Author: duranta

I support Cindy Sheehan’s decision to resign from the Democratic Party. How long can we afford to interpret benign intent in actions that support the funding of this war? Once again, she is showing true courage.

In her own words:

The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a “tool” of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our “two-party” system?

However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the “left” started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of “right or left”, but “right and wrong.”

I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by Democrats and Republican alike. It amazes me that people who are sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies, misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don’t find alternatives to this corrupt “two” party system our Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don’t see party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see that person’s heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?

I’m an avid listener of internet radio for many years now. It’s a way to hear new music, old music, and I’ve been inspired to purchase some cds by listening. Given that exposure to music can encourage people to ultimately purchase the music, its difficult to understand why the music industry essentially wants to tax internet radio out of existence.
Radio Paradise is my favorite station. I remember the night that George Bush stole the election the second time, Radio Paradise was playing political rock with revolutionary implications. They knew, as we knew, what was going down. Helped me to get through that difficult night.

Royalty rates are set to go in effect July 15th, retroactive to January 1st, 2006! SaveNetRadio.org is leading the charge, and explains that an  Internet Radio Equality Act was introduced by a bipartisan coalition in the Senate:

Wyden-Brownback “Internet Radio Equality Act” Introduced in the Senate
Bipartisan Bill Would Save Internet Radio

            WASHINGTON D.C. – Legislation introduced by Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Sam Brownback (R-KA) today would save Internet radio from a recent royalty hike that threatens to bankrupt the industry.  The Internet Radio Equality Act would vacate a Copyright
Royalty Board (CRB) decision to increase fees webcasters pay to play music online by a devastating 300 to 1200 percent.   Companion legislation (H.R. 2060) introduced in the House of Representatives on April 26th, by Congressman Jay Inslee (D-WA) and Don Manzullo (R-
IL), has already garnered the support of more than 60 cosponsors.

 SaveNetRadio.org, a national coalition of webcasters, recording artists, listeners and record labels applauded the bill’s introduction, expressing their gratitude to Senators Wyden and Brownback for their leadership at this critical time for the Internet radio industry and the millions of Americans who listen online every day.  “Since the CRB’s ruling, Internet radio listeners, webcasters and the artists they promote have joined together to urge Congress to prevent this vibrant industry from going silent on July 15th,” said Jake Ward, a spokesperson for the
SaveNetRadio campaign.  “On behalf of Internet radio’s 70 million monthly listeners, thousands of webcasters, and the incredible diversity of talented artists it supports, we commend Senators
Wyden and Brownback for their understanding of Internet radio’s importance and for their leadership in taking the steps needed to save it”

What’s needed, is phone calls to your senators to encourage them to possibly co-sponsor, and support this bill.

If Senate bill is not passed (companion legislation in the House is HR 2060), July 15th will be the day the music died!

July 15, when collection begins on the new royalty fees, literally will be the day the music died. Most Internet radio Webcasters will be driven out of business because of a massive retroactive royalty rate that is above total revenues for most in the business.  For large
Webcasters, the royalty increase could be between 40 percent and 70 percent of revenues.  For small Webcasters the royalty increase could reach up to 1,200 percent of revenues.

Currently, terrestrial radio stations only pay royalties to songwriters.  Internet radio and satellite radio pay royalties to both songwriters and record companies/recording artists.  However satellite radio only pays royalties of 7.5 percent of their revenue.  The Internet Radio Equality
Act of 2007 corrects the enormous disparity created by the CRB by putting Internet radio on par with satellite radio.  Additionally, the legislation would create special royalty rules for the Webcasting arms of non-commercial broadcasters like National Public Radio and college radio to ensure they are not left out of reaching new listeners on the Internet.

Anyone ever feel that a certain bit of music has saved your life? Right after Katrina, I discovered, through internet radio, Brian Eno’s “Another Day on Earth”. The lyrics, the music, helped me to keep moving and keep fighting. Let’s keep the music alive, and keep the people moving to the music.    

This is an excellent analysis that I found on the World Socialist Web Site on the Iraq Study Group, founded in March, and “bipartisan” in nature.

The bad news is that this bipartisan group, headed by trouble maker James Baker, is proposing a blood bath in Baghdad.

Riverbend beware: it may get much worse, before it ever gets better.

As the analysis points out, there are elements in the democratic and republican party, that include Bill and Hillary among others, that simply won’t let go of dreams of empire in the Middle East.

American citizen beware. Empire will be bought and paid for with the lives of your sons and daughters, and the financial security and well being of this country.    
To top it off, the New York Times is complicit with the findings of the Iraq Study Group, and appears to be backing the proposed bloodbath in Baghdad:

The deteriorating military and political situation for the US in Iraq now requires the apologists for US imperialism at the Times to justify in advance a massive escalation of American violence.

At the point in his commentary where Gordon defines the US mission, he omits, significantly, any mention of democracy. Citing American generals who speak of the “larger American mission in Iraq,” he writes: “Their assessment is that if Baghdad is overwhelmed by sectarian strife, the cause of fostering a more stable Iraq will be lost.”

Following the evolving line of the Bush administration, the mantra of a “democratic” Iraq is shelved. Democracy in Iraq has always been a façade to conceal Washington’s real war aims: seizing control of the country’s oil riches and establishing a subservient client regime and military beachhead in the Middle East.

However, the downgrading of “democracy” as the purported aim of the occupation coincides with high-level discussions among US policymakers about ousting the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki by means of a military coup, should he continue to resist American pressure to disarm Shia militias that are hostile to the US presence.

An earlier article in the Times, published on Sunday (“US to Hand Iraq a New Timetable on Security Role”), cited “senior American officials” who indicated that one of the alternatives under consideration is to “give the Iraqi Army the lead role in domestic security, downgrading the role of police units.” A turn to the Army for policing operations would represent a turn to military dictatorship and the enlistment of the traditional Sunni officer corps to attack Sadr and his militia.

Gordon’s commentary is typical of the Times’ cynical and dishonest coverage of the war. After quoting Lieutenant General Peter Chiarelli, commander of American forces in Iraq, as stating, “As Baghdad goes, so goes Iraq,” Gordon adds his own comment: “It is hard to see how any Iraq plan can work if the capital’s citizens cannot be protected.”

Protected from whom? The Times depicts the American military as the protector of the Iraqi people, even as it promotes plans for a massive assault on Baghdad neighborhoods.

The formation of the Iraq Study Group is truly disturbing, as it demonstrates how the interests of the two parties are played out in foreign affairs…

I’m not saying that every democrat running for office would support such a group, but it is interesting that there has been not a peep from democrats on the Iraq Study Group, and its apparent enormous influence in possibly creating policy in regards to the war.

It is also questionable as to whether a so-called anti-war candidate, and how many are there, really, could maintain their opposition in the face of such “institutional” support in both parties for creating empire in the Middle East.

No, it is going to be up to the American people to generate this grass roots opposition to the war, and so far, I see most simply waiting for democrats to take control of Congress, the Senate or both. This may not mean a change in war strategy, and it may mean more escalation either way, particularly without a significant grass roots effort to end the war.

Cindy Sheehan cannot do it by herself.

You may draw your own conclusions. I think there are too many members of both parties who still, to this day, believe the costs are worth the losses, in terms of lives and the quality of life for American citizens, not to mention Iraqis.

It is certainly a blood bath with no end yet in sight.

More on the Iraq Study Group:

The ISG’s mission statement makes clear there will be no criticism of the Bush administration. The Iraq Study Group, it declared, will “conduct a forward-looking, independent assessment of the current and prospective situation on the ground in Iraq, its impact on the surrounding region, and consequences for US interests”. That is, its purpose is not to hold anyone to account for the illegal invasion of a sovereign state; the lies told to the American people about “weapons of mass destruction” and Iraqi links to 9/11; the death and destruction that has resulted; or the tensions the war has created throughout the Middle East. As Baker told the US press, it was not going to “dwell on the past”.

The Democratic Party rushed to provide assistance. Republican Frank Wolf proposed the formation of the ISG to Congress in March with the support of leading Democrats such as Senator Joseph Biden. It enjoys the solid backing of Bill and Hillary Clinton. Lee Hamilton, a leading figure in the Congress throughout the Clinton period, accepted an invitation to serve as the ISG’s Democrat co-chair. Hamilton was an obvious choice. He was co-chair of the 9/11 commission, which covered up the Bush administration’s role in that disaster and can be expected to do the same on Iraq.

The other prominent Democrats on the 10-member commission are William Perry, Clinton’s defence secretary; Leon Panetta, Clinton’s chief of staff; Vernon Jordan, a close confidante of Clinton; and former senator Charles Robb. As well as Baker, the Republican Party is represented by former CIA director Robert Gates; former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Connor; Edwin Meese, attorney general in the Reagan administration; and former senator Alan Simpson.

The willingness of the Democrats to take part in such a body underscores a basic truth of contemporary American politics. The Democrats, just as much as the Republicans, are determined to preserve and extend the US grip over the Middle East and its oil resources. Both parties are equally committed to the perspective of using military force to block any challenges to the waning US dominance over world politics and economy. While millions of Americans want an end to the violence, the US ruling class is plotting new wars against Iran, Syria and North Korea, to name just the most immediate targets. In the meantime, there is a consensus in Washington that the situation in Iraq must be brought under control.

This is what should be grabbing headlines: not a single senator voted against $70 billion more for war, in either party. I think the World Socialist Web Site sums it up quite well:

Not a single senator of either party missed the opportunity to demonstrate his or her support for the bloody interventions in the Middle East and Central Asia. This vote rips asunder the miserable attempts of a section of the Democratic Party to posture as “critics” of the Iraq war. It demonstrates that behind the quibbling over tactics and complaints about the incompetence of the Bush administration’s conduct of the war, the Democrats remain committed to violently suppressing the resistance of the Iraqi people to the US occupation and Washington’s drive to seize the country’s oil resources.

The vote shows that a Democratic victory in the November mid-term elections will in no way alter the basic course of US foreign policy–whether in Iraq or Afghanistan, or other countries targeted for future aggression such as Iran and Syria.

In its report on the Senate vote, the Associated Press noted that the war funding measure was passed “after minimal debate.” Such is the contempt of the two corporate-controlled parties for the sentiments of the American people, who oppose the war by a wide margin.

Nothing could more clearly express the unbridgeable chasm that separates the entire political establishment from the broad mass of working people. These two parties are accountable not to the American people, but rather to a financial oligarchy. What has emerged in America, behind the increasingly threadbare trappings of democracy, is a plutocracy.

As for the Iraqi people, the Associated Press reported one day before the Senate vote the results of two polls that show overwhelming opposition to the US military occupation. A poll conducted by the University of Maryland’s Program on International Policy Attitudes reported that 60 percent of Iraqis approve the attacks on US-led forces and almost 80 percent say the US military provokes more violence in Iraq than it prevents.

The US State Department’s own poll, according to the AP, found that two thirds of Iraqis in Baghdad favor an immediate withdrawal of US forces.

There is dissent in New Orleans; beautiful, raucous, noisy, profane, righteous, brave dissent.

Public housing residents in New Orleans just won’t give up. In fact, judging from the increased turnout from protest to protest, the grass roots movement in New Orleans to reopen public housing is growing.

Elderly residents of public housing in New Orleans have told me personally that they will continue to fight until they are on their death beds. Several have said they have nothing to lose. In this video of the April 4th protest at the St. Bernard Housing Development, in which residents clashed with police and HANO security just for the right to enter their flood-damaged apartments, wheelchair-bound Gloria Irving is heard to exclaim, “If I have to die I want to die in New Orleans.”

Cynthia Wiggins, public housing resident and organizer, said at the recent HANO Board meeting, in which 250+ residents wrested control of the meeting from the hands of the newly appointed HUD reciever, Donald Babers, “What are you going to do, start arresting women and children?”

An exasperated, frightened Babers tried in vain to remain in control of the meeting, but wound up conceding to the residents, and allowing them to speak before regular business. Then, in further defiance of business as usual, after Babers ended the comment period,
residents began to chant “No justice, no peace”, preventing any sense of normalcy for the remainder of the meeting. Babers quickly adjourned the meeting, and fled soon afterwards by police escort.

Now, residents are speaking to lawyers, and simultaneously planning a tent city to be constructed just outside of the St. Bernard Housing Development for June 3rd. This tent city will remain open as long as St. Bernard remains closed, residents have vowed.

There is much at stake. The collusion between liberals, conservatives and urban planners, to stake out and create a new New Orleans, devoid of neighborhoods of poverty, is clashing head on with the passionate desire of residents, including public housing residents, to return home to their neighborhoods and communities.

Fueling the growing desperation of residents to return is FEMA reneging on initial promises to provide vouchers for evacuees for one year to 18 months. Low income residents are beginning to pack their bags and head back to New Orleans, some to still partially-closed Iberville public housing, in a desperate attempt to find housing, after FEMA  has withdrawn the welcome mat for Texas for low-income Katrina evacuees.

“They’re going to bum rush the city when the FEMA vouchers run out,” one public housing resident said several weeks ago, ” and while the “bum rush” has yet to occur, residents are coming back. I just spoke to a public housing resident, an elderly woman in Iberville, who is illegally occupying her apartment.

“They are putting people in jail for illegaly occupying their apartments,” she said. “I guess I’ll be an elderly person in jail.”   . Indeed, word is spreading that panic-stricken evacuees in Houston are packing, even as we speak, to return to a still devastated New Orleans, because they can’t afford the rents in Houston without assistance.

Already, in the partially reopened Iberville Housing Development in downtown New Orleans, HUD is enforcing a rule that only lease holders are allowed to live in the apartments, and HUD has begun evicting family members and friends of the lease holders.

Evictions in New Orleans’ private stock of housing is nothing new post-Katrina, with rents sky-rocketing, and landlords taking advantage of the devastated housing situation and gauging tenants.

Now evictiion notices are being used to insure that the Iberville community remains largely closed, with just 166 families back, out of the 850 that lived there pre-Katrina.

Some of the families that are back and are waiting to come back are receiving notices that they have to remove all of their belongings from their units, under the guise of a mold problem. Only problem is, HUD isn’t offering alternative housing to those who are being asked to leave.

New Orleans had the largest population of people in public housing and Section 8 housing pre-Katrina, in the United States. 49,000 people lived in HUD subsidized housing pre-katrina. Nearly half of those were in public housing. Low income housing provided shelter for those who created and fed the unique culture of the city. Now, with the city’s rent stock drastically depleted from flooding, without low-income housing, New Orleans will become what some white developers, and the Times Picayune, basically have proposed: a museum to the culture that once was.

From demolishing Iberville to build a Jazz City (I thought New Orleans was a “jazz” city), to containing the former home of Fats Domino in a “living museum”, the liberal and conservative, white elite of New Orleans want a sanitized version of the Big Easy, with a drastically reduced population of working class African Americans. And they have national help to bring this about from liberal urban planners.

Black Commentator has an article right now on its front page, by Adolph Reed and Stephen Steinberg, on the collusion between liberals and conservatives, on the continuing efforts to scatter and displace neighborhoods of poverty in New Orleans, and all over the country.

Residents of public housing pay rent, $350 and up. Many have strong neighborhood communities and ties, in particular, the St. Bernard Housing and the B.W. Cooper developments.

Residents of the St. Bernard development have a lengthy history of activism, and are determined, vocal and passionate in their efforts to reclaim their neighborhood. Sharon Jaspers, long-time resident there, said at the May 3rd HANO meeting,

Using cell phones and word of mouth as tools for organizing, displaced residents have come in from Texas for protests on chartered vans and buses. In their efforts to destroy public housing, HUD bureaucrats have run into a brick wall of grass roots support that’s gaining strength, and numbers.  

Sherry Wolf says the jig is up. I have to agree with her. Here in Louisiana, democrats and republicans in the state legislature are set to pass legislation today to outlaw abortion.

Daily Kos doesn’t want single issue groups to control the party, but I would say, working class people, and their issues, lost control of the party long ago.
Wolf says,

But there was a buildup to Hillary’s pronouncement, as Wolf outlines:

Today in Louisiana, SB 33, if passed, will criminalize abortion. Planned Parenthood has an urgent notice out for help to combat this anti-human rights piece of legislation.

Howard Zinn, in Wolf’s article, has these pertinent thoughts on the abortion issue (quoting from his article in the Progressive):

When I have time to read, and it isn’t much these days, I often pull Howard Zinn’s the People’s History of the United States from my bookshelf.

I have taken to reading over and over again about the grass roots movements that rose up in the 1930’s to answer the crisis in affordable housing and workers’ rights of that era.

Of course, we face remarkably similar issues here in New Orleans, and, as New Orleans is a microcosm of the rest of the nation, all over the country as well, as affordable housing prices distance themselves ever more from the salaries of working class people, and yes, the professional class as well.

Unbelievably, despite the acute shortage of labor her in New Orleans at this time, wages are still not keeping up with the cost of living: witness Walgreens offering just $6 per hour to start.

Our United Front for Affordable Housing, composed of public housing residents and community housing activists are staging rallies, marches and confronting the powers that be, over issues of housing and human rights here.

What does all this have to do with abortion? All important legislation regarding the strengthening of human rights in this country has been preceded by grass roots movements that have taken it to the streets.

The recent rise of immigration rights activists, by the hundreds of thousands, has given pause to those lawmakers who were moving full steam ahead against immigrant rights.  I agree with Zinn and Wolf, in that we need a national call to action on the abortion issue, to counter state movement to curtail the reproductive rights of women.

If NOW doesn’t have the guts to do it. then other groups and individuals will need to step in.

It is time, once again, to take it to the streets, regarding the issue of abortion rights. And if and when this happens, watch how other issues of human rights are strengthened with positive fallout.

For those who think this is an issue they can afford to not get involved in, consider this: those women seeking abortions can be viewed now as the least of us. Undermine the rights of one group of people, particularly those most vulnerable to persecution, and all of our rights are undermined.

We can’t afford to “lose” a single issue, because this loss will undermine the human rights we are struggling to uphold and put into practice here in our own country.

That is the fallacy of the condemnation of single issue groups. These groups focus on the issue, and provide education for the rest of us. Let us not abandon a single issue regarding human rights, and strive to protect the human rights of all.  

Make no mistake of this, the same forces that would militarize our economy, our nation, have set their sights on using Katrina to further weaken the rights of ordinary citizens, namely, middle and working class citizens of New Orleans.  As the Nation points out, the democratic party has been weak to non-existent in defending the right of our city to rebuild, and the right of our citizens to return.

 If one examines the recovery of the Gulf Coast in Mississippi, I believe one would see much the same: working class communities left to fend for themselves, in a red state no less.

There’s been a debate here raging between the different activist groups, and C3/Hands off Iberville, the group that I belong to, has been much maligned in suggesting the failure of recovery has much more to do with class issues, than race. It is a debate worth having, and I am hoping it will continue.

In the meantime, I have little faith in the power of electoral politics to change much these days. It is grassroots involvement, as always, that will signal the real changes.

The Nation article makes no mention of our group, C3/Hands off Iberville. We’ve been working side by side with residents to reopen public housing since Katrina. It’s an uphill battle, given Secretary of HUD Alphonse Jackson’s hostility to public housing, and to the low income citizens of New Orleans in general.

He stated back in October that there would be fewer poor people in New Orleans post-Katrina, and he has done everything in his power to bring this about, by keeping the housing developments shut-down. The few that are being repaired are proceeding at a snail’s pace, further insuring fewer residents will return.

Local black and white politicians are using public housing residents as a convenient scapegoat and punching bag for all of the city’s ills pre-Katrina. Mayoral candidate Peggy Wilson has gone so far as to say in a TV ad that the city ought not to welcome back “welfare queens, pimps, crack heads and gang bangers” from public housing. But she has been assisted in this scapegoating by Oliver Thomas, the African American president of the New Orleans City Council, when he suggested recently that the city doesn’t need the “soap opera watchers” in public housing to return.

 Like my colleague Mike Howells said, public housing in New Orleans is about as popular as Anthrax right now, but we believe it to be a key to assisting the working class African Americans in returning to the city.

The Nation article correctly points out that the same people who profited from the destruction of the St. Thomas Housing Development in New Orleans, the Canizaros and the Kabacoffs, in the late 90’s,  now have unprecedented power in deciding what our city may look like in the coming years.

But the powers that be have always, and will continue to underestimate the power and will of the people. New Orleanians are fighting back, and the Nation article underscores some of those efforts.

There are national lessons to be drawn from this New Orleans struggle: the right of citizens to determine the fate of their communities is, at bottom, the heart of the issue, as well as the very purpose of government during and after natural, and manmade, calamities.

The billions going to the Pentagon, and down the black hole of Iraq, is the sub-theme.

Cindy Shehann came to our rally to reopen St. Bernard Housing Development, and underscored this struggle, in an article she co-authored with Sam Bostaph:

Cindy and Sam mistook the St. Bernard Development for the parish of the same namesake. She is on an endless world wind tour of the U.S. to raise issues and consciousness. Local grassroots efforts matter a great deal. What’s going on in your town?

From the Nation:

Hillary can’t stand up to toast. And we all know the policies of this administration can, and should be, toast.

Molly points out, for those concerned with poll results, polls are showing a need for real reform in Washington D.C.

But Hillary and others seem more concerned with status quo: pleasing certain special interests and their lobbyists.

It seems Hillary is counting on her popularity in New York, her general popularity with women registered as democrats, and perceived general ignorance of issues. As polls are showing though, voters seem pretty wise to the issues.

When do we send a message to Hillary and others that we won’t stand for this bullshit any longer?

We can win on an agenda of reform of many issues. The polls are showing this. It is up to us to attract and cultivate the candidate, and we can do this if we remain true to our ideals.

Don’t sell out principles in a mistaken attempt to win elections. We need not take this route. Molly is right.

Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans was clearly pandering, in his speech on Monday that calls for a Divinely ordained chocolate city. He is seeking to ease the tensions he is largely responsible for creating. It was he who created the Bring New Orleans Back Commission (BNOB), composed mostly of white, well-to-do, business/corporate types who have a profound interest in reducing the numbers of African-American working class families in New Orleans.
If Nagin really wanted his “chocolate city” to be restored, he would not have appointed Joseph Canizaro to chair the BNOB.

Why? Joseph Canizaro is the real estate magnate and banker, President Bush fund raiser, who is responsible, with a lot of help from his friends, for the diaspora created by the destruction of the St. Thomas Housing Development in the late ’90’s.

Canizaro made $70 million in that event, profits earned off of the lives and backs of African-American working class families, when land he purchased near St. Thomas became a new home for a Wal Mart. Standing in the way of this development initially was the St. Thomas Housing Development.

850 African American households were displaced with the destruction of St. Thomas, in a pre-Katrina diaspora, to all points in the city, many to low-lying, flood-prone areas. St. Thomas was located in the Garden District, which did not flood. This diaspora triggered turf wars and resulted in deaths.

I had begun to contact some of the former residents of St. Thomas this past summer, and some I spoke to were still looking for adequate housing.

Hope 6 funds were used to demolish St. Thomas, as they have been used all over the country for the destruction of African American neighborhoods in American cities. “MIxed income housing” has been created within the void, and yes it sounds good on paper.

Hope 6, and mixed income housing communities always result in a drastically reduced numbers of available housing for low-income, often minority, workers and their families.

Homelessness is a rising problem in our country, and HUD policies of using HOPE 6 funds to destroy neighborhoods, is adding to the problem (note in the article I link to advocating the destruction of public housing, there isn’t a single mention of concern for  residents once public housing is destroyed).

Alphonse Jackson, Secretary of Housing and Urban Affairs, swept into New Orleans this past October, shortly after the storm, and unleashed a Katrina of his own: he declared, with 4 City Councilwomen standing behind him, that New Orleans would be a city of fewer poor people, and that it was time to dismantle the public housing system in favor of mixed-income communities.

He failed to note, however, that under the Fair Housing Act, passed in 1968, any change in policy calls for public hearings and resident input.

Jackson also declared much of public housing to be “ruined”, as did Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) officials, right after the storm. We countered this by going into the developments in late September, and snapping photos, and contacting HANO officials and the media with those photos.

HANO began to back-track. We helped to encourage and organize residents by contacting them in shelters and all points displaced. We encouraged them, and they encouraged each other, to lobby HANO to reopen public housing.

It worked. HANO and Jackson counted on community support to close troubled public housing developments, but this support did not materialize in most quarters. Even New Orleans City Council members backtracked and began calling for the reopening of public housing to help ease the post-Katrina housing crisis.

So-called “troubled” neighborhoods belong to the people who live there. We cannot improve our neighborhoods if we lose them.

Now, slowly, this lumbering system of housing developments is reopening, despite the crunch in funds from HUD to HANO, which I believe is purposefully designed to discourage citizen use of public housing. Residents are hanging tough and pressuring, and waiting…for the reopening of all of public housing.

Canizaro is now calling for the creation of mixed income communities, much like he helped to creat at St. Thomas, to be constructed all over the city, essentially demolishing African American working class neighborhoods that have been hard hit by the flooding.

Canizaro, interviewed on MacNeil/Lehrer the other night, said New Orleans had a crime problem pre-Katrina. He said many poor people are not coming back to the city, and the crime problem will be alleviated.

This transparent racism and classism is what passes for urban planning in our city right now. But many residents see through this. I attended a District D meeting that included residents from the hard hit New Orleans east. Many residents challened that they will not be driven out of neighborhoods by any plan. Some have expressed that they will commit violence to defend their homes.

By the way, the use of eminent domain is included in the Master Plan, as a “last resort”.

Residents know what is coming. As they struggle to marshall their resources to rebuild, they see this plan for what it is: an attempt to shift the demographics of New Orleans: to keep out African American, working class families, to reduce crime, and a land grab.

Already, commission members of the BNOB have reported, in this Times Picayune article, that they have been approached by developers, who they refused to name, to create “infill” sites: commercial/industrial development, with housing for workers nearby. These sites are slated for all of the devasted neighborhoods.

Our contention is: assist residents in rebuilding destroyed or damaged homes. Long-terms residents should be employed in any commercial/industrial developement.

This was a manmade disaster, in the sense of faulty construction of levees. We believe residents are due damages, which would assist them in rebuilding their homes and returning to the city.

In the master plan, Canizaro has called on a four-month planning process, during which neighborhoods must “prove” their viability in returning. The plan also calls for a moratorium on rebuilding. Both items are already serving to discourage some from rebuilding, as it is intended to do, in my view. It has also had the opposite effect: there is a flood of stubborn, New Orleans residents seeking permits to rebuild.

The spirit of the people here is amazing.

Many residents are determined to defeat a plan that would create a Disneyesque New Orleans, devoid of the very people who created the culture that has given us jazz, creole cuisine and Mardi Gras Indians.

There is a populist movement arising out of necessity here, to defeat this plan.

Please spread the word, and if you like, let your displeasure be known to our city leaders, particularly Mayor Nagin, who is danger of melting the very Chocolate City, that he professes to want to rebuild.

I would also like to encourage people to become aware of public housing issues, and homelessness issues, in their own communities.  Seattle has an activist network around the issue of public housing that I’ve linked to in this article.

I linked to two articles, authored by Jay Arena. He is a Ph.D. candidate at Tulane University, and is finishing up his dissertation on the St. Thomas housing development and the forces that destroyed it. He can be contacted at jarena@tulane.edu

You can download the BNOB’s master plan here.

I would be glad to entertain any questions and/or criticism.

Trying to google for information on the actual budget cuts that went down with Cheney casting the deciding vote, was to wade through a plethera, everywhere I went, on articles on the spying of America.

I take it as a compliment if this administration decided to spy on me.
Now I am not against the posting of articles and information on this unfolding spygate. It must be exposed, and frankly, I would be disappointed if the group I belong to, involved as we are in the preservation of public housing, aren’t on their lists.

Let them spy, as we have nothing to hide.

What is flying somewhat under the radar, is the rape of the lower and middle classes. Did anyone watch Frontline the other night, on the deceptive practices of banks and their credit cards?

I oppose the recent,  inhumane cuts to the budget, and I oppose the corporate sponsored,  vicious attacks on the working poor of this country, and the working poor of Iraq.

Did you hear that the government of Iraq raised the price of heating oil in that country, sparking demonstrations and riots?

We ought to stand in solidarity with the working poor of Iraq, because they are facing a push by this administration to privatize their economy and bring them into the free market system, never mind the cost to actual human beings.

I oppose the recent budget cuts that will target the working poor, in a vicious and inhumane manner, and increase the worries and problems for American families all across this nation.

Some of those cuts are:

“The conference report cuts $2.6 billion from programs serving single-parent families, foster children, and low-income elderly and disabled individuals. These cuts consist of 1$1.5 billion from child support enforcement, $343 million from foster care programs, and $732 million from Supplemental Security income for the elderly and disabled.”

“The conference report cuts Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by $6.9 billion, including harmful increases in cost-sharing and premiums that are structured slightly different than the House bill, but that impose even larger burdens on beneficiaries.”

“The conference report cuts important farm bill conservation programs by $934 million over five years.”

At a time when the availability of adequate housing is in crisis in the gulf states, the budget “saves $230 million by eliminating mandatory spending and requiring annual appropriations for certain activities carried out by the Department of Housing and Urban Development with regard to properties in mortgage default.”

If y’all can find additional information as to what has actually been cut, please post. There is little being written about this,

I’m encouraged by the attention, at least on the blogs, to the New York transit strike. This is really going to test the mettle of those in New York committed to economic justice.

The wealthy elite who profit from the labor of the lower and middle classes are just loving this unfolding spygate that is sopping the attention and the energy of activists like a brand new sponge. Why? Because it diverts attention and energy away from the continued whittling away of basic humane services that help our most vulnerable, which increasingly includes middle class families.

It diverts attention away from the consolidation of economic resources, ever more in the hands of fewer and fewer people.

They don’t mind if a few of their own are sacrificed to the unfolding scandals. What they would mind is if Americans actually began to speak and shout about the disproportionate sharing and distribution of economic resources in this country, and its real life effects on people.

They would really begin to be aggravated if people began to question the ability of a so-called free market system to deal with the ravages of several hurricanes in just a couple of years.

Are a hungry people more likely to revolt, or less likely?