Category: Courts / Laws / legal

Peace & Justice History for 2/24

February 24, 1895
José Martí, a Cuban revolutionary, poet, journalist and teacher, began the liberation struggle against Spanish control. He had been forced out of Cuba repeatedly (to Spain) for his opposition to colonial rule, and spent 15 years in the U.S. organizing the revolution just before returning home.

José Martí

Cultivate a White Rose
By José Martí
I cultivate a white rose
In July as in January
For the sincere friend
Who gives me his hand frankly.
And for the cruel person who tears out
the heart with which I live,
I cultivate neither nettles nor thorns:
I cultivate a white rose.
read about José Martí 
February 24, 1965

District 1199 of the health care workers’ union (now Service Employees International Union) in New York City became the first U.S. labor union to officially oppose the war in Vietnam.
February 24, 1966

Father and son, Tom and Barry Bondhus, united in their opposition to the draft.
Photo: Pete Hohn, Minneapolis Tribune
Barry Bondhus, classified 1-A (fully eligible) for the draft during the Vietnam War, dumped two buckets of manure in file drawers at the Elk River, Minnesota, draft board. A farmer’s son (one of ten brothers) from Big Lake who acted with the full support of his parents, he was charged with destruction of government property.
His father, Tom, wrote a declaration of war on the government over their insistence on forcing his boys into the army. He said he was prepared to die to protect his sons but eager to negotiate. “My opinion is that since our constitution guarantees: Life, Liberty, and The Pursuit of Happiness; and because the army denies all three; the draft is not lawful.”
Barry, sometimes referred to as “the Big Lake One,” who listed his race as “human” on the draft forms, served 14 months in jail and prison for his action.
Perspective on the case and the Bondhus family more than 50 years later 
February 24, 1972
Daniel Berrigan (one of the “Catonsville 9”) was released after 18 months of a three-year term. He went to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where his brother Phil Berrigan was on trial, also for anti-Vietnam War activities [see February 21, 1972].
Investigation of a Flame, a film about the Berrigan brothers and the Catonsville 9 
February 24, 1983
A congressional commission released a report condemning the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, calling it a “grave injustice.”
Read more 
February 24, 2012
Syndicated talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh began a three-broadcast-day-long campaign attacking Georgetown Law School student Sandra Fluke (rhymes with book) for her testimony before the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee.


The previous week she had been invited to testify on the subject of federal requirements for contraceptive coverage in health insurance policies before the Republican-controlled House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Instead, Committee Chair Darrell Issa (R-CA) declared her testimony inappropriate (she is past president of Georgetown Law Students for Reproductive Justice), instead hearing from five men. Committee member Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney asked, “Where are the women?”
Fluke talked about the high cost of contraception and the non-pregnancy-related importance of such medications for some women.
Limbaugh spent six hours on air demeaning her personally and derided her as a “slut” and a “prostitute.”
Watch Sandra Fluke’s testimony: 

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryfebruary.htm#february24

Some great clips, some long from the Majority Report.

Short clips from TizzyEnt

 

This  videos are hard to watch, I had to fast forward over the part showing the man harassing these people and acting like a deranged gang thug, which maga is.  It is going to get worse as more of these vigilantes think they have a right to be enforcers of their own opinions.  We need to make sure that every event is punished and made public to stop these people from acting this way.   Hugs

A south Carolina man is in jail for illegally detaining people he thought were “illegals”

 

Canceling any non white male centric holiday in the name of DEI? Sounds about Project 2025 of them.

Wanting lower grocery prices is good; believing a liar is not.

Deporting his supporters: They got your vote, they don’t need you anymore.

Looks like DOGE is coming for the Department of Labor next.

 

More Ugly News From Kansas

Kansas House embraces bill on religious, moral liberty within state’s foster care program

Snippet (it’s not too long to go read):

An amendment from Rep. Susan Ruiz, a Shawnee Democrat, to modify the bill’s language so best interests of a child in foster or adoptive care remained the top priority at DCF was rejected by the House. She said the amendment was necessary because the bill was drafted in a way that could force a subsection of children in Kansas to endure more trauma.

“You have to remember why children come into the system in the first place,” Ruiz said. “They come into the system because of abuse and neglect, and it comes in so many forms.”

Ruiz told House colleagues that Kansas youth were physically beaten and emotionally traumatized by parents and church leaders who wanted children to adhere to a certain sexual orientation or gender identity. Some kids were expected to “pray away the gay,” she said.

Others were compelled to undergo so-called conversion therapy, she said. It has little basis in science, but proposes to erase a person’s gender identity or sexuality — usually to conform to ideals of other people.

“This bill opens up the door to one of the most horrible forms of therapy that any human being can be exposed to,” Ruiz said. (Snip-MORE)

Kansas Not a Safe Haven

Many of us saw this coming, with AG Kobach in office.

ICE signs deal with top Kansas law enforcement agencies

by: Matthew Self

TOPEKA (KSNT) – Kansas’ attorney general and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI) have signed a deal to assist federal immigration forces in the Sunflower State.

Danedri Herbert with the Kansas Office of the Attorney General said in a press release on Monday, Feb. 17 that Attorney General Kris Kobach and the KBI have signed an agreement with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). This will allow KBI agents to work alongside Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to remove immigrants who are residing in Kansas illegally.

A limited number of KBI agents will receive ICE training that authorizes the agents to arrest immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally, serve and execute warrants for some immigration violations and issue immigration detainers, according to the press release. Herbert said a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes states and political subdivisions of a state to enter into agreements like this. (snip-MORE)

This is how the new US works. How long will we remain a world power?

The US Is Grifting Ukraine

I know it is too late to change the vote, but we can make their vote hang on them and drag them down. They depend on us forgetting what they did.

They Don’t Care …

Thank you Ten Bears for posting this video.  I wish more people could have seen it and stuff like it … before the vote.   Hugs

Peace & Justice History for 2/21

February 21, 1848
“The Communist Manifesto,” written by 29-year-old Karl Marx with the assistance of Friedrich Engels, was published in London (in German) by a group of German-born revolutionary socialists known as the Communist League.

Friedrich Engels Karl Marx
The political pamphlet — arguably one of the most influential in history — proclaimed that “the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles,” and that the inevitable victory of the proletariat, or working class, would put an end to class society forever.
Read the Manifesto 
February 21, 1965
Malcolm X, an African-American nationalist and religious leader, was shot and killed in New York City by Black Muslims with whom he had broken the year before, as he began to address his Organization of Afro-American Unity at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City’s Washington Heights. His home had been firebombed just a few days earlier. He was 39.

Radio story on the late Manning Marable’s biography, Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention 
More on on Malcolm’s assassination
MalcolmX.com 
“In 1964, after his break with Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad, and following his trips to Africa and to Mecca, Malcolm was seriously questioning black nationalism. He was also beginning to recognize that MLK’s non-violent methods, far from being passive, were actually creating more change than the separatism of the Nation of Islam.
In this same period MLK was beginning to recognize that Malcolm was advocating self-defense, not violence.
In March Malcolm and Martin encountered one another by chance at a news conference in Washington, D.C. Subsequently Malcolm spoke at several rallies in support of the civil rights movement, and in February 1965, two weeks before his assassination, he went to Selma to meet with King.” –Grace Lee Boggs

” You can’t separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.”–“Prospects for Freedom in 1965,” speech, January 7 1965.
February 21, 1972
The trial began for Father Philip Berrigan and six other activists (the “Harrisburg Seven”) in Pennsylvania. They were charged with conspiring in an alleged plot to kidnap Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
Proceedings later ended in a mistrial.

Daniel Berrigan, above, and his brother Philip in the documentary, “Investigation of a Flame.” The film focuses on the Catonsville action.
Remembering Fr. Philip Berrigan 
February 21, 1975
Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell, Mitchell aide Robert Mardian, and former White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman were sentenced to 21⁄2 to 8 years in prison for their roles in the Watergate cover-up. They were variously convicted of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, fraud, and perjury.
See the new film, Frost/Nixon, for perspective on some of
the issues behind Watergate
 Charlie Rose interview with Peter Morgan, the screenwriter (and author of what was originally a play) and Michael Sheen and Frank Langella, the lead actors
February 21, 2011
Two Libyan Air Force fighter pilots defected to the Mediterranean island of Malta rather than carry out orders they had received to bomb civilian countrymen. Two helicopters with seven others landed in Malta to escape the violence. Colonel Muammar Qadaffi had ordered the attacks in attempt to quell the growing protests against his 42-year dictatorship.
Libya’s ambassadors to China, India, Indonesia and Poland, as well as Libya’s representative to the Arab League and most, if not all, of its mission at the United Nations resigned the same day.

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryfebruary.htm#february21

An Oklahoma Senator Introduces Legislation to Ban All Porn and Imprison Content Creators

https://www.them.us/story/oklahoma-porn-ban

What is it with these religious bigots who think their god gives them the right to force everyone to believe / live as they claim to do.  They are the first to demand their rights to worship / live as they wish.  What gives them the idea the rest of us don’t want the same right. They were the first to attack the Taliban for forcing everyone in the country to worship / live by their version of Islam.  Yet now they demand to be the US Christian Taliban.  I do not understand their hate.   They pick one or a few passages in the OT to clobber others while ignoring all the rest.  They don’t stone their rebellious children, they don’t follow the other things in Leviticus and they do not follow anything Jesus said about caring for others.  Hate, dominance, and vengeance is all they care about.  The Old Testament god gives them that. And pleae notice the bill is titled Increasing Penalties for Child Pornography …   it goes against all porn.  Just like innocent drag queen story hours were attacked to protect the children from seeing people in costumes reading stories.   Hugs

Alongside SB593, Deevers, who is also a pastor at Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Elgin, Oklahoma, introduced legislation to abolish abortion, prohibit drag performances in front of minors, ban divorce on the grounds of incompatibility, and provide tax credits to couples who opt into “covenant marriages” or have multiple children within the bounds of marriage — just to name some highlights.

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SB 593, introduced by Senator Dusty Deevers, is part of a slate of eight bills by the legislator to “restore moral sanity” to the state.
By Mathew Rodriguez
Image may contain Computer Electronics Laptop Pc Computer Hardware Computer Keyboard Hardware Body Part and Finger
Gender Spectrum Collection

An Oklahoma state senator has introduced legislation that would ban all pornography, with criminal penalties of up to 10 years in prison for the “production, distribution or possession” of any pornography, according to a press release from the Oklahoma Senate. SB 593, proposed by Senator Dusty Deevers on January 21, is part of a slate of eight bills by the legislator to “restore moral sanity” to the state of Oklahoma.

The bill, entitled “Increasing Penalties for Child Pornography and Prohibiting Pornography in Oklahoma,” goes far beyond the scope suggested in its title. While it does advocate for raising the penalty for the possession, distribution, or production of child pornography from 0-20 years up to 10-30 years, the bill has gone so far as to prohibit pornography entirely.

Deevers’ description of pornography as a “highly addictive drug” directly echoes the words of the authors of Project 2025, who, in the foreword to the over 900-page blueprint for a very different America, linked pornography to both child abuse and trans identity.

“Pornography, manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children, for instance, is not a political Gordian knot inextricably binding up disparate claims about free speech, property rights, sexual liberation, and child welfare,” the foreword to the document reads. “It has no claim to First Amendment protection. Its purveyors are child predators and misogynistic exploiters of women. Their product is as addictive as any illicit drug and as psychologically destructive as any crime. Pornography should be outlawed.”

Alongside SB593, Deevers, who is also a pastor at Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Elgin, Oklahoma, introduced legislation to abolish abortion, prohibit drag performances in front of minors, ban divorce on the grounds of incompatibility, and provide tax credits to couples who opt into “covenant marriages” or have multiple children within the bounds of marriage — just to name some highlights.

Mike Stabile, the director of public policy at the Free Speech Coalition, said the proposed bill was really an attempt to encroach on free speech in a statement to USA Today.

 

“Porn is the canary in the coal mine of free speech, and the trial balloon used by governments to pass laws that can censor speech more broadly,” he told the outlet. “No matter how people feel about adult content, we should all be concerned about the proposed government crackdown on speech.”

Deevers’ attack on pornography comes less than a month after age verification laws effectively made porn inaccessible in 16 U.S. states, mostly in the regional South.

At the time that many of these bans went into effect, Aylo, the parent company to PornHub, told Mashable that it has “publicly supported age verification of users for years” but that the kind required by these bills is “ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous,” as well as a threat to users’ security.

PornHub
Pornhub Is Now Inaccessible in Almost the Entire U.S. South
A contributor to Project 2025 was recorded last year stating that age-verification laws are a “back door” to broader porn bans.

Legislators in several states have introduced similarly bizarre bills criminalizing sexual freedom in the short time since Donald Trump’s ascent to the presidency for the second time. Last week, Mississippi state senator Bradford Blackmon introduced the “Contraception Begins at Erection Act,” which would make it illegal for a person to “discharge genetic material without the intent to fertilize an embryo.” The bill suggested a fine of $1,000 for a first offense, $5,000 for a second offense, and $10,000 thereafter. In a statement to local affiliate WLBT, Blackmon said the bill was meant to act as a counterpart to contraception and abortion bills.

“All across the country, especially here in Mississippi, the vast majority of bills relating to contraception and/or abortion focus on the woman’s role when men are fifty percent of the equation,” he told WLBT. “This bill highlights that fact and brings the man’s role into the conversation. People can get up in arms and call it absurd but I can’t say that bothers me.”

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Mathew Rodriguez is the former senior news editor at Them. In the past, he has been a senior culture editor at The Atlantic, as well as a staff writer at Out Magazine, INTO, and Mic. His writing has been featured in Slate, Teen Vogue, The Village Voice, MEL Magazine, and more. He … Read more

Americans aren’t happy with the country’s treatment of queer folks, says new survey

https://www.intomore.com/impact/politics/americans-arent-happy-with-the-countrys-treatment-of-queer-folks-says-new-survey/

It is nice to know that despite the religious right hate media which includes Fox Entertainment, that people are not buying the current demonization of the LGBTQ+ community.  But if we don’t get loud and vocal and our democratic leaders don’t develop a spine and support the LGBTQ+ community our acceptance levels will keep sinking.   Hugs

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By Jude Cramer

 

February 6, 2025

It’s no secret that queer rights are on a backslide in the United States — and American citizens aren’t happy.

In an annual survey by Gallup conducted just before Donald Trump took office, Americans were asked about their satisfaction with various aspects of the country’s culture and politics. That included “the acceptance of gay and lesbian people in the nation,” which only 51% of respondents said they were “very satisfied” or “somewhat satisfied” with. That’s the lowest satisfaction rating in that area since 2013, and an 8 percentage point drop from 2017 at the start of Trump’s first term.

Respondents were also asked about their satisfaction with “the acceptance of transgender people in the nation.” To that, only 38% of respondents said they were “very satisfied” or “somewhat satisfied.”

Notably, the satisfaction varied by political party. Republicans reported that they were largely satisfied with the country’s treatment of gays and lesbians (55%) while Democrats reported dissatisfaction (44%). Both parties expressed dissatisfaction with America’s treatment of transgender people (though potentially for different reasons), with only 42% of Republicans and 31% of Democrats satisfied.

Beyond queer issues, Americans’ overall satisfaction is sitting at 38%, a record low that’s been maintained since 2022. 

Meanwhile, Trump continues his crusade against queer people and specifically trans folks. That’s included signing executive orders banning trans women from sports, making gender-affirming care illegal for people under 19 years old, and erasing trans and nonbinary people from the government’s definition of sex.