In honor of International Women’s Day
Rasmea Fights Back:
The struggle of Women, Immigrants & Political Prisoners

Featuring:
Nadine Naber, University of Illinois at Chicago & Rasmea Odeh Defense Committee

#Justice4Rasmea

Hosted by:
The Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC)

Rasmea Odeh is a 67 year old Palestinian American community leader who was tortured and falsely convicted by an Israeli military court. As a direct result, years later the US government convicted her of Unlawful Procurement of Naturalization, sentenced her to 18 months in prison and imminent deportation. The appeals court heard oral arguments on October 14th and recently granted the appeal!

What does the court of appeals’ decision mean for her case?
What are the implications for her and the Arab and Muslim community?
How can you get involved in her defense and in the defense of all people facing state repression?

www.justice4rasmea.org

If Iowa and New Hampshire have shaken the political establishment, how will things look after Super Tuesday, March 1? We are inviting speakers from different political perspectives (including Progressive Democrats of America, Peace and Freedom Party, Socialist Alternative, and UC Berkeley Students for Sanders) to share their views about Super Tuesday 2016 and listen to ours.

Seating is limited, so plan to come early. We start promptly.
FREE – but hat will be passed for donations to NPML

About Sunday Morning at the Marxist Library
A weekly discussion series inspired by our respect for the work of Karl Marx and our belief that his work will remain as important for the class struggles of the future as they have been for the past.

There is a solution to the Affordable Housing Crisis

Berkeley could build at least 100 units of affordable housing a year, if we raise funds for the Housing Trust Fund. Hear about practical solutions that will raise the money needed. Prepare for the 2016 Election by making plans to elect a mayor, city council members, and rent board commissioners who will represent all of us, not just the 1%.

Speakers include:

● Max Anderson ‐ Berkeley City Councilmember

District 3 (South Berkeley)

● Ben Bartlett ‐ member, Berkeley Planning Commission and District 3 City Council candidate

● Kate Harrison, Berkeley Progressive Alliance and National/State Politics Chair of the Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club

● Community Activists to update us on the upcoming 2016 Berkeley Tenant Convention, Minimum Wage efforts, the Proposed Landlord Tax and Public Campaign Financing

Lead poisoning is irreversible. Pediatricians such as Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha (who discovered the Flint water crisis) fear the Flint children who tested with elevated levels will suffer lifelong consequences. “If you were to put something in a population to keep them down for generation and generations to come, it would be lead,” Hanna-Attisha said. “It’s a well-known, potent neurotoxin. There’s tons of evidence on what lead does to a child, and it is one of the most damning things that you can do to a population. It drops your IQ, it affects your behavior, it’s been linked to criminality, it has multigenerational impacts. There is no safe level of lead in a child.”

The Flint water crisis is a drinking water contamination crisis began in April 2014. After Flint changed its water source from treated Detroit Water and Sewerage Department water to the Flint River, its drinking water had a series of problems that culminated with lead contamination with extremely elevated levels of the heavy metal. In Flint, between 6,000 and 12,000 children have been exposed. Nine lawsuits have been filed against government officials on the issue, and several investigations have been opened. The city was declared to be in a state of emergency by the Governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder, before Obama declared it as a federal state of emergency. Four government officials: one from the City of Flint, two from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, and one from the Environmental Protection Agency resigned over the mishandling of the crisis, and one addditional MDEQ staff member was fired and another has a termination hearing pending. Governor Snyder issued an apology to citizens and promised to fix the problem.

While the local outcry about Flint water quality was growing in early 2015, Flint water officials filed papers with state regulators purporting to show that “tests at Flint’s water treatment plant had detected no lead and testing in homes had registered lead at acceptable levels.”The documents falsely claimed that the city had tested tap water from homes with lead service lines, and therefore the highest lead-poisoning risks; in reality; the city does not know the locations of lead service lines, which city officials acknowledged in November 2015 after the Flint Journal/MLive published an article revealing the practice after obtaining documents through the Michigan Freedom of Information Act.

In 2003, Bayview Hunters Point residents and community environmental justice organizations filed complaints with the US Department of Energy, charging the California Independent System Operator and PG&E with violating Title VI of the United States Civil Rights Act of 1964. By applying standards that subject Bayview Hunters Point residents, the majority of who are low-income people of color, to unnecessary levels of fossil fuels, PG&E and California Independent Systems Operator are violating civil rights, the residents and organizations said.

Two years later, residents continued to suffer a medical chart’s worth health problems through being exposed to pollution from two of the state’s oldest power plants. This is in addition to the constant bombardment they’ve received of fumes and gases from sewage treatment, cement factories, a radioactive shipyard, and two highways. According to a 2003 study by the nonprofit Greenaction, residents in Southeast San Francisco are hospitalized for cognitive heart failure, hypertension, diabetes, emphysema, and asthma at three times the statewide average. “The city of San Francisco has never made a commitment to the people of Bayview Hunters Point or to their health,” said Dr. Raymond Tompkins, administrative lecturer at San Francisco City College.

The rate of breast cancer in African American women under the age of 50 is twice as high there as in the rest of the state, he said. “The same chemicals that cause breast cancer cause testicular cancer,” he cautioned, adding that the health department has not even been searching for the latter disease when collecting its statistics on Bayview Hunters Point residents. He also pointed out that while the life expectancy for a white male living in San Francisco is 78 years, for an African American male in Bayview Hunters Point, it is 58 years. “We’re talking about life and death here.”

Please join us at OccupyForum Monday night to hear from Steve Zeltzer and Dr. Ray Tomkins about environmental genocide in communities of color; to call out the perpetrators, and to take a stand with communities against the corrupt agencies and systemic racism in the United States that allows, and perhaps encourages this to happen.

2016 International Working Women’s Day: Fight the Right, Deportations are Violence against Women!

This March 8th, join working women across the world to celebrate the resistance of immigrant women and stand up against right-wing attacks against immigrant families!

2 PM: Art and cultural Celebration [Lake Merritt Amphitheater, Lake Merritt Blvd & 12th St.]
March to the Federal Building [1301 Clay Street, Oakland] Vans provided to drive those with mobility needs
Rally: Immigrant Women speak out against Deportations and to stop the right wing attacks to immigrant women’s rights and survival!

Sponsored by ACUDIR, the World March of Women Bay Area Chapter, and GABRIELA USA.

The second of three community “listening sessions” to be conducted by the Justice Department’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, known by its acronym COPS, which was called in by police Chief Greg Suhr and Mayor Ed Lee following the fatal shooting of Mario Woods on Dec. 2.

Background article.

Our first film this year will be Salt of the Earth (1954), which was produced, directed and written by victims of U.S. Congressional blacklisting, (aka redlisting). Originally banned in the U.S., it was directed by Herbert Biberman, one of the Hollywood Ten. The cast is almost entirely workers who participated in the real-life strike that the film is based upon.
In a gritty mining town in New Mexico, Mexican-American workers go on strike to protest their dangerous working conditions and low wages. They meet with fierce opposition from company thugs and local deputies. After vicious beatings the wives and mothers of the striking workers take over the picket line in a final demand for justice.

Sponsored by the BFUU Social Justice Ctee
Wheelchair accessible.

Join us for an amazing panel discussion with four women activists with Black Lives Matter and associated organizations. Plus a documentary screening of “We Have Nothing to Lose But Our Chains!”

The future is up to us.

Join with activists, community, labor, students and faith-based groups to begin to formulate a vision, priorities and a plan of action for A BERKELEY FOR WORKING FAMILIES.

Berkeley can lead the way on expanding affordable housing, strengthening rent control, and creating livable wages, a healthy environment and expanded city services.

Sponsored by the Berkeley Minimum Wage Coalition.

Join us to fight for a livable wage for all Bay Area workers! We collaborate in principled reflection and action on what the Bay Area livable wage would be and where we are at on the right to a livable wage.

The Oakland Livable Wage Assembly builds Community and Power among those who seek higher wages and better work life conditions for area workers.

Our work together encompasses:

(1) The concerns of precarious, care and contingent workers,
(2) Campaigns to improve wages for low wage workers, and
(3) Efforts by unionized workers and unions to improve wages and quality of work life.

We share stories and information in an egalitarian and participatory way to build relationships and build the movement.

Oakland Livable Wage Assembly meets every 2nd and 4th Tuesday of the month, 6:30-8:00 pm at the SEIU Local 1000 Union Hall, 436 14th Street #200, Oakland, CA

Please love and support one another ~ We have a duty to fight ~ We have a duty to win!

olwa.org

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1568668586707336/

 

Department 110 on the 5th Floor.

This is the last day of court for the incident with the CHP from last September.

“Good, stable jobs protecting the climate can help challenge the growing inequality and injustice of our society, but only if policy is designed to do so.”

Join us for a conversation with Jeremy Brecher, cofounder of the Labor Network for Sustainability and author, most recently, of the just-published Climate Insurgency: A Strategy for Survival. He has received five regional Emmy Awards for his documentary film work and holds a PhD from the Union Graduate School.

“Good, stable jobs protecting the climate can help challenge the growing inequality and injustice of our society, but only if policy is designed to do so. Climate policy needs to include strong racial, gender, age, and locational hiring requirements to counter our current employment inequality and provide a jobs pipeline for those individuals and groups who have been denied equal access to good jobs. It needs to help remedy the concentration of pollution in low-income communities, the lack of transportation, education, health, and other facilities in poor neighborhoods, and other manifestations of discrimination.”
—  Jeremy Brecher, Making the Promises Real: Labor and the Paris Climate Agreement

This event is free and open to the public.

The US DoJ wants to hear your perspectives, concerns and suggestions concerning the San Francisco Police Department.

 Pizza is being served for free provided by SEIU (Union).

San Francisco residents don’t miss our next community mtgs 3/8 & 3/10! We want to hear from you regarding the #SFPD. pic.twitter.com/A5dUpv4MD9

— COPS Office (@COPSOffice) March 2, 2016

March 11, 2016 is the fifth anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe that is still reverberating in Japan and around the world. The nuclear plants are still releasing thousands of tons of radioactive water and over 1000 tanks filled with contaminated radioactive water surround the broken nuclear plants.

The children and families continue to have a rising level of thyroid cancers and this uptick is taking place in other places in Japan. Despite these dangers the Japanese Abe government has said that the problem has been solved. They are demanding the the families and children return to Fukushima or lose subsidies for housing. The government is also claiming that they have “decontaminated” Fukushima and told the Olympic Committee that the problem had been solved.

The government has also raised the limits of allowable radiation to those of nuclear research facilities in Japan. The Japanese government has also passed secrecy laws threatening the journalists and investigators getting information out about the disaster and also seeks to militarize Japan by eliminating Article 9 of the constitution that limits wars and intervention. The government is seeking for the full militarization Japan including nuclear weapons despite mass opposition among the majority of the population. Hundreds of thousands of citizens have gone to the streets to demand an end to the restarting of Japan’s remaining more than 40 nuclear plants.

On March 11, 2016 people throughout the world including in San Francisco will be speaking out and calling for an end to the restarting of it’s nuclear plants, for the evacuation of the children and families in Fukushima and for the government to take responsibility for subsidizing housing outside the area.

We call for an end to the censorship laws and also against the elimination of Article 9 which will lead to further militarization and war.

We call for the closure of all nuclear plants around the world including Diablo Canyon in California which is also running on an earthquake fault like many nuclear plants in Japan.

Please Join Us and Speak Out

Initiated by No Nukes Action Committee

Endorsed by

Tri Valley CAREs (Communities Against a Radioactive Environment), Livermore, Codepink Golden Gate Chapter, Occupy SF Action Council, Fukushima Response, Veterans for Piece- Chater #69,SF, Veterans for Peace East Bay Chapter #162, Asian Americans for Peace and Justice, EON (Ecological Options Network), BARK ( Barkers Agitating for Reactor Closure), PG&E Ratepayer Revolt, Mt.Diablo Peace and Justice Center, Walnut Creek, Sloths Against Nuclear State(反核ナマケモノの会), New York, Solar Justice, San Louis Obispo Mothers for peace, United Public Workers For Actionhttp://www.upwa.info, and more groups and much more individuals.

http://nonukesaction.wordpress.com/

Additional links:

http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20160216/p2a/00m/0na/010000c
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/24/the-great-fukushima-cover-up/
https://jfissures.wordpress.com/2016/02/04/on-fukushima-prefecture-and-hiroshi-kainuma/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/five-years-after-nuclear-meltdown-no-one-knows-what-to-do-with-fukushima/2016/02/10/a9682194-c9dc-11e5-b9ab-26591104bb19_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-cards_hp-card-world%3Ahomepage%2Fcard
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/34565-radioactive-water-from-fukushima-is-leaking-into-the-pacific

Please join Friends of the Earth & Common Cause for a discussion about the growing national movement to reclaim a people centered democracy.

From Presidential candidates to Oscar winners, everybody is talking about the negative impact unlimited campaign money is having on our democracy.  Sometimes it feels like there’s nothing we can do about it. But the truth is, we can reclaim our political system so that it represents our concerns for the environment, and not just those of corporations and the super-rich. Now is the time to take action. It has been six years since Citizens United opened the floodgates for anti-environmental mega-donors like Monsanto use their deep pockets to poison our planet. It’s clear that to make progress on the issues we care most about, we need to stand up and fundamentally change the way we do politics – locally and nationally.

What: Panel discussion and presentation on the state of our Democracy

I’ll be joined by Berkeley Council Member Kriss Worthington, who will talk about the city’s plans to address money in politics; UC Berkeley Common Cause member Celeste Alexandra Pylko, who will share about student’s work to get money out of politics on UC campus; and Helen Grieco from Common Cause who will talk about the upcoming Democracy Awakening mass mobilization on Washington DC.

Sign up HERE or via Face Book to reserve your space! Find out more about how the current state of our democracy blocks progress on the issues you care about, and how you can take part in the largest pro-democracy mobilizations our nation has seen in decades!

JOIN US FOR A SHIFT: MASS COPWATCHING

· Friday March 11, 8 PM – 11 PM
· Thursday March 17, 5 PM – 7 PM
· Saturday March 26, 8 PM – 11 PM

Since October 2015, Berkeley Copwatch has been holding “mass copwatch” events that invite folks to join us for a shift. It’s been fun and very empowering to have a group of copwatchers patrolling our city and on the scene when police stop people.

This month we have three shifts scheduled. The Thursday shift will likely be a walking shift. Please join us; we will train you in the essentials of copwatching, how to document and how to stay safe!

Contact us at (510) 548-0425 or berkeleycopwatch@yahoo.com to learn where we will be meeting.

Speak Out Now 2016 Revolutionary University
Tools for Changing Society

Join us for two days of presentations and discussion on some of the major questions of our time.

Come to all sessions or choose the ones that interest you.
(Note: Sunday is the first day of Daylight Savings time)

Saturday 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Syria and the Conflict in the Middle East
Prof. As’ad AbuKhalil,
Professor of political science at CSU Stanislaus and author of Saudi Arabia and the U.S.
——————————————-
3:30 pm – 5:30 pm
The Life of Victor Serge: Learning from the Past – Looking to Our Future
Susan Weissman,
Professor of Politics at St. Mary’s College and author of Victor Serge: The Course Is Set on Hope
——————————————-
7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
Capitalism –a System in Crisis
Robert Brenner,
Economist and Professor of history at UCLA and an editor of the socialist journal Against the Current, and New Left Review
——————————————-
Sunday
10:00 am –11:30 am
France, the Worker’s Movement Faced with the Growth of the Far Right Toni Rouvel,
an activist in the French Trotskyist group Fraction L’Etincelle
——————————————-
12:00 pm – 2:00 pm
Mexico: Drug Wars and State Terror
John Gibler,
Mexico – based journalist and author of Tzompaxtle and To Die in Mexico
——————————————-
2:30 pm – 4:30 pm
The Environmental Crisis and the Working Class
Speak Out Now,
a Bay Area revolutionary organization.
Followed by time to discuss and socialize – refreshments provided.

Monthly interfaith prayer meeting, held on second Sundays, dedicated to survivors and victims of violence and police terror in Oakland.

The Baha’i community of Oakland is organizing this gathering for the community to connect, share prayers, writings and poems from all spiritual traditions, reflect and recharge and build coalitions interested in healing.

Come share prayers, quotes, poems, and favorite passages from your scriptures with us.