or else, at least, the employees make a lot more of the product than they can buy; make 40 cars, buy one. The other 39 cars have to be sold to people other than the workers.

But let's say you are on a desert island, with a population of 100, all of whom work for your factory and that is their sole income. You can't export anything from your island, it is a closed system. It costs you $1,000 to make a car, of which $500 is labor costs, and you sell the car for $2,000. You make 100 cars, with the idea that all your employees can buy one. But how can they afford to buy the cars since they have been paid only 1/4 of the price of the car? Your employees decide to pool their money, so they can afford cars. Four employees each buying one car results in only 25 cars sold, and you go bankrupt.

The only solution is to export the cars. You have to find people off your island to sell to, or you will go bankrupt.

But in this system, there HAS to be a large class of people who will and work for you at a wage that only a fraction of the price you are charging. In other words, there HAS to be a large portion of the population that cannot afford to buy your cars.

And as corporations take over the necessities of life -- food, shelter, even water -- and make it necessary to have money to buy those things, giving them control over people's lives -- there HAVE to be people who CANNOT afford those things. This is built in to the corporate system, and as they destroy the independence of people who live outside the money economy, primarily by destroying their landbases, and make people dependent on money for the necessities of life, they ensure that there will always be a supply of people willing (or forced) to work for them, no matter how much they may hate their jobs. There may be people who like their jobs, but the hatable jobs will be filled as well.

Countries with many people living at subsistence level are said to be "poor." Subsistence means you produce for your own needs, neither for the market nor dependent on buying things. Like independent tribal peoples, subsistence farmers live outside the money economy, and independence from money cannot be tolerated. Such countries must be "developed," by corporate investors who come in for the natural resources -- cutting down forests on which people depend for life, forcing people off their small self-sufficient farms to create monocrop plantations for export crops, or otherwise destroying the base of people's independence, which forces them to work for money.

By making people's very lives dependent on money, the population is controlled in the "land of the free." This is why homeless people are treated as outlaws and their lives made hell -- because that is the threat if you try to live in freedom from the money system. You will be made to live in hell.

And note that those aforementioned monocrop plantations, in the "developing" countries, are for =export=. The workers on the plantations can not afford the products for the same reason that the workers in the island car company could not afford the cars. But if you don't work for the plantation, you will starve -- you know that, there are plenty of starving, or at least, malnourished people all around you.

Every country in the world in which there is starvation or hunger is producing export crops for the rich countries. People are hungry not because their countries can not produce food, but because they cannot outbid the rich. Money determines who eats and who does not. Corporations pocket the profit, and the people who were once self-sufficient are reduced to poverty. Poverty is built in to the system.

But fossil fuels have taken the place of much of the human labor, and the pyramid needs an ever-expanding base of consumers to buy their products, as well as laborers. So that is why corporations are marketing so aggressively around the world, trying to turn people into consumers of their products.

So the a continual process of turning resources into consumable products is built in to the profit system. There are now movements toward "natural capitalism," with a more intelligent and frugal use of natural resources, and that could certainly sustain the pyramid longer and could slow down the destruction of the Earth. But capitalism by definition means investment for profit, and that means that the base of the pyramid MUST continue to grow. That is why the economists are always talking about "economic growth" -- fast growth is good, slow growth is bad, and no growth is an emergency. Capitalism and steady-state, sustainable lifeways are incompatible. The growth cannot stop or the system collapses.

That is the reason for the corporations' push to globalization, aka a world run by the search for profit as its most important guiding principle. Globalization and capitalism will not solve the problem of poverty, because poverty is built in to the system by necessity. And capitalism cannot stop devouring the natural world. "Free trade" simply means removing the last barriers to corporate profit -- labor laws, environmental laws, laws to protect local markets must not stand in the way, because the pyramid must continue to grow or it will collapse.

Of course, it will collapse eventually. The question is how much of our world will be left.

posted in Anti-Globalization - 7 replies

FTAA controversial in Ohio

2008-03-21T07:48:09Z

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20080228/ts_csm/adayton;_ylt=AqTiwEKWygGR656GwYVqjGxh24cA

By Amanda Paulson Thu Feb 28, 3:00 AM ET

Dayton, Ohio - In Ohio, it feels like 1993 again.
ADVERTISEMENT

The coming Democratic presidential vote here has revived a debate over the merits of globalization and free trade – as epitomized by the long-reviled North American Free Trade Agreement.

In Ohio, which has lost nearly 225,000 manufacturing jobs since 2001, NAFTA is an easy target. For many working-class Ohioans – and the voters Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton hope to win in Tuesday's critical primary – it stands as a symbol for much that troubles their state. Against that backdrop, say experts, it's not surprising it's become a political piñata.

"It's nice to blame the bogeyman, rather than the failed business strategies of Ford, GM, or Chrysler," says Ned Hill, an economist at Cleveland State University. "And middle-class anxiety is a real issue." The bickering isn't so much over the candidates' current positions on NAFTA – both are eager to tell Ohioans just how much they dislike the pact and how quickly they would renegotiate a better deal – but how consistent they've been in that stance in the past.

Senator Obama never loses an opportunity to remind voters that Senator Clinton's husband was the one who pushed NAFTA through, or of certain pro-NAFTA comments she's made in the past decade. Senator Clinton, meanwhile, cites a 2004 speech to Illinois farmers in which Obama also praised trade agreements.

"It's clear that both senators have learned the Sherrod Brown playbook," says Professor Hill, referring to the Ohio senator who was elected in 2006 largely on the basis of an antitrade platform.

Hill says Ohio's economic woes are due to far more complex causes than globalization or a trade agreement, but the general hatred of NAFTA in the state makes it an easy target for politicians.

Here in Dayton, where some 15,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost over the past five years, the effects of globalization are seen in sharp relief. It's not all negative. The changes have forced certain businesses to shift their focus, become better managed, and target new sorts of value-added manufacturing.

Better business through free trade
Globalization "made us make better business decisions," says Dave Dysinger, whose family-owned tooling and machining company in Dayton almost went out of business at the end of the 1990s, dropping from 116 people down to 12, until he shifted away from the traditional commodity-based clients and local markets he used to serve.

Today, his company employs 42 people, is thriving, and designs tools for more specialized energy, agricultural, and appliance companies around the country.

Still, Mr. Dysinger acknowledges that the transition was painful. And for the thousands of people who lost good-paying union jobs as large factories such as Delphi shut their doors to move overseas, it's hard to see anything positive in a more global marketplace.

"The Dayton area is a classic example of what's happening in the changes in the world economy," says Joe Tuss, the Montgomery County economic development director, noting that the city hung on to traditional manufacturing jobs longer than many places in the state. "We're at the end of the line in Ohio in terms of production jobs."

The future, he says, is moving away from the classic assembly-line work that has employed so many people for so long. Any manufacturing that replaces it is focused on high-skill, value-added niches that employ far fewer people. "It's not commodities, not producing widgets, anymore," says Mr. Tuss.

For Earl Conley, recently laid off from his $19-per-hour job making car seats at a GM supplier, that's not much comfort. Mr. Conley has a high-school education and few marketable skills.

He goes every day to the county's Job Transition Center, set up to help people laid off because of factory closings, where he learned to use a computer – he'd never turned one on before – and applies for every job he can find online, including janitorial positions and jobs making barely more than minimum wage. So far, he's had no success. "Everyone wants skilled labor," he says sadly. "I'm 54 years old – it'd be hard to retrain me."

Conley's wife, Jill, is on disability, and both of them had operations last year. Watching bills stack up is terrifying, they both say, and they worry about losing their home.

"The manufacturing jobs are changing," Conley says. "I guess people are obsolete anymore and not needed."

US export: jobs
The Conleys are skeptical that any politician can help them much, but others are listening to what Obama and Clinton are saying about jobs and trade, and in some cases holding Clinton's own history with NAFTA – via her husband – against her.

"Clinton – there's that name again. I heard on the radio that she'll fight hard for unions," says Brian Rader, a forklift operator for Delphi for 21 years until he took their buyout package last April. "But you didn't do it. You didn't say anything to Bill back then. Now it's too late. The only thing we're good at exporting anymore is jobs."

Mr. Rader, who has a wife and three children, made $27 an hour at his old job. He says he's happy to take something that pays less than half that now, but is finding that many places don't want to hire a former union worker. Back when he started at Delphi out of high school, he remembers, "those were the jobs everyone wanted…. You were told, 'You have a job for life.' "

That story is hardly unusual in Dayton, where Delphi and GM have both had large layoffs in the past year, and even more jobs are seen as at risk.

It's people such as Rader and Conley and the many others who have either lost work or are feeling the pinch of rising mortgages or falling wages that Clinton and Obama are trying to reach as they offer plans for new jobs in green technology, renewable energy, or information technology. Both also propose renegotiating NAFTA to improve – and enforce – labor and environmental standards. "I would have a 'trade timeout'" until NAFTA is fixed, Clinton promised voters in the debate in Cleveland Tuesday night, in which she and Obama traded sharp words over how consistently anti-NAFTA each had been.

"I'd give an edge to Obama on this only because his last name isn't Clinton," says Bill Burges, a Democratic political consultant in Cleveland who worked on Senator Brown's campaign.

He adds that he expects voters in the end will be more swayed by personality – especially if Obama begins to seem more familiar – than by the trade issue. But focusing on NAFTA makes sense, he says, and isn't just about looking to mistakes in the past.

"These are major issues, and the people are blaming their government for not only the loss of their job but also their inability to pay their mortgage and the loss of their homes." Says Mr. Burges: "NAFTA matters."

posted in Anti-Globalization - 3 replies

Fraud Alert regarding North Coast Earth First! Aka NCEF! Media. Completely independent from any activist group!

2008-03-21T07:13:40Z

16 views since posting on Sunday, December 2, 2007
Location California

enlarge photo
NCEF! Media in Humboldt County Ca.(AKA NORTH COAST EARTH FIRST!), is accused of fraud and donation embezzlement. Caution! Do not support this lone wingnut's scam! Active and legitamate groups exist in the area. Caution! Do not be fooled by NCEF! Media and his fraudulent outreach. Shunka Wakan exists completely seperate from any active affinity group.

Read about how he perpetuated a lawsuit under the guise of EF! against a legitimate environmental nonprofit:

From: northcoastjournal.com/100407/...004.html

October 4, 2007

"Money On Trees"

Big cash nearly fell into Shunka Wakan's lap. Other Earth First!ers are kinda happy it didn't.

by Heidi Walters

As the jury trial for the civil suit Kathryn Miller v. the Trees Foundation puttered to a start last week inside Courtroom 3 at the Humboldt County Courthouse, Shunka Wakan — a key witness for the plaintiff — spent mornings sitting on the hard wooden benches in the long hallway outside the courtroom. During breaks, Miller's attorney Linda Mitlyng, would come out of the courtroom to join him. But otherwise, as other people and their legal affairs swirled around him in a warm, odiferous bath of humanity, Shunka sat alone. Or, sometimes, he stood alone, straight-spined, his small, stocky body swallowed by the huge, stiff blue suit out of which his newly shorn, razor-scraped bald head poked vulnerably — as if, at any moment, the suit could gulp once more and he'd disappear completely. Always, he clutched a paper folder with a wolf's face on its cover.

The North Coast Earth First! Media guru had shaved off his woolly rust-tinged brown hair and beard the night before jury selection started, after discussing it with attorney Mitlyng. Now, it took an uncertain moment to recognize him. Then, of course: Shunka's light blue eyes in the pink-pale face, Shunka's closed-lip smile, Shunka's trademark husky murmur, "Mm-hmm, for sure," in response to a comment.

In Courtroom 3, the amiable but no-nonsense Judge Christopher Wilson's domain, the fate of a $185,000 donation dangled. Would the plaintiff, donor Kathryn Miller, prevail in her claim that the defendant, the Trees Foundation, was not in fact the intended recipient of her generous gift? That Shunka Wakan's NCEF! Media Center and the treesitters were? Or would the Trees Foundation convince the jury that, in fact, the money was intended all along for Trees, with no instructions attached for funneling it elsewhere?

Richard Idell, left, who is defending the Trees Foundation against a lawsuit filed by Kathryn Miller, confers with Doug Wallace, community support coordinator for Trees. Photo by David Lawlor.

In her opening arguments, Miller's attorney, Mitlyng, said the case came down to "fraud and broken promises." "She believed [Trees] would hold [the money] in trust, for the benefit of North Coast Earth First!" said Mitlyng. The defense's attorney, Richard Idell, countered in his opening argument that the donation was an unconditional gift and Miller never wrote letters of instruction — as Miller claims she did. "Ms. Miller ... didn't do anything. She took the check [from her mother's estate] and flipped it over and wrote on the back, 'Payable to the Trees Foundation,'" said Idell.

Miller's claim sought the return of her $185,000, plus interest.

Out in the hallway, Shunka waited to tell his side of the story. Maybe he thought about the magical donation that never materialized, and now probably never would. Maybe he thought about the other times he'd been in this courthouse — dozens of times, along with other activists, often before Judge Wilson, answering to charges of trespassing and other forms of civil disobedience in the woods. Likely, he wondered when they were finally going to call him in to testify — it was taking forever in there. He'd even sent out an e-mail prematurely to the several hundred subscribers to his NCEF! online group erroneously announcing he would be first up to testify.

By the end of Friday's court session, Miller was still on the stand. Perhaps Monday it would be Shunka's turn. Whenever it was, he would be testifying on Miller's behalf; but he wasn't a party to the lawsuit. And in the end, after hearing all of the evidence, the jury would be determining who was telling the truth about intentions and letters of instructions. Shunka was just there to provide context and evidence in a contract dispute.

But to a number of forest activists, including a half dozen or so who appeared in the audience last Friday to watch the trial unfold, that context matters more to them than the legal questions. They say this lawsuit has placed a strain on the environmental community that could do as much damage as an ill-felled redwood that takes down other giants in its descent. They disapprove of the lawsuit, and they blame Shunka for it. And, they say, it's just another example of how Shunka has commandeered the North Coast Earth First! identity and used it for purposes that nobody else in the amorphous but consensus-driven local Earth First! movement has agreed to.

"For a lot of us, when we read about the lawsuit, this is kind of like Shunka on trial," said long-time forest activist Deane Rimerman last Friday, calling from Olympia, Wash. "And, to what extent is he worthy of that money?"

Kathryn Miller wanted her money to go toward saving trees, she said on the witness stand last Thursday. The slender 59-year-old was dressed in a pink print skirt and white sweater, with her gray-streaked dark hair pulled back into a neat, thin braid tinted slightly green. (Little did the jury know that Miller had spent the night in jail, in blue jail duds, and then had been "dressed out," in court lingo, in her street clothes before being escorted into the court by the bailiff. Miller had been arrested the week before, on Sept. 17, when she arrived in civil court for the pre-trial readiness hearing; according to the misdemeanor criminal charges filed against her, Miller allegedly had made annoying phonecalls to Barbara Ristow of the Trees Foundation all hours of the day and night.)

On the stand, Miller described how she became an activist. She remembered how, when she was a child in Orinda, her mother decided to stop spraying the beautiful oak trees on their property after reading Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. "And then, when my son was 9, we were watching the news on TV about the Chernobyl nuclear power plant meltdown. And my son said to me, 'I wish I'd never been born. I don't think I'll get to live a full life.'"

She protested the building of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. She started a peace action group in the late 1980s in San Jose. She did nonviolent protests at the Nevada Test Site. And in 1990, she came up with some of her fellow protestors to help set up the camp for Redwood Summer, and to take part in demonstrations. She's been on and off involved in Earth First! actions in Humboldt ever since, she said, including huffing in supplies for treesitters and huffing out their garbage. She'd also, at one point, bought a condo in Arcata.

In 2004, Miller sold her condo and bought an acre of farmland, already planted with coffee, in Guatemala. She put in fruit trees to shade the coffee. That same year, her mother, who lived in Sonoma, died. "The last time I saw her was in 2003," said Miller. "She told me when she died, she was going to leave me some money. I told her I'd use it to further my work for the forest. And she was pleased, because she loved the treesitters and the forest."

Shortly after learning of her mother's death, Kathryn Miller sought out Shunka Wakan in front of the food co-op in Arcata, where he "tabled" to raise funds for the North Coast Earth First! Media office — selling T-shirts, and stickers, offering pamphlets, accepting donations. She'd known Shunka for about five years, she said.

"I said to him, I was going to inherit some money: What was the best way to get that to the North Coast Earth First!?"

In the spring of 2005, Shunka Wakan was floating above the treetops. "I was so excited," the 32-year-old said in an interview a few weeks ago, sitting inside his tiny but colorful North Coast Earth First! Media office in Arcata, walls covered in art and topo maps — including one of Buckeye Mountain, where in 2000-2001, during the "Mattole Free State" action, Shunka and others hiked 14 miles through waist-high snowdrifts to save trees.

Kathryn Miller, he recalled, had come up to him excitedly as he walked along the sidewalk outside the Arcata Co-op and said, "I just donated $185,000 to North Coast Earth First!'"

She'd talked to him the year before about making the donation — she'd said she was anticipating an inheritance from her mother's estate, and she wanted to make a big donation to his group. He'd told her to make it through the Trees Foundation, which handled the NCEF! Media office's finances through an arrangement that had been established years ago. (The Trees Foundation is an umbrella organization formed in 1991 to assist smaller environmental groups. As a 501(c)3 nonprofit, it can accept large, tax-deductible donations on behalf of affiliates, and provide professional resources. And it can lead large campaigns, like the one to save the Headwaters Forest back in the '90s.)

Well, now she'd finally done it.

Miller and Shunka agreed to meet at Fiesta Café in Sunny Brae, so she could tell him how she wanted the money spent: She wanted, straight away, for someone to organize a mediated workshop for the local Earth First! activists on ageism and sexism, issues she thought were fracturing the movement. And, she wanted the bulk of the donation to help support the forest activists who blockade logging roads and hunker up in ancient redwoods to fend off loggers' saws.

Not long after, Shunka was on his way to have lunch with some folks from the Trees Foundation, where they'd talk about Miller's wishes.

"Our media outreach was going to get a big boost," Shunka said. "The donation would keep the EF! office going for many years. So I walked into the Wildflower Café feeling elated, thinking we got all this money."

Barbara Ristow and Doug Wallace of the Trees Foundation were there. "I was super excited," Shunka said, "and I said, 'This is great, this big donation. Isn't it wonderful?' We ordered food, and still I'm all excited, talking about the money, but I notice they're looking nervously at each other. [Finally], they said, 'Well, we're just shocked that you think this money was for you.' And I was like, 'I just met with the donor, and that's what she said.' And they're like, 'Well, let's go ahead and plan the workshop and deal with that later.' I remember that, because it put me at ease."

After that, Shunka said he gave Trees a list of people he thought might benefit from the mediator-run workshop. "Some were people I knew had beefs with me, but I was willing to bring 'em into the circle and talk about it."

According to some vague accounts, the workshop was a disaster. One person who was there claims that Shunka, at one point, pounded his fists on the floor, blustered, then got up and stormed out, yelling as he walked away. Shunka says that's overblown.

"The letter from Kathryn Miller to Barbara Bristow said she wanted the mediation to be a safe place, safe to be emotional," he said. "And I think people are saying 'I freaked out.' The freak-out reports are exaggerated. It's just part of this ongoing character assassination. People say I was 'red-faced.' But my face is naturally red."

In late 2005, while Shunka was in Seattle, a friend called him from Arcata to say a woman had come by asking for the office key. She had a list of equipment she wanted to take away. The friend didn't give her the key.

When Shunka got back from Seattle, he discovered his reimbursement funds from Trees had been "frozen." He also learned about a letter someone in the NCEF! movement had circulated for signatures and then sent to Mark Knipper, who handled the Trees Foundation transactions for the NCEF! Media office. It said, in essence, "We don't want Shunka running EF!"

"I called the Trees Foundation," Shunka recalled. "I was sick, it was the middle of the winter, I'm trying to table, it's raining, it's cold. And Barbara Ristow told me, 'You just need to have a meeting [with the other Earth First!ers] and come to a group consensus on what the Trees Foundation funding should be used for."

The meeting never happened — nobody could agree to meet, said Mark Knipper, also in an interview last week. Knipper is a social worker and a long-time activist who had been the contact person between Trees and NCEF! Media. "So it ate itself," Knipper said. "And although I'm former Navy, a mariner, I said I'm not going down with this ship. So I divorced myself from it ... and signed it all back to Trees."

The NCEF! Media office was dropped from the Trees Foundation altogether.

Shunka and the NCEF! Media office never did see any of the big donation. Miller didn't even know that, he said, until she phoned him up in the summer of 2006, more than a year after she made the donation, to ask about a guy named "Jungle," who had been reported as missing on the NCEF! hotline. Miller was spending much of her time in Guatemala now, where she was raising fruit trees; after she'd made her big donation, Hurricane Stan had struck — she spent the ensuing year mopping up the mess.

First, Shunka told her Jungle was still missing. Then he told her about the money.

"I said, 'Yeah, they told me it wasn't for us,'" said Shunka. "And she said, 'I meant for all of it to go to you guys.' She sounded real upset. And I was like, 'I knew it! I knew it!'"

Shunka tried to sue Trees in small claims court, but it went nowhere.

Miller filed a claim against the Trees Foundation on Oct. 5, 2006, in Humboldt County Superior Court, seeking the return of the $185,000 plus interest so she could distribute the money herself.

And if she wins? "She may just spread it out more," said Shunka. "She's got tree planting ideas. Maybe she could buy a grove. She'd maybe not give it all to Earth First! this time. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that Trees blew for us."

On an uncomfortably hot afternoon last week, four forest activists who'd agreed to an interview for this story — Jeff, Shaggy, Sparrow and Farmer — sat on the ground at the Arcata Marsh next to a log bench on which a teeming crew of red ants worked a splintered notch. Someone had come along here in 1999 and carved a grouping of faces — bearded, grimacing, possibly mourning faces — onto the log and signed it Daniel. The carving had been drenched in red paint, and burnished by years of sitters.

"It kind of reminds me of the memorial for Gypsy," said one of them. "With the red paint."

Gypsy was the forest name of David Nathan Chain, who in September 1998, during an Earth First! action at Grizzly Creek, was crushed to death by a tree felled by an enraged logger. Farmer, actually, was there — he was just 16, but had a year of activism already under his belt. And Shunka was there — it was Shunka's first forest action.

Farmer, Shag, Sparrow and Jeff first made it clear that they spoke for themselves alone, although they participate in various forest defense affinity groups: Farmer works for the Mattole Wildlands Defense Group now, watchdogging the California Department of Forestry for new timber harvest plans, and keeping an eye on a Pacific Lumber Co. watershed analysis. Shag, who saw his first redwood about five years ago, helps keep the Fern Gully treesit village in Freshwater functioning. Jeff, who grew up in the high desert, and fell in love with the woods, works with the Nanning Creek treesit just outside of Scotia, as well as other groups. Sparrow, who was drawn to forest action because the cultural landscape was "like a folktale" he couldn't resist, is with the Fern Gully affinity group. These groups are all part of the Humboldt Forest Defense Association, a collective with a website but no formal structure.

The HFDA sprang into being six years ago — about the time the entity called North Coast Earth First! had essentially dissolved. It would take a book to describe that drawn-out dissolution — a book of lost causes, won causes, waning media interest, Judi Bari's death, Gypsy's death, ego-spurred squabbles, interpersonal catastrophes, a war overseas, hurricanes. And while the HFDA activists might still cherish the Earth First! name — the movement — in their hearts, it's now been further complicated by what you might call the Shunka effect.

"I still feel in many ways solidarity with the greater Earth First! movement abroad," said Farmer. "But in this county, in this climate, if you say you're with the North Coast Earth First!, many people associate you with North Coast Earth First! Media."

Shunka revived the North Coast Earth First! office around 2002. And he did what previous office managers had done — tabled, put out news releases, wrote articles for other publications. But it wasn't like the old days, in the '90s, when hundreds of people were getting arrested in forest actions and the jail support phone and legal resources were in constant use.

Shunka first worked in an office in Eureka, then later moved to Arcata. He called his outfit the NCEF! Media Center. For a time, he and other "affinity groups" tried to work together. But he alienated some people. He took over the North Coast Earth First! website. He controlled the North Coast Earth First! email list of 300 or more subscribers to the news alerts. He sent out press releases on his own.

"I felt the North Coast Earth First! Media Center was a unilateral effort on Shunka's part," said Farmer. Whereas, in the old days, "spokespeople were decided on by the group. And if you wrote an article it was passed by everyone. I feel Shunka appointed himself spokesperson at some point."

Many also claim they've been subject to a lashing anger from Shunka.

"I won't work with him because I pledge nonviolence in my actions," said Shag. "I don't believe he pledges the same thing. He has exhibited violent behavior towards me and towards other activists in my presence."

"He's a bear," said Jeff, making claw-fists with his hands.

But the sad thing is, all of this infighting probably has done nothing to help the actual trees. And the mediation workshop Kathryn Miller wanted didn't fix matters. Now, there was her lawsuit.

"When I heard about this lawsuit, I thought, the Trees Foundation does not deserve to be attacked in that way," said Farmer. "There's much bigger issues that need to be dealt with — with Maxxam and old-growth logging. ...If you look at Fern Gully and Nanning Creek (the Bonanza timber harvest plan), there's hundreds of old growth acres still standing whose fate is unclear."

Shag put it more bluntly: "If [Miller] knew Shunka and wanted to get the money to North Coast Earth First! Media, she should've given it to Shunka. But if she was trying to get it to treesits and forest defense, then the money went to the right place.

"My problem is this whole representation thing. There's people in the trees — how do you know who to get the money to, to help them?"

Shunka knows that a lot of fellow activists aren't happy with his role in the donation dispute. He also knows how some people talk about him and say he's hard to get along with. "I'm just standing up for the truth," he said. "And people don't like it. To me, it feels like a small clique of people who don't like me. I feel a lot of love and support in this community."

He certainly doesn't come off right away as someone who's angry, or who lashes out, or who locks the office and doesn't let people in. Why, recently, he helped a young woman hook up with the treesitters so she could learn the ropes. (Shaggy said that's proof Shunka doesn't have direct connections with the people doing direct action; but you can't deny it's a connection.)

It's probably a bad idea to ask Darryl Cherney, one of the founders of the local Earth First! movement, what he thinks of Shunka Wakan, whose real name is Jason Wilson. (Shunka tells a story of how he was named by a Lakota medicine man on the banks of the Cheyenne River in South Dakota in 1995. "Shunka Wakan," meaning "great dog," is only part of it. There's a secret part after that — altogether, his name means "the humble man called horse.")

"Shunka's a wingnut," Cherney said over the phone last Friday, sounding cheerfully vitriolic. "I have a 10-verse song about Shunka."

Here are the last few verses:

Who's at the co-op spanging a donation
Shunka, Shunka
Who's got a lawsuit 'gainst the Trees Foundation
Shunka, Shunka
Shunka, Shunka
Who's gonna keep on fighting the fight
Shunka, Shunka
With four of his friends at swimmers delight
Shunka, Shunka
Shunka, Shunka (Shunka voice: It's the last of the revolution)

There's no other word for it but "mean." But Cherney and Shunka have history — not all of it sour. Cherney said Shunka laughed when he heard the song, at least the first time.

"I met Shunka in 1998," Cherney said. "And I know he knew Julia ["Butterfly" Hill, whom Shunka had come west to find]. That was a good thing, helping Julia. That was good Shunka."

Cherney had even pushed for Shunka to go to Houston to talk with Charles Hurwitz, whose Maxxam Corp. bought out the old Pacific Lumber company back in 1985 and quickly became the forest activists' number one villain. Shunka went.

But now? "The current status of Shunka and me," Cherney said, "is that Shunka has sent me five or eight or nine e-mails threatening to sue me. Shunka is a joke."

Cherney can talk for hours about the problems he's had with Shunka over the years. His main point, though, is what has Shunka done for the trees lately?

"My question is, where's your topo maps?" he asked. "Where's your wilderness preservation proposal? Where's your lobbyist team in Sacramento?"

It has to be that, on some level, even the people in the movement who don't like Shunka understand somewhat where he's coming from. So he's emotional. Passionate. Perhaps he's caught up so completely in the cause he can't let go. Or, who knows — maybe he's a phony, like he accused Knipper of being back in 2005.

But being a forest activist comes with perils beyond the obvious physical ones.

"I'm really trying to have compassion for Shunka, even though he's kind of attacked us," said Susy Barsotti by phone from Laytonville a couple of weeks ago. Barsotti is president of the Trees Foundation board, and she says the lawsuit has held Trees hostage, unable to function fully. "I've been mystified and dismayed that he's participated like this in the suit. But Shunka witnessed Gypsy's death. And I think he may have post-traumatic stress syndrome. I don't think he's recovered from it. And that can affect your behavior."

A number of people mentioned this, actually, about Shunka. And he often refers to Gypsy's death himself. In an article titled "What Luna has taught me," posted on the website of Julia "Butterfly" Hill's organization, Circle of Life, Shunka writes: "I decided to commit to doing ground support after witnessing the death of David Nathan "Gypsy" Chain on September 17, 1998 ... I remember looking across the valley as we hiked up that day, seeing the rolling hills of forests and clear-cuts, and thinking out loud, "That's why we're here!" Seeing Gypsy's life taken from him, and then seeing the corruption and lies of the Humboldt County Sheriffs ... really opened my eyes to the situation our old-growth forests face."

Later, he did ground support for Hill in her second year in Luna. And in the same article on her website, something else Shunka writes indicates how ready he was to devote himself to a cause: "Being on the support team was the top priority in my life, and I was happy knowing that everything else revolved around when I'd be needed for the next supply run. I never felt lost because I knew what I was doing. That was a feeling I had not felt in years, between feeling dissatisfaction with life in college, and then more dissatisfaction with life as a minimum-wage worker after college. Before joining Julia's ground support team I was unhappy, even to the point of tears, wondering if my entire life was going to be a minimum-wage nightmare ...."

Pure devotion, without benefit of a little hypocrisy, could drive anyone batty. Deane Rimerman, the activist from Olympia who said it is Shunka who is on trial, said it's not uncommon for intense, stressful movements like Earth First! to produce an army of walking wounded. And he's been around, in forest actions up and down the coast, for long enough to know; he was the one, in fact, who "got the maps and led the first hikers up to the hill" to the Gypsy Mountain campaign and Luna treesit.

"In the forest activist movement, there's very little that's rewarding," Rimerman said. "There's a lot of post traumatic stress syndrome. All of us get it. Once you've been through the court process, and the jail process, and seen 1,000-year-old trees get cut down that you really cared about and thought you could save — it's devastating."

That alone, setting aside the troubles with Shunka, could explain the many rifts that have occurred within the local EF! ranks over the years. Josh Brown, who moved to Humboldt in 1995 right before the peak of the Headwaters campaign, said one of the unique qualities of Earth First! is that it "is primarily a youth movement."

"A lot of people that come through are young, are passionate — and it's a wonderful thing," he said. They get thrown into leadership positions quickly — and then they get burned out. Many move quickly on to other things. Brown stayed in longer than most. "When I left [in 2001], I was 30 years old. And I'd been a full-time activist since I was 18."

Paradoxically, said Brown, the youthful draw and the departure of seasoned activists leaves the movement with "no elders to kind of sit around and coach the [new kids]."

The movement also draws strong personalities, he said. Tenacious ones, too, like Shunka's.

"Shunka, I think he really does have a big heart," said Brown. "And I think he does care for the forest."

Last Friday, following the morning session of Miller v. Trees, a group of the Humboldt Forest Defense Association activists stood on the courthouse steps talking. The door opened, and Shunka walked out and down the steps toward the group. They didn't greet him. After a time, he tried to talk to one of them, Jeff. Jeff walked away. Shunka followed him, then stopped and talked to another guy. Then he stood alone again.

From: northcoastjournal.com/101107/...011.html

"Trees Foundation Wins"

October 11th, 2007

The jury in the civil case Kathryn Miller v. the Trees Foundation decided in favor of Trees, after deliberating all day Tuesday. (See "Money on Trees," Oct. 4).

Miller is the long-time forest activist who inherited a bundle from her mother and then signed $185,000 over to the Trees Foundation. In her lawsuit, she claimed she had intended the money to be passed through Trees to one of its affiliates, North Coast Earth First! Media, run by Shunka Wakan. She claimed she had made her intentions clear, verbally and in writing, and that Trees had agreed to the conditions, then broken its promise and kept the money. Trees denied making such promises, and said it had never seen any letters or heard of instructions to give the money to NCEF! Media. (Also, somewhat relatedly, in criminal court on Tuesday Miller pleaded no contest to charges that she had made annoying phonecalls to Barbara Ristow of the Trees Foundation.)

So, that's that. Now, there are only the pieces to pick up.

For Shunka Wakan — featured in last week's Journal as a central figure in a messy nest of infighting that has fractured the current ranks of local Earth First!ians — it could be a long, lonely patching together of lost friends and broken alliances. Not only did he and Miller lose their attempt to retrieve her donation, but now he's been banned from the North Coast Co-op.

Yes, that happened last week. It was Thursday, around 4:15 in the evening, and two activists with the Humboldt Forest Defense Association were tabling — hawking brochures and such — outside the Co-op. It's an activity Shunka himself has spent many a day doing in that very same spot, raising cash to pay for his NCEF!Media outreach work and other causes. And, well, these two fellows, Jeff and Farmer, were on Shunka's shit list, now. They'd spoken gently, but unfavorably, about Shunka's doings in the North Coast Earth First! arena — said he lashed out at people, said he commandeered NCEF! resources, and so forth. Here's a snippet of Jeff's account of what happened, which he sent to the NCJ in an e-mail on Friday:

"Shunka was removed from the Arcata Co-op yesterday after a scuffle with myself and another activist around 5 p.m. Well, he wasn't exactly removed, but APD was called. He was asked to leave after threatening to flip over the HFD donation table while stating he was 'like Jesus in the marketplace ...'"

Sue Coulter, manager of the Arcata Co-op, recounted on Friday how an employee walking by heard the argument and went inside to get her. "So I went out to talk to [Shunka], because it's not the first time we've had problems," she said. "Most of the time, he's fine. Most of the time, I stick up for him." One time, she said, she even called the police to protect Shunka after someone had threatened him. "But he gets into arguments. I tried to talk to him. I told him to leave. ... He was causing a scene, right by the door, and I can't have it. He refused to leave. ... I said, fine. I went into the store. He followed me into the store, and he was still yelling at me, 'Oh, now you're going to call the police on me.'" Coulter called the police, but Shunka left before they arrived.

Shunka, waiting in the courthouse for the jury verdict Tuesday, said Coulter did indeed ask him to leave and he did, indeed, refuse to. As for the HFD tablers, he said he merely asked them why they had Trees Foundation literature on their table. "I said, 'Why do you want to represent these people?'" And then, he said, "Jeff accused me of embezzling — he said this in public. He said, 'You've embezzled thousands of dollars from the Earth First! movement through the years.' And I complained to one of the employees who was walking by. Because that's serious, accusing someone of embezzling."

But Shunka said the whole thing's yet another attack on him. "I don't consider I was yelling. We were talking. I'm an emotional person, I concede to that. I speak from my heart. I don't scream at people. I would love to — but I don't."

In his email, Jeff with HFD predicted Shunka would leave town within weeks, if not sooner. But at the courthouse, even before the verdict, Shunka said he wasn't going anywhere.

"I'm just going to continue to run the Earth First! office and continue to call Humboldt County home," he said. He's also going to write a letter to the Co-op, complaining about how he gets scapegoated and booted out of there even when other people, he says, are the culprits. And, as for the Miller v. Trees case, he said, he and Miller may now take their complaint to another venue.

-- Heidi Walters

Posted by Anonymous
respond to this listing title message
Send Response
more listings like this kinderfrau
MANHATTAN BEACH - 10 views since 11/22 by Iris (no connection)
kinderfrau
MANHATTAN BEACH - 5 views since 11/22 by Anonymous (no connection)
Fashion Consultant
- 7 views since 11/20 by Alwyn (no connection)
EN-670 Software Sr. Product Developer – Staff – Anaheim, CA
- 12 views since 11/06 by Tim (no connection)
EN-678 Sr. Software Dev / Lead Staff - San Francisco or...
- 12 views since 11/06 by Tim (no connection)
Posted by Anonymous

posted in Anti-Globalization - 3 replies

In Revolt - Argentina

2008-03-07T06:46:24Z

Subtitled, You will find that in the middle, the sound quality gets really bad, so you might mute it for a few minutes.

http://youtube.com/v/xhP71SNqhYE.swf

posted in Anti-Globalization - 2 replies

democracy by the people

2008-01-21T02:47:22Z

check out these great new blogs:
democracybythepeople.blogspot.com
delaesquinacaliente.blogspot.com

posted in Anti-Globalization - 0 replies

Seattle Vidoes

2007-12-25T04:09:24Z

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEL-LDvIMPM

posted in Anti-Globalization - 5 replies

Christ Mass card to the White House...warning NC17 rating

2007-12-23T17:32:59Z

T’was the nightmare before Christmas, and at the White House.
The president was smoking cannabis, talking to his pet mouse.

“Did you know that this weed”, He said to the mouse, “would cure all diseases?
This silly green stuff, which grows from the ground, holds miracles that are needed.
If everyone knew how good this stuff was, well I’d be totally f#@ked.
Just think of the millions of innocent herb users, unconstitutionally locked up.
If they really knew that The United States of America, was a British chartered nation;
Illegally run, by businessmen, managing THE UNITED STATES corporation.”

“That’s pretty tricky”, said the mouse to the man, as he handed back the bong,
“I’d never have imagined you’d kept up this nonsense, for even quite this long.
I watched JFK when I was a lad, from over there in the corner.
He and his brothers, and most of the staff were all quite avid stoners.
He was a DEFENDER of justice and truth, unlike you and the other VI KINGS;
That bullshit the masses, oppressed countless millions to secure the illuminati ring”

“What really bothers me,” the president said, as he took another big hit.
“Is how fast this info is coming to light, blowing the top off the lid.
If they were to see, that Washington DC, is a little country all on its own;
With its own constitution since 1871, and the dollars on high interest loan;
From the Fed, owned by Rothschild’s and quite a few others;
Tied to secret society, and organized by skulls, bones and frat brothers!
Sleazy old banker that make billions by banking both sides of battles;
Americans birth certificates, sent overseas and used as collateral.
They’ll riot in the street and scream out for vengeance and pain,
Until my weapon toting peace keepers round up and detain;
The millions of ‘terrorists’ that are sure to arise,
As the secret combinations unveil before their eyes.”

“That’s heavy”, said the mouse as he twisted up some hash,
“Just how do you expect American soldiers to do a dirty job like that?”

“Oh that’s easy”, said the president, as he bowed his head to avoid;
The cynical gaze of the mouse that was becoming quite annoyed.
“I’ve already made new money stamped: North American Union.
Once the dollar is dead, and the borders are dropped, and everyone busy looting;
I’ll offer up ‘new jobs’ to millions of hopeless and starving women and men.
Give the Mexicans guns and the Canadians bombs, oh America’s future is grim”

“What the hell”, said the mouse, “are you going to do in the end;
When millions are locked up, and more wake up, ready to avenge?
When people see through, all of the lies they’ve been forced;
To accept blindly as fact, they’ve been maliciously coerced!
And crop dusted and cheated and poisoned and infected!
In the bigGEST DAMN CONSPIRACY EVER CONCIEVIBLEY DETECTED!”

“Get off you soap box,” said the president as he dropped the smoking tweezers.
“You’ve got no right to talk shit, through those peasant lips, to rightful bloodline leader.
You know that I’m not the only conspirator in the mix;
That most of the orders, come from the Queen of England’s very lips.
And really who’s worse, under the nitty and gritty;
Look at the billions of deaths linked to Vatican City???
And look at the other Christian leaders, that know what’s going on;
Lulling the masses to sleep, singing the tithing for redemption song!!!”

“Pardon me”, said the mouse, “but you all are quite crazy;
This is nothing but global domination so the rich may remain lazy!
And speaking of control, probations and tariffs;
How long must you sit there and Bogart that spliff?”

“Screw you”, said the president, through the holes magically created;
Between the pearly whites as the lies increasingly perpetuated.
“I’ll keep this from you, just as easy as from the people;
By laws, or brute force, or false doctrine from a steeple.
For if I let you or anyone else, use all the cards that Mother Earth dealt;
Then THE PEOPLE would be self sufficient, and Babylon would melt!
As they grew their own medicine, food, clothes, and monetary wealth;
They’d also stop buying our drugs disguised as chemicals on food shelves.
Then the veil would come off, and the masses would look here.
For the first time in their lives, minds would be perfectly clear;
And this is a day all of us secretly fear”

“But that’s not going to happen”, said the president with a cough.
“We’ll just keep adding more poison to keep their menation shut off.
One of the most important rules of being ‘govern-mental’ by design;
Is to ruthlessly use every trick in the book, rather than let the plan die.
Secret oaths that I made, in the dead of the night, to men under hooded cloaks;
Keep me bound to my promise of conquest, using force to poisonous smoke.”

“This I know is quite true”, said the mouse, as he bowed his head to pray.
“But regardless of your plans and secret combinations, the Gods will save the day.
Millions of people, over thousands of years have all manifested salvation;
The elements have responded, seeds have been planted for continuing evolution”

“Our Heavenly Father would you…”, the little mouse said,
“…please stop all this madness, and badness, and death.
Please don’t use plagues, floods, or fire reigning down from heaven.
Just please loosen the noose on this oppression we’ve been havin’.
I have faith that everything that grows from the ground;
Was provided by you, filled with information that is sound.
I beg for THE PEOPLE”, the humble mouse cried,
For the poisoning to stop, in the water, food, and skies.
Of all of the stuff that these mobsters do daily;
The secret drugs must stop first as it’s making the world crazy.
And for the blatant poisoning of everything from kids toothpaste to babies pacifiers
May God have mercy on your souls, as you roast like marshmallows, on hells fire
To conclude”, said the mouse , “under the council of my grey haired furry shaman
I ask these things in Christ’s name, Yahweh’s as well, and not in the Egyptian’s god AMEN”

Peace, Love, and all that Shit…slacker

posted in Anti-Globalization - 0 replies

Greetings from Ministry of Alchemy

2007-12-19T22:16:02Z

Please visit both our tribe site and website at www.ministryofalchemy.org

Peace, love, and all that shit...slacker

posted in Anti-Globalization - 0 replies

Paris Uprising of 1968

2007-12-11T11:48:46Z

This I posted a few months ago, but it does tell how valuable it is to voice opinions and how more than the original demands may come out in the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUJZgkhSCq8

posted in Anti-Globalization - 1 reply

Black Block

2007-12-10T05:48:28Z

I would like to open a discussion about the tactical use of black blocks, discuss whether the tactic is still viable and what uses it may have had or still does hold. Criticism of Black Blocks are also welcome.

My understanding is that the black block is listed as a terrorist organization. This is total bullshit because there is no Black Block organization. Its nothing more than a tactic generally associated with a collection of principles such as the belief that "An injury to one is an injury to all", the advocacy of civil disobedience, and acting as a leaderless yet cohesive unit to make it more difficult to arrest or break up the block.

Vandalism is not necessarily a tactic that is embraced by every black block. Many black blocks were purely defensive, offering protection to protesters as the police began firing tear gas and plastic bullets by using a wall of shields on the front line and throwing back canisters with heat resistant gloves. Since the black block is leaderless, some masked individuals may have non-violently spray painted political slogans on unethical corporate windows, and a few may even have gone so far as to break a window. These tactics have drawn significant criticism from other protesters who have accused them of instigating police violence. However, while it may not have helped reduce police violence the police have generally responded with violence even when no illegal activities have taken place.

Other radicals have at times criticized the black block also on the grounds that the tactic has become too predictable, too vulnerable at smaller events lacking the numbers to resist mass arrest, and at times divides the event. Other people suggest that you may actually be more hidden and discreet blending into the crowd rather than consolidated in a block....Supporters of the black bloc have pointed out that the block has often been able to resist police repression, prevent their comrades from being arrested, and helped keep the event from getting bullied by police, all done without serious violence generally relying on locking arms and at worst pushing. This is not the case 100% of the time however.

So considering all this, what role do you think the Black Blocks may have in the future of protest events in America? Is the tactic still viable?

posted in Anti-Globalization - 10 replies

South Koreans Clash Over US Trade Deal

2007-11-17T20:16:37Z

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/071111/skorea_us_free_trade.html
AP
South Koreans Clash Over US Trade Deal
Sunday November 11, 6:37 am ET
South Korean Workers Clash With Police Over Free Trade Deal With United States

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- Tens of thousands of South Korean farmers and workers clashed with riot police Sunday at a massive rally against a free trade agreement with the United States.

Some protesters fought with riot police wearing helmets and shields, attacking them with the sticks, throwing stones and trying to turn over police buses set up to block the protest site in central Seoul. Police fired water cannons at the protesters and sprayed fire extinguishers.

ADVERTISEMENT
The protesters occupied a 16-lane road and chanted slogans against the free trade deal. Police said they arrested some 100 protesters and that more than 10 riot police were hurt. Organizers said some 50 demonstrators were hurt -- mostly suffering head injuries.

Organizers said about 50,000 people participated in the protest, while police estimated there were 20,000 demonstrators.

"We will thwart (the passage) of the FTA as it would deepen the polarization of our society," said Woo Moon-sook, a spokeswoman for the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, one of organizers of the rally near Seoul City Hall.

Trade chiefs from the two countries signed the accord in June, concluding months of tough negotiations to lower or eliminate tariffs and other trade barriers on a wide range of industries and services.

The proposed agreement must be endorsed by legislatures in both capitals before it goes into effect. The South Korean government submitted the proposal to parliament in September for approval.

The deal is the largest for the U.S. since the North American Free Trade Agreement more than a decade ago, and the largest ever for South Korea.

Both sides said the accord will boost growth, but certain constituencies, such as farmers in South Korea and labor groups in the U.S., have opposed it.

Although the deal excluded rice -- a key Korean crop -- farmers are worried that other kinds of U.S. agricultural produce will pour into the country, threatening their livelihoods.

"Farmers would be the biggest victim of the free trade deal," said Lee Young-soo, a farmer who attended the rally, adding that the agriculture industry will collapse.

posted in Anti-Globalization - 1 reply

Former Top UK Trade Official Admits Globalization Hurts the Poor

2007-10-23T19:00:27Z

Former Top UK Trade Official Admits Globalization Hurts the Poor

"I WAS WRONG. FREE MARKET TRADE POLICIES HURT THE POOR"
The IMF and World Bank orthodoxy is increasing global poverty

By Stephen Byers
The Guardian
May 19, 2003

In November 1999, during the World Trade Organisation ministerial conference in Seattle, I watched from my hotel room as thousands demonstrated against the evils of globalisation.

Anarchists clad in black marched alongside grandmothers dressed as turtles and steelworkers from Philadelphia. They saw international trade as a threat - to their jobs, the environment or simply as part of a capitalist conspiracy.

As leader of the delegation from the United Kingdom, I was convinced that the expansion of world trade had the potential to bring major benefits to developing countries and would be one of the key means by which world poverty would be tackled.

In order to achieve this, I believed that developing countries would need to embrace trade liberalisation. This would mean opening up their own domestic markets to international competition. The thinking behind this approach being that the discipline of the market would resolve problems of underperformance, a strong economy would emerge and that, as a result, the poor would benefit.

This still remains the position of major international bodies like the IMF and World Bank and is reflected in the system of incentives and penalties which they incorporate in their loan agreements with developing countries. But my mind has changed.

I now believe that this approach is wrong and misguided. Since leaving the cabinet a year ago, I've had the opportunity to see at first hand the consequences of trade policy. No longer sitting in the air-conditioned offices of fellow government ministers I have, instead, been meeting farmers and communities at the sharp end.

It is this experience that has led me to the conclusion that full trade liberalisation is not the way forward. A different approach is needed: one which recognises the importance of managing trade with the objective of achieving development goals.

No one should doubt the hugely significant role that international trade could play in tackling poverty. In terms of income, trade has the potential to be far more important than aid or debt relief for developing countries. For example, an increase in Africas share of world exports by just 1% could generate around 43m pounds - five times the total amount of aid received by African countries.

This has led President Museveni of Uganda to say: "Africa does need development assistance, just as it needs debt relief from its crushing international debt burden. But aid and debt relief can only go so far. We are asking for the opportunity to compete, to sell our goods in western markets. In short, we want to trade our way out of poverty."

The World Bank estimates that reform of the international trade rules could take 300 million people out of poverty. Reform is essential because, to put it bluntly, the rules of international trade are rigged against the poorest countries.

Rich nations may be prepared to open up their own markets, but still keep in place massive subsidies. The quid pro quo for doing this is that developing countries open up their domestic markets. These are then vulnerable to heavily subsidised exports from the developed world.

The course of international trade since 1945 shows that an unfettered global market can fail the poor and that full trade liberalisation brings huge risks and rarely provides the desired outcome. It is more often the case that developing countries which have successfully expanded their economies are those that have been prepared to put in place measures to protect industries while they gain strength and give communities the time to diversify into new areas.

This is not intervention for the sake of it or to prop up failing enterprises, but part of a transitional phase to create strong businesses that can compete on equal terms in the global marketplace without the need for continued protection.

Just look at some examples. Taiwan and South Korea are often held out as being good illustrations of the benefits of trade liberalisation. In fact, they built their international trading strength on the foundations of government subsidies and heavy investment in infrastructure and skills development while being protected from competition by overseas firms.

In more recent years, those countries which have been able to reduce levels of poverty by increasing economic growth - like China, Vietnam, India and Mozambique - have all had high levels of intervention as part of an overall policy of strengthening domestic sectors.

On the other hand, there are an increasing number of countries in which full-scale trade liberalisation has been applied and then failed to deliver economic growth while allowing domestic markets to be dominated by imports. This often has devastating effects.

Zambia and Ghana are both examples of countries in which the opening up of markets has led to sudden falls in rates of growth with sectors being unable to compete with foreign goods. Even in those countries that have experienced overall economic growth as a result of trade liberalisation, poverty has not necessarily been reduced.

In Mexico during the first half of the 1990s there was economic growth, yet the number of people living below the poverty line increased by 14 million in the 10 years from the mid-1980s. This was due to the fact that the benefits of a more open market all went to the large commercial operators, with the small concerns being squeezed out.

The evidence shows that the benefits that would flow from increased international trade will not materialise if markets are simply left alone. When this happens, liberalisation is used by the rich and powerful international players to make quick gains from short-term investments.

The role of the IMF and World Bank is also of concern. The conditions placed on their loans often force countries into rapid liberalisation, with scant regard to the impact on the poor.

The way forward is through a regime of managed trade in which markets are slowly opened up and trade policy levers like subsidies and tariffs are used to help achieve development goals.

The IMF and World Bank should recognise that questions of trade liberalisation are the responsibility of the WTO where they can be considered in the overall context of achieving poverty reduction and that it is therefore inappropriate to include trade liberalisation as part of a loan agreement.

This represents a departure from the current orthodoxy. It will be opposed by multinational companies who see rich and easy pickings in the markets of the developing world. But such a change would benefit the worlds poorest people and thats why it should happen.

Stephen Byers is Labour MP for North Tyneside. He is a former trade and industry secretary and was a cabinet member from 1998 to 2002.

FAIR USE NOTICE. This document contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. India Resource Center is making this article available in our efforts to advance the understanding of corporate accountability, human rights, labor rights, social and environmental justice issues. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

posted in Anti-Globalization - 2 replies

NYMAA General Assembly 9, NYC, Oct 28. Dont miss it!

2007-10-21T22:21:02Z

Mark your calendars! NYMAA General Assembly #9, Sunday, October 28th, 2007.

_______

Calling all anarchists, anti-authoritarians, horizontalists, and grassroots activists! Come join us as we plant the seeds of the anarchist century!

Mark your calendars: You are cordially invited to the Ninth General Assembly of the New York Metro Alliance of Anarchists / Alianza de anarquistas del área metropolitana de Nueva York (NYMAA).

Date: Sunday, October 28th, 2007
Time: 2:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m.

Place: The Red Root Community Space, 2407 3rd Avenue, Suite 3R, Bronx, NY (see directions below)

On March 4, 2006, 65 radicals, revolutionists, and anarchists came together in an historic gathering and founded an explicitly anarchist organization--the first of its kind in NYC in nearly 100 years! Since then, much has been accomplished, yet much more must be done in order to forge a lasting anti-authoritarian presence on the streets of New York.

In order for the ideas of horizontalism and revolution to firmly take root among broad swaths of people, anarchists need to band together for the purpose of initiating and nurturing a wide range of projects. NYMAA's aim is to help build momentum and contribute to a genuine movement of resistance and liberation that can ultimately uproot the brutality of authoritarianism, capitalism, and oppression.

Along those lines, NYMAA has arguably initiated the largest upswing in anarchist organizing that this city has seen in a very long time, marking as its accomplishments a number of ongoing projects, groups, and campaigns. This is truly a historic time, as we continue to build anarchist communities and projects while connecting and facilitating communication with other radical and revolutionary groups and organizations.

You can read more about NYMAA and familiarize yourself with its basic organizational structure (we strongly encourage this) by visiting: http://www.nymaa.org

Proposals and other agenda items for the General Assembly are welcomed. Please e-mail them along with any RSVPs (especially if you're bringing
kids!) to: nymaa-comms [at] riseup [dot] net

Food and beverages, as well as childcare, will also be provided.

History / Herstory in the making! Don't miss it! See you there!

_______

Directions to the Red Root Community Space: Take the 4/5/6 to 138th Street in the Bronx. Walk to 3rd Avenue. If you took the 4/5, turn right onto 3rd Avenue from 138th Street. Coming from the 6, turn left onto 3rd Avenue. Walk four blocks until you get to Dimitri's Garden Center, on the right-hand side of the street.

Google maps position: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=2407+3rd+Avenue&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=48.956293,57.480469&ie=UTF8&z=16&om=1

posted in Anti-Globalization - 1 reply

CAFTA Dividing Costa Rican Society

2007-10-11T01:34:02Z

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/09/25/18449686.php

Americas | International | San Francisco | Global Justice and Anti-Capitalism | Government & Elections
Central America Free Trade Agreement Dividing Costa Rican Society
by brendan behan ( brendanb [at] globalizethissf.org )
Tuesday Sep 25th, 2007 12:35 PM

For the first time in the history of world, a voting population will have the opportunity to vote on a free trade agreement in a referendum. Costa Rican voters will be asked to decide whether or not to accept CAFTA. The referendum is is set to take place on October 7, 2007, and if more than 30% of the voting population turns out for the vote, the results could be considered legally binding.

CAFTA-DR would fundamentally change thousands of laws that are presently in place in Costa Rica, as it has already done in other countries that are party to the agreement--Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic--who have already ratified CAFTA-DR and begun implemention. One of the most critical legal changes required by DR-CAFTA are the elimination or substantial transformation of laws protecting natural resources from foreign purchase or control.

Key features of CAFTA-DR include allowing highly subsidized U.S. agriculture to gain immediate duty-free access to CAFTA-DR markets, excluding competitors from CAFTA-DR markets so as to protect U.S. textiles & apparel under the 'Yarn Forward' Rule, non-reciprocal & anti-free trade sanction measures allowing the United States to impose tariffs on certain goods in the event of 'import surges,' protecting international investors, entitling corporate entities to full compensation for the market value of any properties, natural resources, or goods that are nationalized or expropriated by Central American countries, privatizating all social services and allowing U.S. companies to bid on these privatized public industries, including education and environmental services.

marcha_contra_el_tlc_001_-_de_bloque_verde_225w.jpg
marcha_contra_el_tlc_001_...

Central America Free Trade Agreement Dividing Costa Rican Society

by brendan behan of Globalize THIS!
http://www.globalizethissf.org

Sept. 25, 2007 - Even after more than 13 years of environmental degradation and dramatically increasing gaps between the rich and poor which have left workers in the U.S., Canada, and México out in the cold, the Bush Administration continues to push the NAFTA model on other countries throughout Latin America.

The mistakes of NAFTA have been duplicated and codified in the text of the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR), which was negotiated starting in 2003 between the United States, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua--the Dominican Republic later joined the negotiations in 2004--and signed in 2005.

The agreement requires, among many other stipulations, that 80% of all tariffs on U.S. goods entering CAFTA-DR nations be eliminated immediately and that the remaining tariffs be phased out over the next ten years.

CAFTA-DR represents the next step toward the swallowing of the American continents by shady, back-room trade deals like those that gave rise NAFTA.

However, opposition groups in Costa Rica quickly organized to demonstrate against the agreement, citing the threat that CAFTA-DR poses to the environment, workers' rights, economic sustainability, and Costa Rican autonomy and have successfully forced the government to acknowledge the voice of the people in the public arena.

For the first time in the history of world, a voting population will have the opportunity to vote on a free trade agreement in a referendum. Costa Rican voters will be asked to decide whether or not to accept CAFTA. The referendum is is set to take place on October 7, 2007, and if more than 30% of the voting population turns out for the vote, the results could be considered legally binding.

Submitting the Central America-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement to a referendum in Costa Rica is perhaps the most democratic approach to a free trade agreement that the world has yet seen in that it is the first instance in world history of a voting population's having direct veto power over a free trade agreement. This is in stark contrast to the manner in which DR-CAFTA was negotiated, which was without public input and behind closed doors under President Bush's now-expired Fast Track Authority.

CAFTA-DR would fundamentally change thousands of laws that are presently in place in Costa Rica, as it has already done in other countries that are party to the agreement--Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic--who have already ratified CAFTA-DR and begun implemention. One of the most critical legal changes required by DR-CAFTA are the elimination or substantial transformation of laws protecting natural resources from foreign purchase or control. Any one of Costa Rica's local laws protecting natural resources, such as sub-soil energy resources, could legally be challenged under DR-CAFTA as a barrier to trade in binding international arbitration panels overseen by unaccountable, unelected trade lawyers--not elected representatives of the people--who are empowered by the agreement to render the final decision.

These provisions would seriously inhibit the power of local communities to legally prevent multinational corporations from environment pillage as DR-CAFTA would provide legal recourse to these polluters to sue government institutions seeking such protections. This represents a very profound change in the democratic structures of these localities, placing the destinies of these communities--literally, their ability to live in an environment free of toxic pollutants--out of their hands permanently.

Among other provisions in CAFTA-DR, parties to the agreement would be compelled to consider nuclear waste as a tradable good in the eyes of the law. This could potentially mean that if a private corporation in the United States, which, quite importantly, is the only party to the agreement with a substantial nuclear industry, were contracted by the U.S. government to dispose of its nuclear waste in another country, the company could sue for the right to dump these radioactive 'tradable goods' in Costa Rica even if existing laws prohibit it, under provisions in DR-CAFTA which preclude governments from implementing laws that discriminate against certain industries or corporations. DR-CAFTA bestows the right upon these companies to sue local, regional, and national governments for not allowing such dumping of toxins and other public hazards and to also collect financial compensation from such legal bodies should the arbitration panels side in favor of the corporations.

These foreign corporations who are not beholden to these local communities do not have to bear the impact of their actions while the surrounding communities do. It has long been recognized by major economic thinkers like Joseph Stiglitz and others that the only means of preventing these corporations from perpetually hoisting these noxious externalized costs onto surrounding communities is by democratic political change, which means regulation.

In the context of Costa Rica, this presents the possibility of a new kind of internationalized environmental racism since Costa Rica's indigenous communities and their lands were the only indigenous groups to be excluded from DR-CAFTA's indigenous communities' exemption clauses.

Other key features of CAFTA-DR are as follows:

-Highly subsidized U.S. agriculture gains immediate duty-free access despite the fact that these subsidies keep prices of U.S. goods at artificially low levels, which is inconsistent with free trade doctrine

-Excluding competitors from CAFTA-DR markets so as to protect U.S. textiles & apparel under the 'Yarn Forward' Rule; summarizing the U.S. Trade Representative, the 'yarn forward' rule requries that apparel using yarns and fabric from the United States and CAFTA-DR countries qualify for duty-free benefits. This includes fabrics, yarn, garment pockets, thread, narrow elastic fabrics, and visible linings. The legal implications are that any garments produced with fabrics originating from countries other than the U.S. (particularly China, which is a main competitor of the U.S. in this area) will be subject to tariffs, creating a protected market for U.S. textiles, yarns, threads, fabrics, and more

-Non-reciprocal & anti-free trade sanction measures allowing the United States to impose tariffs on certain goods in the event of 'import surges'

-Protection for International Investors including equal treatment for U.S. investors and CAFTA-DR domestic investors

-Corporate entities would be entitled to full compensation for the market value of any properties, natural resources, or goods that are nationalized or expropriated by Central American countries

-The right for investors to sue governments and be compensated for violations of CAFTA-DR

-Privatization of all social services and access for U.S. companies to bid on these privatized public services, including education and environmental services

-Increased protections for socially contentious patents and intellectual property rights, including trademarks, and pharmaceutical test data that is currently used to produce cheap, generic drugs that are far more affordable to the poor

-Protecting plant DNA patents and allowing for the patenting of nature; enforcement mechanisms would include requiring any farmer caught growing patented crops, whether intentionally or in the event of the unintentional 'contamination' of their crops by genetically modified varieties, to destroy their fields or face imprisonment and/or fines

-Limiting public access to cheap, generic pharmaceuticals, which will most greatly impact poor

-Environmental protection mechanisms will be limited to market-based 'No Punishment, Voluntary Atonement' solutions disallowing local governments from sanctioning gross violators of environmental laws

-The explicit elimination of the possibility that labor and environment violations can be punished by means of sanctioning or withholding trade access

-Labor & environment disputes are relegated to a toothless public hearings procedure with no binding enforcement mechanisms

The notion that these kinds of polluting industries have a right to force their externalized costs onto local communities is completely at odds with any basic understanding of democracy—which, one must remember, does not equate with the 'freedom to do business,' but rather the freedom to control one's own life within the social landscapes that one operates.

Of what value is freedom in any sense, if one cannot have the ability to maintain the safety of the most basic necessities of life: our water, our food, and our air? Communities do have a democratic right to limit corporation's externalized costs, especially when those externalized costs do not just inhibit our freedom to live in a toxin-free environment, but also may inhibit our right to prevent those toxins from entering our systems.
http://www.globalizethissf.org
© 2000–2007 San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center. Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by the SF Bay Area IMC. Disclaimer | Privacy | Contact

posted in Anti-Globalization - 7 replies

Corporate Globalization

2007-10-10T22:49:59Z

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI0itS3gQFU

posted in Anti-Globalization - 17 replies

Slightly OT: New Freegan Tribe Forming

2007-09-25T06:56:17Z

http://tribes.tribe.net/ef0f2448-2f81-4704-a66a-fda79c08384f?_click_path=Application%5Btribe%5D.Tribe%5Bef0f2448-2f81-4704-a66a-fda79c08384f%5D

freeganism will nick your globalization in the bud. join us in the bin.

: )

posted in Anti-Globalization - 3 replies

Costa Rican government involved in dirty tricks to get DR-CAFTA to pass

2007-09-22T03:38:17Z

latimes.com
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-cafta21sep21,1,13700.story?coll=la-headlines-business&track=crosspromo
From the Los Angeles Times
GLOBAL ECONOMY
Costa Rica dealt wild card in trade pact rift
Government officials' letter urging dirty tricks to sway voters to back an agreement could backfire.
By Marla Dickerson
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

September 21, 2007

SAN JOSE, COSTA RICA — -- With just over two weeks to go before Costa Ricans head to the polls to vote on a free-trade agreement with the United States and six other countries, Alfredo Volio should be a happy man.

As head of the "yes" campaign championing the pact, known as CAFTA, he has watched public support climb in recent months. The latest opinion polls showed Costa Ricans leaning toward backing the Central American Free Trade Agreement, which would dismantle most trade barriers between the United States and half a dozen Latin countries.

But that was before a memo written by CAFTA advocates was leaked to the public this month, fueling outrage here. The document, dated July 29 and written by two high-level government officials with close ties to Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, outlined a campaign of dirty tricks intended to sway voters.

The authors proposed smearing CAFTA opponents by linking them to leftist firebrands such as Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Cuban President Fidel Castro. They called for a public relations campaign to "stimulate fear" among citizens about the alleged dangers of snubbing the deal.

They also advocated punishing local officials -- by withholding funds for public programs in their regions -- if their constituents repudiated CAFTA.

CAFTA opponents have cried foul while supporters have suddenly found themselves on the defensive over a measure that appeared headed to victory. Prominent CAFTA backers, including Arias, have distanced themselves from the memo, which was addressed to him and his brother, Presidency Minister Rodrigo Arias.

One of the authors, Second Vice President Kevin Casas, has resigned from the "yes" campaign and temporarily stepped down from his Cabinet post as planning minister while election officials investigate whether any laws were broken.

"It's a bombshell," said Luis Guillermo Solis, a political science professor at the University of Costa Rica who opposes CAFTA. "It's Watergate."

Solis predicted that the memo would spark a backlash among undecided voters and citizens fed up with corruption scandals that have roiled Costa Rica in recent years. Other analysts have dismissed the incident as political noise that will quiet down by the day of the referendum, Oct. 7.

What's clear is that the document has energized CAFTA opponents and embarrassed Arias just ahead of the crucial vote.

"It's a blow," said Volio, a former government minister, in a recent interview in his office in an upscale suburb of Costa Rica's capital. He said he knew nothing of the memo until it was leaked to the media, adding that the "yes" forces had not acted on any of its recommendations.

Few trade experts would have predicted that Costa Rica, Central America's most prosperous economy and a model of social stability for the region, would be roiling over CAFTA. It's the only member of the seven-nation deal that has yet to ratify the pact, which includes the United States, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.

The trade issue has proved so divisive among Costa Ricans that the government relented this year to allow voters to decide whether to ratify it.

Business groups are solidly behind the deal, saying it's the best way to bullet-proof trading relations with the United States, the destination for about half of Costa Rican exports of coffee, fruit, apparel and high-tech products, and its biggest source of direct foreign investment.

A number of U.S. companies, including Intel Corp. and Baxter International Inc., have set up shop in Costa Rica, attracted by its location, political stability and high-quality workforce. Others are eager to enter the nation's industries such as telecommunications and insurance, currently government-run monopolies in Costa Rica that would be pried open to competition if CAFTA is approved.

Volio said the trade deal would mean lower prices, faster export growth, continued U.S. investment and jobs. Costa Rica is experiencing sluggish economic growth and has high unemployment.

"Costa Rica is at a crossroads," Volio said. "This is about our future."

Opponents are wary of the U.S.-prescribed recipe of unfettered trade and privatization for the region. Some portray CAFTA as an attack on their nation's unique social model. Costa Rica abolished its army in 1949, choosing instead to invest in education, universal healthcare and social programs that have made it a prototype of human development for the region.

Foes say the benefits of CAFTA will flow mainly to Costa Rica's elite, making the country more like its impoverished neighbors. For example, some worry that competition will bankrupt the state-run phone service, which, while hardly the epitome of efficiency, has provided Costa Ricans with some of the lowest telecom rates in Latin America. Others fret that protections granted to U.S. pharmaceutical makers will make it harder for Costa Rica's national health service to procure low-cost generic drugs.

Costa Rica's powerful public-sector unions are opposed to CAFTA. So are rice and dairy farmers who produce mainly for the domestic market. They fear a flood of subsidized U.S. agricultural commodities will wipe out their livelihoods.

"Our [profit] margins are thin, but this business has always been stable," dairy farmer Roberto Rodriguez Vargas said. "A lot of us couldn't survive even one or two bad years."

Others reason that if the benefits of CAFTA were so patently obvious, then supporters wouldn't need to craft a clandestine campaign to scare people into voting for it. Farmer John Brealey said he was fed up with "lies" about how the U.S. would retaliate against Costa Rica if citizens voted against the pact or that leftists such as Castro were bankrolling the "no" campaign.

"Fidel would be so happy that he'd probably live another 10 years if Costa Rica voted it down, but he's got nothing to do with this," Brealey said. "It's shameful the way [CAFTA supporters] are trying to frighten people."

Leaders of campaign against the pact say they aren't against free trade; they just want to cut a better deal by negotiating a separate, bilateral trade agreement with the United States.

Some experts say that's wishful thinking. Democrats in the U.S. Congress have put the brakes on pending trade pacts with Peru, Colombia and Panama and wouldn't be enthusiastic about a new round of trade talks with Costa Rica.

"It's very unlikely [Costa Rica] will get another deal" said Michael Shifter, analyst at the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington think tank. "That's a high-risk bet" by CAFTA opponents.

The whole debate has put Costa Ricans such as Juan Vargas in a bad mood. The retiree said he was furious about the scare tactics advocated by the secret memo he had read about in newspapers. But he is also worried about a small country such as Costa Rica trying to go it alone in a globalized world.

"Right now I'm not sure how I'll vote," he said. "I'm fed up with the whole thing."

marla.dickerson@latimes.com

If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at latimes.com/archives.
TMS Reprints
Article licensing and reprint options

Copyright 2007 Los Angeles Times | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service
Home Delivery | Advertise | Archives | Contact | Site Map | Help

partners: KTLA Hoy

posted in Anti-Globalization - 0 replies

Stop CAFTA - Costa Rica is not for sale

2007-09-10T00:58:23Z

Title: Globalization and the Fight for Central America: Costa Rica Inc. and Beyond
START DATE: Saturday September 15
TIME: 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Location Details:
The SF Women's Building
3543 18th St. (between Valencia and Guerrero)
San Francisco, CA 94110
Event Type: Speaker
Contact Name Brendan
Email Address info@globalizethissf.org

Globalize This! in conjunction with the Costa Rican Federation for the Conservation of the Environment (FECON), will be hosting a special event which will look at the consequences of free trade agreements on the Americas with a focus on Central America, specifically Costa Rica. We will review contemporary struggles of peoples across the American continents against the ratification of the Central America-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA).

With us we will have guest speaker Fabián Pacheco Rodriguez, the current President of FECON and the son of former Costa Rican President Abel Pacheco.

Fabián will be discussing FECON's involvement in Bloque Verde and the Costa Rican movement to defeat CAFTA in the upcoming referendum on October 7, 2007. Fabián will be coming to us direct from Costa Rica and fresh off the front lines of this historic vote, which is the first time that any population has had the opportunity to vote on a free trade agreement.

The event will include a screening of segments of two documentaries, "Fourth World War" and "Costa Rica Inc," and will include a discussion of strategies for people in the U.S. to work in solidarity with our comadres and compadres in Central America.

This is a bilingual English/Spanish event.

Cost:
Requested donation of $5.00-$20.00
(everyone is welcome--no one turned away for lack of funds)

http://www.globalizethissf.org

posted in Anti-Globalization - 0 replies