Wednesday, September 9, 2015

Baltimore Activist Alert - September 9 -10, 2015



24] Europe & the Iran Deal – Sept. 9

25] Amazon Watch talk – Sept. 9

26] Environmental Justice Coalition meeting – Sept. 9

27] Struggle of women in Afghanistan – Sept. 9

28] Compare Israel’s and Iran’s nuclear programs – Sept. 9

29] Maryland Alliance for Justice Reform General Meeting – Sept. 9

30] Practice singing a climate song – Sept. 10

31] No change on venue – Sept. 10



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23] – CodePink is gathering as follows: On Wed., Sept. 9 from 8 AM to 1 PM, vigil on the House side at corner of New Jersey and Independence Aves. SE (across from the Longworth House Building).  Stand in line at 8:30 AM for a 10 AM to 1 PM Hearing in the House Foreign Affairs, 2172 Rayburn. At 12:30 PM, march to Ted Cruz/Donald Trump/Sarah Palin/Glen Beck rally (meet at corner of 1st and Independence Aves. SW) at Capitol South Metro.  The Trump rally starts at 1 PM.  From 3 to 5 PM, lobby on the House side.  At 8 PM, Seal the deal" Light Brigade Action is happening on the walkway in front of the Visitors Center at US Capitol Building.

 On Thurs., Sept. 10 at 8 AM, join the all-day vigil on the House side at the corner of New Jersey and Independence Aves, SE, across from the Longworth House Building, as well as lobbying in the House. From noon to 5 PM, lunch together in Rayburn Cafeteria followed by lobbying in House.  At 6:30 PM. The DC Vigil for Peace & Diplomacy is at Dupont Circle NW, sponsored by MoveOn. Call Michaela (432-934-5715) or Medea (415-235-6517).

24] – On Wed., Sept. 9 from 12:15 to 1:45 PM, hear from Jean-Marie Guéhenno, International Crisis Group; Wolfgang Ischinger, Munich Security Conference; Suzanne Maloney, Brookings Institution; and Cornelius Adebahr, Carnegie Endowment, tackle "How Europe Will Respond to the Iran Nuclear Agreement" at the Carnegie Endowment, 1779 Massachusetts Ave. NW, WDC. RSVP at http://carnegieendowment.org/events/forms/?fa=registration&event=4976&lang=en.



25] – Amazon Watch and Bank Information Center Invite You to a "Green-Bag Lunch" Presentation: Indigenous Rights in the Peruvian Amazon 2015.  Resource Extraction, Indigenous Territory, and a Tale of Two IDBs will be discussed by Hamner Manihuari Curitima, Lizardo Cauper and Wendy Pineda, AIDESEP on Wed., Sept. 9 from 12:30 to 2 PM at Bank Information Center conference room, 1023 15th St. NW, 10th Floor, WDC. Peru's Amazon jungle - the fourth largest extension of tropical rainforest in the world - continue to be a hotbed of controversy and social conflict. With falling commodity prices, the Peruvian government has weakened environmental legislation to encourage greater investment. At the same time, indigenous peoples are continuing to organize and demand respect of their rights, including an initiative to expand collective indigenous land ownership from roughly 1/5th of the Peruvian Amazon to 50%. International financial institutions like the Inter-American Development Bank are playing a schizophrenic role, supporting indigenous land titling through a climate mechanism while threatening it through a major land titling loan.



Come hear straight from leaders with Peru's largest and internationally respected indigenous federation, AIDESEP. What are the key threats to Amazonian indigenous peoples? How are those peoples organizing to defend their own rights and self-determination? How can the international community play a constructive role?



26] – Come to the Sierra Club Offices, 50 F St. NW, Eighth Floor, WDC, on Wed., Sept. 9 from 6 to 8 PM for a meeting of the DMV Environmental Justice Coalition to learn more about what communities of color, low income groups, and others overburdened by environmental hazards, greenhouse gas emissions and co-pollutants are doing in DC, MD and VA.  The Black Lives Matter will critique white supremacy, and you are urged to learn more about it. Enjoy refreshments. RSVP to JimDriscoll@NIPSPeerSuport.org or 520-250-0509. Go to http://www.ceejh.org/dmv-ej-coalition or contact Coalition Coordinator Dr. Sacoby Wilson, Professor, University of Maryland-College Park, at swilson2@umd.edu.



27] – Come see and hear about the struggles, determination, and resourcefulness of the women and all people of Afghanistan, AWF’s efforts to partner with them to build a positive future, and what is happening for “average” people who don’t make the headlines. The event will take place at St. Francis of Assisi Church, 3615 Harford Road, Baltimore on Wed., Sept. 9 from 7 to 9 PM.  Enter a free parking lot from Chesterfield Ave. off Harford Rd. The church hall entrance is off the parking lot. The church is on the #19 Bus Route.  See photographs and hear stories from this summer by Fahima Vorgetts-Gaheez, director, Afghan Women’s Fund. She travels to Afghanistan regularly for the Women’s Fund, an all-volunteer solidarity organization working with women’s groups and villages in rural areas on survival and rebuilding projects. This summer she spent six weeks there, meeting with AWF partners and projects, talking with women (and men) who are displaced persons, teachers, farmers, organizers, entrepreneurs, medical workers, activists, officials and elders, students, and others. Handicrafts and other items will be available for purchase. All proceeds go to AWF projects in Afghanistan.  Contact Alicia at aluckste@wacdtf.org or 443-722-2024

28] –  From 7 to 9 PM  on Wed., Sept. 9 hear about  Israel and Iran: A Comparison of Nuclear Programs at  La Casa, 3166 Mt. Pleasant St. NW,  Kenyon and Mt. Pleasant NW. Use the Columbia Heights Metro. Despite being a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), since the 1979 revolution and especially over the past ten years, Iran has come under unprecedented scrutiny by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the United Nations Security Council over its nuclear program. Meanwhile, Israel, one of only four NPT non-signatories (Pakistan, India and North Korea are the others) and the only state in the Middle East actually possessing nuclear weapons, has remained free from any meaningful international oversight. While Iran has suffered debilitating economic sanctions over unproven suspicions that it might have a clandestine nuclear weapons program, Israel, with and arsenal of hundreds of modern nuclear weapons and a sophisticated delivery system capable of targeting the entire Middle East and Europe, is permitted to act with impunity.  This blatant double standard over the Iranian and Israeli nuclear programs has been recognized by many observers as weakening the international nuclear non-proliferation agenda.

John Steinbach is an activist, educator, researcher and writer, and has written extensively on environmental, economic, social justice and nuclear issues. His published works include the map and database Deadly Radiation Hazards USA co-authored with his late wife Louise Franklin-Ramirez. Other titles include Environmentalism & Social Change, The Israeli Nuclear Weapons Program, Comparing Israel’s & Iran’s Nuclear Programs, Nuclear Nightmare: The Bush Administration and U.S. Nuclear War-Fighting. 
 
Mr. Steinbach has been active against nuclear power and weapons since 1970, participated in the first protest against Fermi 2 south of Detroit. In 1981, he was arrested, along with 2,000 others, at the Diablo Canyon Blockade. Earlier the same year he helped co-found the

Hiroshima/Nagasaki Peace Committee of the National Capital Area, which educates the community about the need for nuclear disarmament, and hosts an annual delegation of atomic bomb survivors.  Mr. Steinbach lives and works in Prince William County, VA and was the recipient of the 2007 Prince William Human Rights Award.



Dr. Bahram Zandi is an Iranian physicist and a peace & justice activist.  Currently he is co-chair of the International and the Steering Committees of the Green Party US and a delegate to the Federation of the Green Parties of the Americas.  Dr. Zandi will provide an overview on Iran's past history and its resistance to colonial powers which leads to the current situation. 



29] – There is a Maryland Alliance for Justice Reform General Meeting on Wed., Sept. 9 @ 7:30 PM at the Annapolis Friends Meeting, 351 Dubois Road, Annapolis.  The MAJR Coordinating Council meeting will report on its plans and request approval by the general membership present.  Also, the three committees will report.  There will be an update on the Md. Justice Reinvestment Coordinating Council and the focus groups, with requests for volunteers for a couple of tasks.



30] – In conjunction with Grandparents Climate Action Day, jubilant singers are needed to SING FOR THE CLIMATE and give our leaders the message that we must change our nation's energy policies while there is still time to avoid catastrophic changes in the Earth's climate.  We are elders, parents, grandparents, students and maybe YOU!  There are practice times at 7 AM on Thurs., Sept. 10 outside of Union Station, front left side and at 10:45 AM on the lawn in front of the Capitol, close to the House Office Buildings.  To join, RSVP to lpiser@aol.com or 215 913 8362.  Listen to the video and practice the song at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGgBtHoIO4g.



31] – Gather at the Clarence Mitchell Courthouse, Court House East, 111 N. Calvert St, on Thurs., Sept. 10 from 8:30 to 11:30 AM.  The next major issue is the question of changing the location of the Freddie Gray trial. No change of venue, convict the accused and then jail them. 



To be continued.



Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/.



"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs 


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