Should we call it the Bush Limbo Dance– How Low Can You Go? From Opertion Flashlight:
MILITARY RECRUITMENT – 9/7 JOB FAIR IN THE ASTRODOME
Stop the military from preying upon the vulnerable! Come educate youth dislocated from their lives and communities – facing homelessness, joblessness and often hopelessness – about the false promises of recruiters!
Doling out food to the hungry crowds overflowing Houston’s Astrodome, the National Guard has engaged in ad hoc recruiting in recent days. Tomorrow, September 7, 2005, the U.S. military is conducting a Job Fair in the Astrodome in a blatant effort to exploit the despair of masses of Americans evacuated from the Gulf Coast. Once signed up, even if purportedly to reconstruct their region, they could easily find themselves deployed to Iraq, left with medical coverage for only two for only combat-related injury and the expectations for training eviscerated. And if they sign up on the promise of temporary relief, they could find themselves bound for extended tours of duty. Download info from the formidable Counter-Recruitment resources on the United for Peace and Justice site. www.unitedforpeace.org. Come and speak truth to empower! Call for a real jobs program which employs people to reconstruct the entire Gulf Coast region for the benefit of those in need, not to pander to corporate greed!
wilfred — I posted a diary on this earlier today — I hope that none of the watchdogs of reality come here and wreck this one too….
Thanks for getting my back (even if it was unintentional)!
lol
trying to confirm this morning — have you contacted the people whose numbers are listed in the OF post?
Have they confirmed? i was looking for people on the ground there in Houston (don’t have the extra $$ to drive down there today and see for myself) — do you know any?
Well, there’s ME…
All I’ve been able to confirm is that there WAS a detachment of volunteers from two Engineer Battalions at the `dome today. I have no idea what they were doing.
But there have been at least a dozen job and resume fairs in Houston since the weekend, (I covered two yesterday and another this afternoon), there are probably another couple dozen in plan, and I was at a meeting last night whereat the Mayor announced several more upcoming in the next week… and I think, but cannot recall for sure, that he said there was one this morning at the Astrodome (I’m pictures, not words, and it’s hard to listen carefully and shoot well at the same time). There might have been NG recruiters at an all-comers fair, but none of my contacts have said anything about a Guard-Only Recruiting Party…
(Understand I can’t shake the tree on this REAL hard without turning myself into another homeless Katrina-ite.)
I’ll keep an ear to the ground but at this point I’m thinking it’s maybe overblown a bit… (which, given Houston Indymedia, wouldn’t surprise me overly much…)
Are you a freelance phtographer? If not, I guess you can’t say what publication you work for or share any of your pictures?
In any case, thanks for the info. from the source. Is it true that they are not letting reporters/photgraphers in to the Dome? How far away do you all have to stand/be?
Yes, I’m freelance… but if I get “outed” doing political-type work, especially from the progressive side, three of my major gigs will vanish instantly.. and my apartment will follow, six days after the end of the month, as the remaining stuff isn’t NEAR enough to cover minimal expenses like rent and electric. So … subvert from within, quietly.
I haven’t been down there personally; I don’t have the credentials or the pull to be a part of the pool without an assignment and none of my regulars want to hire me to GO inside, they’re happy with what they’re getting through AP and Chronicle wires. So I’d be wasting my time, professionally, and from what my contacts at the locals tell me they’ve already got FAR more “press” there than they know what to do with… so I’d be part of the problem rather than the solution. Not good.
However. The situation at the dome, as of a couple of days ago when I last checked, is that coverage inside is being pooled. I’ve seen pictures from inside, both still and video, on a regular basis, and the Chronicle and several other press organizations have word and picture people onsite 24/7. The Chron actually has three or four people blogging from inside the dome with, apparently, cooperation of the authorities. There is onsite web and telephone access and evacuees are free to come and go as they please although I saw this morning a story that there’s going to be a 11-5 curfew so the majority of people within can sleep like normal people. However, a few hundred yards in any direction there’s a major street, and the train goes by about 50 feet outside the east fence…
Depending on where they’re drawing the line on “non-pool” press it could be up to maybe four hundred yards or so between the fenceline and the dome entrances.. but, as I say, the residents are free to come and go unaccompanied, so as far as I can see there’s no real “censorship” or “keeping `em away from the press” issues, and pooling coverage inside the dome made a great deal of sense; there are a LOT of people milling about between volunteers, residents, medical and emergency personnel…. so several hundred pressers would be yet another nuisance. Pool is enough to assure that nobody’s being seriously mistreated, I’d think… and they’re encouraging the new residents to go out and find jobs and make arrangements and so on.
I’ve chatted idly with I have no IDEA how many “evacuees” in the last 72 hours, all of whom knew I was press (three cameras, it’s hard to miss) and none of whom whispered anything about the deep dark secret unholy practices taking place in the shelters after hours; in fact they seemed mostly glad to be alive and safe with family and helpful strangers, and to be trying to find ways to get on with their lives.
I’m not going to get into the ins and outs of the “relief efforts” in Louisiana, such as they may or may not have been… Here in Houston it seems like we’re doing reasonably well by them, and if the NG wants to show up AT an open job fair to recruit, personally I don’t have a major problem with it. There are a LOT of places recruiting HEAVILY among evacuees right now, so the idea that the NG could coerce or pressure anyone into signing up, in today’s circumstances, is fairly close to laughable.
Now if someone can show me a convincing story that NG recruiters are setting up a situation where they’re making people think they’re the only option or the only way people can get back to N’Awlins to rebuild their own town, that’s going to be a VERY Different situation, but realistically I just don’t see it. These folks aren’t in lockdown.
i should have checked below for your diary, my apologies. I posted this at LSF too and we’ve been trying to verify through United Peace and Justice. The link to Operation Flashlight went down this afternoon but is back up now.
NO WORRIES, wil!! The more the merrier — the diary police are not so anal retentive around here!
😉
None at all — please share with us what you find out re: verification and/or debunking!!
Ding!Ding!Ding!Ding!Ding!Ding!
“Give that man a prize!”
“I’ll take the big stuffed panda, please. Thank you!”
This was predicted by yours truly one week ago today:
No, I’m not psychic; these people are just predictably malicious, pernicious, vicious, and any other -ious you can think of… (sigh)
Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement
Principle 13
1. In no circumstances shall displaced children be recruited nor be required or permitted to take part in hostilities.
2. Internally displaced persons shall be protected against discriminatory practices of recruitment into any armed forces or groups as a result of their displacement. In particular any cruel, inhuman or degrading practices that compel compliance or punish non-compliance with recruitment are prohibited in all circumstances.