Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
July 25, 2021
Hello All – Daniel Hale was part of the US drone-assassination system in Afghanistan. At first enthusiastic, he became appalled at what he was doing and what he had done. Upon leaving the military, he gave documents to the media and later testified against the drone program. On Monday, he will be sentenced in Alexandria, Virginia for his violation of the 1917 Espionage Act. The Biden administration has asked for the maximum sentence, 11 years in prison.
Hale's story, including the letter he wrote to his judge last week, is detailed in two excellent articles below, and on the website of his supporters, www.standwithdanielhale.org. His background is totally mainstream Middle American. He states that his motivation in speaking out against the drone assassination program was simply to tell the truth, that he knew something that Americans needed to hear. Despite government efforts to paint Hale's actions as endangering "national security," there is absolutely no evidence that any harm befell US troops because of his revelations. The damage that Hale caused was the exposure of war crimes that the Obama, Trump, and now Biden administrations want to keep in the dark. His prosecution is not so much because of what he did, but to warn others who might be inclined to speak out against US war crimes that they had better not do it.
In addition to simple justice – that Hales should be commended for what he did, rather than spend a decade of his young life in jail – the vicious prosecution of Hale underscores the importance the Pentagon and the Biden administration ascribe to keeping a free hand to use weaponized and surveillance drones. In Afghanistan this week, the US military launched an "over the horizon" drone strike on Taliban forces outside the city of Kandahar; and the Pentagon is warning that there is much more of this to come. Also this week, a drone strike was launched in Somalia, possibly against White House assurances that pre-clearance was required before a strike could be launched (see below).
More generally, militarized and surveillance drones are now used by a dozen militaries around the world, and it is only a matter of time before all nations, large and small, can launch drone attacks against each other, including the USA. Big city police are also getting into the act, using surveillance drones to scan crowds, photograph faces, and share information. While the dangers of drone proliferation are obvious, calls for regulating the arms trade and use of drones, or of abolishing weaponized drones altogether, have gone unheeded. To learn more about the drone menace, go to www.bankillerdrones.org.
So on Monday Daniel Hale will be sentenced. Let us hope that his judge is cognizant of Daniel Hale, the person – and not "the traitor" – and gives him only a token sentence. In any case, on the website www.standwithdanielhale.org you can find information on how you can write to him, if you wish to express your appreciation of his courage and conscientious citizenship.
News Notes
It is obvious that the War Powers Act (WPA) of 1973 has not been successful in curbing the ability of the President to launch wars without consent of Congress. Last week Bernie Sanders and two other Senators introduced National Security Powers Act. It would strengthen the WPA and also regulate arms sales and "national emergencies." While unlikely to pass in this Congress, it will serve as a benchmark for what real "national security" needs to do.
Since coming into office, President Biden has placed restrictions on drone strikes, in particular, requiring White House prior approval. Last week the US military in Somalia launched a drone strike against suspected members of al-Shabab, apparently without such approval, raising questions of "who is in charge?" Rep. Ilhan Omar, who grew up in Somalia, is challenging Pres. Biden's justification for the attack. Read more here and here.
India Walton, a nurse and socialist who recently won the Democratic mayoral primary in Buffalo (and thus de facto will become mayor), was interviewed by The Nation's John Nichols this week. His first question: "You have a background as an organizer and an activist. How did that help you as a candidate?" Some interesting answers.
By all accounts, the Olympic Games now underway in Tokyo are a disaster. While the Olympics is usually a big problem for the host city, especially poorer people, the Tokyo Olympics comes amidst the Covid crisis. Check out this (video) story from Democracy Now!, "'COVID Games Begin in a Fearful Japan as Olympic Committee Prioritizes 'Profits Over All Else.'" Also useful/interesting is this article from Jacobin Magazine, "The Olympics Is a Racket" [Link].
CFOW Nuts & Bolts
Please consider getting involved with Concerned Families of Westchester. We meet for a protest/rally each Saturday in Hastings, at 12 noon at the VFW Plaza (Warburton and Spring St.) A "Black Lives Matter/Say Their Names" vigil takes place every Monday from 5:30 to 6 pm, in Yonkers at the intersection of Warburton Ave. and Odell. If you would like to join one of our Zoom meetings, each Tuesday and Thursday at noon, please send a return email. Our newsletter is archived at https://cfow.blogspot.com/; and news of interest and coming events is posted on our CFOW Facebook page. If you would like to support our work by making a contribution, please send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
Rewards!
July 26th is the anniversary of the beginning (1953) of the Cuban Revolution, as this 5-minute video history describes. The attack on the Moncada army barracks in that year was a dismal failure (but the patriotic stalwarts at the battle of Lexington in 1775 didn't do too well either); but the revolutionaries regrouped and finally triumphed in 1958/59. To mark this day, here is some music from the famous Cuban band Buena Vista Social Club. And here is a marvelous short film about the re-composition of the old Cuban singers who made up the band. Enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
CFOW Weekly Reader
Facing Years in Prison for Drone Leak, Daniel Hale Makes His Case Against U.S. Assassination Program
By Ryan Devereaux, The Intercept [
---- The missiles that killed Salim bin Ahmed Ali Jaber and Walid bin Ali Jaber came in the night. Salim was a respected imam in the village of Khashamir, in southeastern Yemen, who had made a name for himself denouncing the rising power of Al Qaeda's franchise in the Arabian Peninsula. His cousin Walid was a local police officer. It was August 21, 2012, and the pair were standing in a palm grove, confronting a trio of suspected militants, when the Hellfires made impact. The deaths of the two men sparked protests in the days that followed, symbolizing for many Yemenis the human cost of U.S. counterterrorism operations in their country. Thousands of miles away, at the U.S. military's base in Bagram, Afghanistan, Daniel Hale, a young intelligence specialist in the U.S. Air Force, watched the missiles land. One year later, Hale found himself sitting on a Washington, D.C., panel, listening as Salim's brother, Faisal bin Ali Jaber, recalled the day Salim was killed. [Read More] Also of interest: "US Government Seeks Harshest Sentence Ever In Leak Case Against Drone Whistleblower" by Kevin Gosztola, The Dissenter [July 21, 2021] [Link].
(Video) "Crime of the Century": How Big Pharma Fueled the Opioid Crisis That Killed 500,000 and Counting
From Democracy Now! [July 19, 2021]
---- As the U.S. continues to deal with the fallout from the devastating opioid epidemic that has killed over 500,000 people in the country since 1999, we speak with Academy Award-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney, whose latest documentary, "The Crime of the Century," looks at the pharmaceutical industry's methods in promoting and selling the powerful drugs. … The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says U.S. drug overdose deaths skyrocketed to a record 93,000 last year — a nearly 30% increase. It is the largest one-year increase ever recorded, with overdoses rising in 48 of 50 states. [See the Program]
War & Peace
Where Do Wars Come From?
By Michael T. Klare, The Nation [July 19, 2021]
[FB – This is a review of two new books, Margaret MacMillan's War and Martin Sherwin's Gambling with Armageddon. Towards the end of his review, Klare suggests that what is missing from these otherwise fine analyses is an assessment of the role of "masculinity" in the mix of factors leading to war.]
---- If there is one aspect of Sherwin's and MacMillan's rich and evocative analyses that is open to criticism, it is their failure to delve deeply into the relationship between gender and conflict. Reading their books and others in this field, it is hard not to come away with the impression that lurking under the more conventional explanations for acts of war—nationalism, territorial expansion, monarchical rivalry, and so on—lie the purportedly masculine traits of combativeness and self-aggrandizement that these men (and nearly everyone making these decisions were men) felt they had to embody. … They interpreted the Soviet missile deployment to Cuba as a "test of wills" (to quote Dean Acheson), in which fearlessness in the face of possible annihilation was deemed the optimal stance and any expression of support for caution was viewed as evidence of weakness. [Read More]
LATIN AMERICA IN UPHEAVAL
Migration Is Not the Crisis: What Washington Could Really Do in Central America
---- Earlier this month, a Honduran court found David Castillo, a U.S.-trained former Army intelligence officer and the head of an internationally financed hydroelectric company, guilty of the 2016 murder of celebrated Indigenous activist Berta Cáceres. His company was building a dam that threatened the traditional lands and water sources of the Indigenous Lenca people. For years, Cáceres and her organization, the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras, or COPINH, had led the struggle to halt that project. … Yet when President Joe Biden came into office with an ambitious "Plan for Security and Prosperity in Central America," he wasn't talking about changing policies that promoted big development projects against the will of local inhabitants. Rather, he was focused on a very different goal: stopping migration. His plan, he claimed, would address its "root causes." Vice President Kamala Harris was even blunter when she visited Guatemala, instructing potential migrants: "Do not come."[Read More]
In Cuba
If Biden Wants to "Stand With the Cuban People," He Can Ease the Cruel Blockade
By Marjorie Cohn, Truthout [July 19, 2021]
---- The corporate media have been bashing the Cuban government in response to the recent protests in Cuba, while President Joe Biden claims, "We stand with the Cuban people." But they ignore or minimize the leading cause of economic suffering in Cuba: the U.S.'s illegal and punishing economic blockade that Biden has left in place. … But former President Donald Trump reversed the progress Obama had made and imposed 243 onerous new sanctions on Cuba as part of his "maximum pressure" strategy against Cuba. Those punishing sanctions, together with the pandemic, spelled disaster for the Cuban people. Trump also returned Cuba to the list of state sponsors of terrorism. … During his presidential campaign, Biden repeatedly hitched his coattails to Obama's star and promised to lift Trump's sanctions against Cuba. But Biden has refused to end any of Trump's sanctions on Cuba, even calling it a "failed state." [Read More]
Also useful for understanding Cuba now – "U.S. Imposes New Cuba Sanctions as 400+ Noted Activists, Political Figures Call for End to Embargo," from Democracy Now! Headline [July 23, 2021] [Link]; and "What's Really Going on in Cuba" b [Link]
In Haiti
(Video) "It Is Offensive": Haitian Activist Says It's Not Up to U.S. to Determine Haiti's PM or Future
From Democracy Now! [July 21, 2021]
---- Two weeks after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, Ariel Henry has been sworn in as Haiti's new prime minister, after acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph announced he was relinquishing power. Henry is a neurosurgeon who was appointed by President Jovenel Moïse shortly before he was assassinated, but not formally sworn in. Both Joseph and Henry had claimed power following Moïse's death. Over the weekend, the United States and other members of the so-called Core Group threw their support behind Henry, who will become Haiti's seventh prime minister in four years. Monique Clesca, a Haitian pro-democracy advocate based in Port-au-Prince, says despite the polarization and turmoil in the country, it is ultimately up to Haitians to find a political solution. "It is not up to the United States State Department to tell us who should be the prime minister of Haiti," Clesca says. "It is offensive. It should not be done. It is unacceptable." [See the Program]
Also useful for understanding Haiti now – "The Best Haitians Can Expect From New President Ariel Henry" by Amy Wilentz, The Nation [July 23, 2021] [Link]; "We Owe Haiti a Debt We Can't Repay" b [Link]; and "Battle for Power in Haiti Extends to Lobbying in Washington" bKenneth P. Vogel and [Link].
And in Colombia
Confrontation in Colombia
By Alma Guillermoprieto, New York Review of Books [July 22, 2021]
---- What amounts to a nationwide state of confrontation started on April 28. A long-seething mood of dissatisfaction and frustration had caught fire a couple of weeks earlier, when Duque's finance minister presented a sweeping tax bill to Congress. …The point was this: they lived in a society that made them feel like trash and offered them no hope at all. Overnight, miraculously, with virtually no guidance except whatever orientation the large young man might conceivably be getting from the equally clueless but dangerous urban and rural guerrillas who are part of Cali's environment, they had organized a bespoke world for themselves, one where every unemployed or woefully undereducated kid had a part to play, where there was at least one good meal a day for all, thanks to the neighbors' continuing generosity—with maybe the proceeds of a little extortion thrown in, or maybe not—and where they could shout their loathing for their heartless rulers 24/7, dreaming for once that they were free. [Read More]
The Climate Crisis
(Video) "All We Can Save": As Climate Disasters Wreck Our Planet, Women Leaders Are Key to Solving the Crisis
From Democracy Now! [July 22, 2021]
----- As the impacts of the climate emergency continue to be felt around the globe, white men overwhelmingly dominate the airwaves on climate coverage. We speak with co-editors of the new book "All We Can Save," an anthology of essays by 60 women at the forefront of the climate justice movement. "We are simply not seeing very much climate coverage at all in the mainstream media," says Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, a marine biologist and co-founder of the Urban Ocean Lab. Katharine Wilkinson, visiting professor at Sewanee: The University of the South in Tennessee, emphasizes women and girls around the world are "disproportionately impacted by climate change" and must lead the search for solutions. "There is a growing body of research that centering women's leadership on climate is not just something that sounds nice. It's actually a critical strategy for how we win," Wilkinson says. [See the Program]
(Video) Just Out of Jail, Winona LaDuke Decries Militarized Crackdown on Enbridge Line 3 Pipeline Protests
From Democracy Now! [July 23, 2021]
---- Nearly 600 water protectors have been arrested during ongoing protests in Minnesota against the construction of the Enbridge Line 3 tar sands pipeline at the Shell River, which the partially completed pipeline is set to cross in five places. On Monday, authorities arrested Indigenous leader Winona LaDuke and at least six others. She was just released from jail yesterday and joins us after three nights in jail. LaDuke describes how the Canadian multinational corporation Enbridge, which is building the pipeline, has funded more than 40 police squads from around the state to crack down on protests, saying, "It is a civil crisis when a Canadian multinational controls your police force." [See the Program] And this just in: "'Huge Legal Win': Court Stops Police From Blockading Line 3 Protester Camp," Common Dreams [July 23, 2021] [Link].
Health & Healthcare
Medicare for All Rallies in 50 Cities Show Big Support for Universal Health Care
C.J. Polychroniou interviews Peter Arno (of Hastings), Truthout [July 23, 2021]
---- Why are health care expenditures in the U.S. significantly higher than those of other industrialized countries? And how do we explain poor health outcomes, including life expectancy, compared to most European nations?
Peter Arno: The short answer as to why the U.S. has the highest health care expenditures in the world is simply that, unlike other developed countries, we exercise very few price constraints on our health care products and services, ranging from drugs, medical devices, physician and hospital services to private insurance products. On a broader level, the corporatization and profits generated from medical care may be the most distinguishing characteristics of the modern American health care system. The theology of the market, along with the strongly held mistaken belief that the problems of U.S. health care can be solved if only the market could be perfected, has effectively obstructed the development of a rational, efficient and humane national health care policy. Despite the U.S.'s outsized spending on health care, its relatively poor health outcomes are beyond dispute. [Read More] Also interesting/useful: "Medicare for All Advocates Take to the Streets of Over 50 US Cities" by Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams [July 25, 2021] [Link].
(Video) The Pandemic Is Not Over: Science Writer Ed Yong on Delta's Devastation in Low-Vaccination States
From Democracy Now! [July 21, 2021]
---- COVID-19 cases in the United States have tripled over the past month as the highly contagious Delta variant rapidly spreads across the country, particularly in areas with low vaccination rates. Deaths from COVID-19 have increased by nearly 50% over the past week, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the Delta variant is now responsible for 83% of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. "Things are much worse than people might realize," says Ed Yong, science writer at The Atlantic who has been reporting on the Delta variant's spread in Missouri, one of the hardest-hit areas in the U.S. [See the Program] Also useful is "American Dysfunction Is the Biggest Barrier to Fighting Covid" b[Link].
Israel/Palestine
[FB – Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream has said that it will discontinue selling its ice cream in the Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem when its current contract expires. However, they will continue selling their ice cream in "1948 Israel," the area before the 1967 war led to further occupation of Palestinian lands (within the "Green Line"). – For the first time, this brings a major corporation (Unilever, the owner of Ben & Jerry's) into the line of fire of the many state laws that essentially outlaw the BDS movement. This will raise many legal questions and calls for creative and forceful action by pro-Palestinian advocates (and ice cream eaters) in the USA.
(Podcast) Can US Law & the Israeli Government Force Ben & Jerry's to Support Occupation?
From the Foundation for Middle East Peace [July 22, 2021]
---- In this episode of "Occupied Thoughts," Peter Beinart interviews FMEP President Lara Friedman about the potential blowback Ben & Jerry's faces for their decision to stop selling their products in Jewish settlements in the Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Lara is an expert in the efforts to exploit U.S. laws (state and federal) and courts to quash criticism and activism challenging Israeli policies, which she has been documenting for years. [Hear the program - 30 minutes]
Also useful/interesting on the Ice Cream Crisis – "New York State Puts Ben & Jerry's Parent Company on Notice" bJuly 23, 2021] [Link]; and "'It shows that BDS works': how a group of Vermont activists got Ben & Jerry's to move: by[Link].
Our History
The 'Creative Chaos' of Gloria Richardson (1922–2021)
By Barbara Smith, The Nation [July 23, 2021]
---- I learned about Gloria Richardson when I was a teenager in the early 1960s. Following the example of the adults in my family, my sister and I paid close attention to news about the civil rights movement. I might have seen Richardson on TV, but more likely it was in the pages of Ebony, Jet, or the Call and Post, Cleveland's Black newspaper. Although I had no real concept of sexism or gender politics at the time, Richardson made an impression because it was so unusual to see a Black woman out front leading. Gloria Richardson died in Manhattan on July 15 at the age of 99. She was an exceptional leader who achieved national prominence during the civil rights era but in later years was often overlooked. … Richardson got involved in organizing in her hometown of Cambridge, Md., in 1962 when local teenagers, including her daughter Donna, launched a campaign to protest the city's segregated public facilities. At the time Richardson was 40 years old, divorced, and raising two daughters. She was drawn into the work when a group of parents decided to support the young activists. Richardson soon took on a leadership role in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)–affiliated Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee. Despite its name, CNAC did not subscribe to nonviolence across the board. While it adhered to nonviolence as a tactic during demonstrations, its position was that people who were under attack in other circumstances had the right to defend themselves. The Eastern Shore had a notorious history of racial violence, including lynchings. Richardson emerged as a militant, outspoken advocate for her community as well as a canny and effective strategist. [Read More]
