Tag: Activism

cross-posted from The Dream Antilles

This morning, I re-wrote my dailyKos diary from yesterday, put it up, and again asked people please to call New Mexico Governor Richardson and to ask him to sign the Death Penalty Abolition Bill.  Here’s what I wrote:

I posted this diary yesterday.  I’m posting it again today because Governor Richardson is taking comments on the New Mexico Death Penalty Abolition Bill until Monday evening.

Friday, I wrote that the New Mexico legislature passed a bill calling for the abolition of that state’s death penalty.  The bill (pdf) has been sent to Governor Richardson for his signature.  That’s where you, my fellow Kossacks, come in.  We all need to call the Governor and ask him to sign the bill.

Governor Richardson has formerly supported the death penalty, but he says he has not made up his mind about this bill:

Richardson, a second-term Democrat, has opposed repeal in the past but now says he would consider signing it.

“I haven’t made a final decision,” the governor said this week.

I want you, fellow Kossacks, to help him make his final decision, a decision to sign the abolition bill.



You can make a lasting contribution to the abolition of the death penalty in New Mexico and ultimately in the entire US, by making a single telephone call to New Mexico Governor Richardson and asking him courteously to sign the death penalty abolition bill.  Just ask that he sign the bill.  Here’s the number:  (505) 476-2225. The number will record your request.  There is no human being on the phone, just a recorder.

Please spend 30 seconds making this call and make this request.



The logic for this is clear.  The more calls the Governor receives, the more he understands that there is enormous support for him and for abolition and for his signing the bill.  Huge support for signing makes it more likely that the Governor will sign the bill.

It’s unbelievably simple what is needed.  But it requires you, dear Kossacks, to take action, to make the call, to spend 30 seconds.

Please make this call.  Please bring abolition of the death penalty to New Mexico.

Despite their directness, neither diary/essay generated a large response.  Today’s had about 20 recommendations; yesterday’s, about 40.  I have no idea how many people actually called Governor Richardson’s number (505) 476-2225 and left a recorded message asking the Governor to sign the bill.  I know that I did, and I trust that those who said they called in the comments actually called.  Of course, I have no idea how many people just made the call after they saw the essay and didn’t bother to click anything on dailyKos.

I also sent the first request for calls essay to a number of well known, large, leftwing blogs to ask them to help out with this, to ask them to ask their readership to call the Governor.  This morning I awoke to see that none had responded to the request.

I don’t really claim to understand how something that seems to me to be so important and so easy to carry out can have so lame a response.  I’m not whining about this.  I’m just saying that I don’t understand it.  I have no intention of spending additional time or energy trying to figure this out.  I need to devote myself to trying to bring about results and not shunt myself onto some abandoned siding to analyze the meta.

So, dear readers, I am asking you to call Gov. Richardson and ask him to do the right thing, sign the bill, end the death penalty in New Mexico.  It’s easy.  And it’s the right thing to do.

Update (3/15, 3:35pm ET):  Richardson apparently is taking this decision very seriously.  Here’s the local Sunday story:

The governor said he is looking for the public’s input before he decides.

“I want to hear compelling argument, factual arguments. I want to hear from the clergy-conscious arguments,” he said.

Although the death penalty is still common in places like China, Africa and Middle-Eastern countries, The United States is on an increasingly short list of western nations that still execute prisoners–something the governor says he’s aware of.

“It bothers me that America is one of the few countries that still has the death penalty,” he said.

The governor’s office has been flooded with thousands of calls and e-mails on the issues, with opinion split evenly. Now, the governor says he wants to go face-to-face with voters.

“We’re going to be available all weekend to hear from constituents,” he said. “I’m going to meet with constituents on Monday–anyone that wants to talk to me about this issue,” he said.

You can call the governor at 505-476-2225. You can also e-mail him through his website under the “contact the governor” link.

Put another way, your call is especially urgent.  And, of course, you can email as well.

Update (3/16, 1:53 pm ET):  Last chance to make this call is today, Monday.  I’m doing what I can to solicit responses, including this at GOS.  Anyone else is, of course, free to post similar solicitations. Thanks for all the attention to this.

cross-posted from The Dream Antilles

For most of my life, I’ve been passionately opposed to state killing.  I remember as a child knowing that California’s gas chamber execution of Caryl Chessman was unjust.  I remember hearing with horror about the federal electric chair executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.  And I admit that since I was 10 I have never understood how civilized people could justify state killing.  From the beginning, state killing has appeared to me to be barbaric and horrific.  Yes, there are lots of other barbaric things in the world, you could make a long, annotated list of them, but for one reason or another, despite all of the other terrible things in the world, something about state killing deeply appalled me.  And eventually, the fight to end state killing spoke to me, so I took it up.  That was a long time ago.

It’s probably my feelings about barbarism that are driving me today to try to save the 49 people facing the federal death penalty.  I know we are better than this.  I know we are not killers.  I know we are more compassionate than that.  I know we are more just than that.  It’s my feelings about barbarism that have me writing an essay every day about the same thing.  That’s what has me asking you over and over again to email Attorney General Eric Holder at Whitehouse.gov or at [email protected].  That’s what has me asking you to sign a petition.  In short, I’m appalled by state killing, and I want to stop it.

What’s necessary now in my opinion is to ask Attorney General Eric Holder please to review all of the decisions made by his predecessors in office that directed federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty in federal cases and to determine whether he agrees with those decisions.  If he does not think that the death penalty is entirely appropriate, he should withdraw authority for federal prosecutors to seek death.  It’s really quite simple.  I’m not asking him to dismiss the indictments.  I’m not asking him to drop cases.  I’m not asking him to perform acts of mercy.  I’m just asking him whether the United States can be satisfied asking for a maximum of life without parole and not death in these cases.  That’s all I’m asking for.

It’s not much to ask for.  Really it isn’t.  What, if anything, is the government giving up by not asking for death and asking instead for life without parole?  In my view the government gains in stature and it gives up nothing of value.  What it does give up are things it should have abandoned decades ago.  In my view, by not asking for death, the government gives up some of its inhumanity, it gives up a horrific difference from other civilized nations, it abandons an old harbor for its racism, it leaves behind its most unenlightened, violent, hypocritical aspect.  It emerges wiser, more powerful, more human, more compassionate, and more just.  It acknowledges that humans are imperfect and that there are weapons that should never be used.  

cross-posted from The Dream Antilles

The voice of him that cryeth in the Wilderness

Isaiah 40:3

Ut oh.  Ut oh.  Ut oh.  I’m wondering whether my little, disorganized, spontaneous, repetitive campaign to require the new Attorney General to review the 49 pending federal death penalty cases and to decide that federal prosecutors shouldn’t be seeking the death penalty in these cases, has worn out my readership, my welcome, and any remaining goodwill.  That’s how it is, sometimes, when there’s more persistence than creativity.  But I soldier on, vox clamatis in deserto.

The petition now has 75 signatures, for which I am incredibly thankful.  If you haven’t signed it yet, please do so.  It is a concrete way to ask Attorney General Holder to review all of the 49 pending federal death penalty cases and to decide that his prosecutors have no business seeking the death penalty in these cases.

And many, many people have sent Attorney General emails at Whitehouse.gov or via [email protected], the Justice Department’s email address, encouraging him to review these 49 cases and not to seek the death penalty in them.  Again, please do so, too.

Please join me in the wilderness.  

cross-posted from The Dream Antilles

I woke up Sunday thinking that Attorney General Eric Holder could save the lives of the 49 people who are presently facing the federal death penalty.  He could save their lives simply by reviewing the determinations made by the Bush Administration AG’s directing that federal prosecutors should seek death in these cases, and he could decide that death wasn’t an appropriate maximum penalty in these cases.  He could decide, for example, that life without parole was enough.  More than enough.  And this simple decision could save someone’s life.  This simple decision could also put the United States in the main stream of civilized countries in the world that do not impose the death penalty.  Ever.  And it could prevent us in the United States from having even more unjustifiable blood on our hands.  And it would move us slowly, gradually toward ultimate abolition of the death penalty in the United States. What a great idea!

This is good to keep in mind when liberals, radicals, anarchists, anyone on the left is doing things within their communities, being an activist, their daily lives, etc, etc …

Its quit visible that this country (the USA) has a rather large white population.  And with this of course, comes privilege. Unearned privilege, privilege most of us don’t even realize we have.  Privilege most of us can’t even see because we are entrenched in it.

First, I want to define what privilege is.  Privilege is a sociological concept that defines the benefits that white people enjoy and/or take advantage of.  These benefits may exist in social, political, and economic situations and issues in comparison to so-called non-white people. It is not the same as racism or prejudism, mind you.  Many people don’t even realize their own privileges whether that is so-called race, male, heterosexual, religious, class, cultural, gender appearance and many others.  Within these privileges, as well, people don’t even realize that they unearned.  Meaning, a person did not have to do much of anything to benefit and/or receive them.  For example, a so-called white person will more than likely NOT be called out in a classroom to explain what it’s like to be white, but a non-white person probably will.  It’s almost as though a non-white person is called out in class to be the spokesperson for their so-called race. But within their race, the experiences are different, as well. These privileges are a part of socialization and societal norms, unfortunately.

To celebrate the revolutionary spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I’ve decided to look at a newer volume; Chris Harman’s A People’s History of the World.  This newer book takes off from Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, which indeed covered the particular impacts of people’s movements (including the one participated in by King) throughout American history.  A People’s History of the World, unfortunately, has to cover far too much ground far too quickly, and so Harman puts out a series of historical explanations which follow his script too closely, and thus misses a lot of the content of people’s history.

A People’s History of the World is nevertheless a fun read which ought to stoke some anti-capitalist fires in the hearts of readers, even if it doesn’t do so thoroughly.  My review will conclude by discussing the import, to activists, of the issues Harman brings up.

I am an activist for my people.  As I have grown older, I have more likely performed my activism with my words, which is the tool I have had at hand.

Sometimes I am repetitive.  I am a teacher.  Some lessons are hard.  That’s a clue to the fact that they are important.  Important lessons need to be taught more than once, again and again, time and again, using different words, approaching the issue from different points of view.  That’s what I do.  Some of you claim that I do it “ad nauseam.”  It’s your nausea, not mine.

Many of you know me as the transsexual woman (or whatever you call me…I’m sure that it is not favorable in many instances).  Some of you know me as a poet.  Some of you see the teacher in me.  Or the glbt activist and PFLAG parent.  I am all of these.  I am a human being.

I was born in a place and time.  I have absorbed the life lessons presented to me since then.  I am still learning.

I’ve tried to pass on what I have learned.  I continue to make that effort, in whatever new venues are available, wherever I can find an opened eye or ear.