Oil, Oil Everywhere and No Justice In Sight

In This Week's Action Alert

Action: Stop DC's Secure Communities Program!
Resource:  Fundraising Resources
Featured Article: Halliburton implicated in BP Oil Spill
Cause: Volunteer for the Washington Peace Center

This Saturday!  Join us to build the progressive movement in the DC Metro Area
THIS SATURDAY:  JOIN THE GREATER DC PEOPLE'S ASSEMBLY TO BUILD PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENTS IN THE DC METRO AREA

Get Your Tickets Now: DC Labor Chorus and Grammy Award Nominee, Christylez Bacon on May 22nd, for more info click here

Events [scroll down for full details]:

We 5/12-Making Your Media Matter Conference
We 5/12-Author Series: Jeffrey Wasserstrom
Fr 5/14-Retreat 2010 Continuing the Struggle: Solidarity with Honduras
Sa 5/15-Greater DC People's Assembly
Sa 5/15- Join the Palestinians in Commemorating the Day of Nakba
Sa 5/15-Book Party for The War Before: The True Life Story of Becoming a Black Panther
Sa 5/15-Free Screening of Soldiers of Conscience
Su 5/16-Report Back from the 50 Year Anniversary of the SNCC
Mo 5/17-Make Big Banks Pay Their Share
Sa 5/22-Greater DC People's Assembly
 

Hey D.C.,


The oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico is not only an environmental and economic tragedy, it is also another example of the negative consequences of selfish and irresponsible multinational corporations that remain unaccountable to political processes set in place for the rest of us to follow.  As President Evo Morales correctly assessed that capitalism is a key reason for environmental degradation and injustice, it is important to also tie corporate interests to US imperialism that manifests itself internationally as well as domestically.

The Gulf of Mexico is the 11th largest body of water in the world and is bordered by the southeast US and parts of Mexico, Belize, Honduras and Cuba. Not only does this oil spill impact the poor and disenfranchised people of the US such as fishermen in New Orleans, it also impacts negatively on the economy other countries on the Gulf.

Ironically, this oil spill sponsored by the British Petroleum Corporation, with assistance from Halliburton, happened around the same time as the unjust immigration law of Arizona. This law directly effects the ability of laborers particularly from Mexico to cross the border to seek economic opportunities disrupted by US government NAFTA policies that prioritize corporate interests in the region.  It is important we continue to take action, on a local level against these immigration laws that threaten communities all around the US. So please keep sending emails to  the Public Safety and Judiciary Committee of the DC city council to make sure that they keep their word to not introduce the Secure Securities program.

Lastly, we thank you for coming out to our training on May 11th on graphics design and save the date for our next training on June 8th. Don't forget to volunteer with us to engage in the change-making process!


Featured WPC Resource this week...
Fundraising Resources


Is your organization or group feeling the economic crunch? Are funding opportunities once open to you no longer available? Or are you contemplating taking on a new project but are stuck because of lack of resources?  Whether you've been at the fundraising game for a while or just embarking on this journey to fund your dreams, it is important to do your research and know what's out there.  So check out our Fundraising Resources page and please let us know if you have anything to add!

Appreciate this service? Please DONATE to support the movement for a more just and peaceful world.


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Making Your Media Matter Conference
Wednesday, May 12
9:00am
American University's Katzen Arts Center
4400 Massachusetts Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20016

Making Your Media Matter is a conference for established and aspiring filmmakers, non-profit communications leaders, funders and students looking to learn and share cutting-edge practices for making their media matter.

For more details on the event, click here

Author Series:  Jeffrey Wasserstrom
"China in the 21st Century: What Everyone Needs to Know"
Wednesday, May 12th
6:30-8:00pm
Merrill Lynch
1250 K Street, 5th Floor
Washington, DC 20006


Respected academic and author Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom will join the World Affairs Council - Washington, DC to speak on his new book about China's global role in the 21st century. A professor of history at the University of Californa, Irvine, Wasserstrom is a regular contributor to scholarly journals and various general interest periodicals. Throughout his career Wasserstrom's studies and expertise has focused on China, Urban Culture, Protest, Gender, Globalization & Social Movements. Professor Wasserstrom is the author of four titles, including his latest, China in the 21st Century: What Everyone Needs to Know.

For more information, click here

Retreat 2010 Continuing the Struggle: Solidarity with Honduras
Friday, May 14, 2010 - 5:00pm
Sunday, May 16, 2010 - 12:00pm
Maryland

Witness for Peace Mid-Atlantic Annual Retreat
Join together with activists and organizers from around the Mid-Atlantic this May 14 - 16 for what promises to be an exciting and powerful weekend of change-making.
Stay through Monday, May 17th, for a day of lobbying and direct actions in support of the TRADE Act to reverse U.S. free trade policies and HR 2567 to cut funding to the School of the Americas/WHINSEC.
 Your $110 retreat and conference fee includes all your food (vegetarian options provided), lodging, training, and fun for the weekend.

For more information, click here

Greater DC People's Assembly
Sat, May 15th
9:30am - 4pm
Plymouth UCC
5301 North Capitol Street, NE
(Fort Totten metro)

Meet and connect with people from across the DC Metro area who are
working for change, discuss our common problems, and come up with a
common political analysis and an action plan.

For more information, click here

Join the Palestinians in Commemorating the Day of Nakba
Saturday, May 15
12:00pm - 12:45pm
 
"We can further cement our solidarity by making our support for the buffer zone protests and the Free Gaza flotilla a theme for Nakba Day (May 15) demonstrations world wide.  As the Palestinians of Gaza march to protest the buffer zones and welcome the Free Gaza flotilla, we can hold twin demonstrations of support in our home towns. Take photos of your actions and we will offer a prize (a $100 donation to Free Gaza in your name) for the best Nakba Day photos featuring support for the buffer zone demonstrations or Free Gaza. Go ahead -- let your creativity loose and tell the world about the flotillas aiming to break the siege.  Let us know your plans and please forward this call to action on to others."

For more information, click here

Book Party for "The War Before: The True Life Story of Becoming a Black Panther, Keeping the Faith in Prison, Fighting for Those Left Behind"
Saturday, May 15th
 4:00pm-7:00pm

In 1968, Safiya Bukhari witnessed an NYPD officer harassing a Black Panther for selling the organization's newspaper on a Harlem street corner. The young pre-med student felt compelled to intervene in defense of the Panther's First Amendment right; she ended up handcuffed and thrown into the back of a police car. The War Before traces Bukhari's lifelong commitment as an advocate for the rights of the oppressed. Following her journey from middle-class student to Black Panther to political prisoner, these writings provide an intimate view of a woman wrestling with the issues of her time-the troubled legacy of the Panthers, misogyny in the movement, her decision to convert to Islam, the incarceration of out spoken radicals, and the families left behind. Her account unfolds with immediacy and passion, showing how the struggles of social justice movements have paved the way for the progress of today.

For more information, click here

Free Screening of Soldiers of Conscience
Saturday, May 15
6:00pm
2111 Florida Ave, NW DC 20009
Friends Meeting of Washington - entrance on Decatur Pl

The Center on Conscience & War invites you to a screening of the award-winning documentary Soldiers of Conscience. Following the film there will be an open discussion including former Navy Sailor Daniel Lakemacher whose experiences in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba led him to seek discharge as a conscientious objector.
Soldiers of Conscience is a dramatic look at the dilemma facing individual U.S. soldiers in the current Iraq War. The film profiles seven American soldiers: three who decide not to kill and become conscientious objectors, and four who believe in their duty to kill if necessary. This film reveals how all of them wrestle with the morality of killing in war.

For more information, click here

Report Back from the 50 Year Anniversary of the Student Nonviolent Coordination Committee
Sunday, May 16th          
3 - 5pm
Sisterspace and Books
3717 Georgia Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20010-1657

Report Back from the 50 Year Anniversary of the SNCC Conference to commemorate the April, 1960 founding of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee at Shaw University, Raleigh, N.C. The conference was held on April 15-18, 2010 in Raleigh, North Carolina. Our local activists/organizers who attended the conference will provide their insights, expections and hopes inspired by the SNCC 50th Anniversary. Sister Dorie Ladner, Brother Lawerence Guyot, Sister Gail Dixon, Brother Acie Byrd, Lois Wiley, Kamau Benjamin, and many others will give a full report to our community.

For more information, click here

Make Big Banks Pay Their Share
Monday, May 17th
12 - 2:30pm
Farragut Square
17th and K NW

Join thousands of activists from National People's Action, Jobs with Justice, SEIU, the AFL-CIO to demand jobs and real economic reform. The big banks and the lobbyists that support them received an estimated
$213.8 billion in taxpayer funds as a part of the bail-out, then spent millions lobbying against regulation, solutions to the housing crisis, and the right for workers to organize unions. Following up on the
showdown on Wall Street, we are coming to K Street to put the spotlight on the lobbyists that do that banks' dirty work-and to demand Congress stop accepting their bribes!

For more information, click here

One Voice: Songs of Peace and Justice
Saturday, May 22
7:30pm - 9:30pm
First Trinity Lutheran Church
 501 4th Street, NW

The DC Labor Chorus Presents their Annual Community Benefit Concert Proceeds go to send people of color, youth, and low-income DC-area residents to the U.S. Social Forum in Detroit.

Featuring local progressive hip-hop artist and Grammy Nominee, Christylez Bacon

Tickets $20 - You can buy tickets online,  at the door, or from any member of the DC Labor Chorus or  members of the Greater DC USSF Organizing Committee.

For more information, click here


Featured Article:

Haliburton Implicated in BP's Deepwater Oil Spill
Written by Edward Helmore
May 4, 2010 on www.thefirstpost.co.uk

Halliburton, the Texan oilfield services giant, has emerged as a key player in the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe. The controversial firm, once run by former vice president and Iraq war architect Dick Cheney, had been hired by BP to handle the cementing process on the doomed rig.

According to Transocean, the operator of the drilling platform, Halliburton workers had just finished pumping cement to fill the space between the pipe and the sides of the hole and had begun temporarily plugging the 18,000 ft well with cement shortly before the explosion that caused the rig to catch fire and ultimately to sink.

Latest reports suggest oil is blasting from three seperate holes in the bedrock beneath the gulf of Mexico at a rate of 200,000 gallons a day - a rate that has caused the slick to spread far more rapidly and widely than previous estimates forecast.

According to oil experts, the timing of the initial blast points to problems with cementing, typically one of the most troublesome parts of the drilling process.

Faults in the process have caused explosions in the past; over the past 14 years, 18 of 30 blowouts have been linked to cementing. Typically, a faulty cement plug at the bottom of the well or cement between the pipe and well walls that did not harden is to blame.

Read more


See you in the streets!

Chioma, Hazal, Jon & Sonia
Washington Peace Center