Maggie, and all SftP activists,
Even though you have treated me very unfairly recently by
ignoring or dismissing all my posts on any issue, I will endorse this
call for rejection of the unjust condemnation of the RCP and Bob
Avakian. I do not agree with the RCP and Bob Avakian on many points,
and I think they are quite wrong in their strategy and tactics, but I
cannot stand by and see them singled out in this fashion. Thank you
for posting this.
David Westman
On 8/6/2012 1:45 AM, Maggie Zhou wrote:
> Dear climate activists,
>
> The US (and UK, and other NATO powers) government has been busy
> associating activism of many stripes with the magic black paint of
> "terrorism", starting with the most radical groups, but using laws
> purposely written in vague languages, closing in on all the rest that
> poses any threat/inconvenience to the powers-that-be, just like using
> a giant dragnet. Environmentalists, and indigenous rights groups
> struggling to protect their land, water and soil, have been often
> lumped in with and treated using the same tactics as "terrorist
> organizations" by the US intelligence/security apparatus, according to
> some declassified/leaked documents. So, I hope you do not consider
> the below irrelevant to these mailing lists, especially since it has
> become clearer than ever that a truly systemic change to the
> profit-driven capitalist/imperialist system is needed to allow any
> real solutions to the climate crisis, and we will need all our allies
> in other social movements to effect that change, and can not allow the
> fascists in power to take us out one by one.
>
> Below is a request for individual/organizational endorsement of a
> statement fighting back on a dangerous insinuation by the legal ruling
> in the USA in the case of /Hedges et al. v Obama et al. /pertaining to
> the National Defense Authorization Act, and about who the government
> can claim to advocate violence/terrorism. Though the case is in the
> US, theywelcome international endorsements as well.
>
> Even though I disagree with the RCP on some major points, I understand
> that RCP does not advocate terrorism, which is violence against
> innocent people. They only advocate being prepared to meet violent
> repression unleashed by the state, which I think should be totally
> legal as it would be self-defense, though I don't even know if that's
> a viable strategy (could violent response to state violence be used to
> justify more violent repression, and also prevent internal revulsion
> among the ranks of the state's military/police apparatus?) In any
> case, RCP's advocacy and organizing should be protected by our
> constitutional rights, and we can not allow them to be singled out for
> persecution. Besides, the US and NATO has been providing "material
> support" to the "rebels" in Syria, and previously in Libya and many
> other places, to violently challenge their respective states, and
> often proactively, as opposed to in self-defense, so the hypocrisy is
> quite naked.
>
> If you do not see the text of the statement itself titled "*A Call To
> Stand Together To Oppose The Obama Administration’s Dangerous Assault
> On Fundamental Rights*", immediately below the name and email of
> Raymond Lotta, please let me know. Some others have reported this
> strange disappearance of the text, and the pdf of the statement fails
> to forward too.
>
> Thanks, and all the best.
>
> Maggie Zhou
>
> ----- Forwarded Message -----
> *From:* raymond lotta <[log in to unmask]>
> *To:* Raymond Lotta <[log in to unmask]>
> *Sent:* Saturday, August 4, 2012 6:33 PM
> *Subject:* Response requested: Statement vs NDAA
>
> Dear Friend,
>
> I am sharing with you a public statement for signature entitled “A
> Call To Stand Together To Oppose The Obama Administration’s Dangerous
> Assault On Fundamental Rights.” The statement can be read below this
> letter or as an attachment (and it will soon be posted on the web).
>
> The purpose of this statement is to call attention, and summon
> resistance, to a dangerous trajectory of repressive acts and laws and
> to reaffirm a core principle: we cannot allow any one group or person
> to be singled out and targeted. I have drawn up this statement out of
> great concern for the situation we are confronting—and in doing so
> have consulted with, and incorporated the insights of, others
> expressing similar concerns.
>
> The immediate catalyst for this statement is the National Defense
> Authorization Act of 2012 and the ruling of May 16 by District Judge
> Katherine Forrest in response to the law suit/Hedges et al. v Obama et
> al./ The ruling was a mainly positive one, but it also contains an
> erroneous and potentially harmful characterization of the
> Revolutionary Communist Party, USA (RCP) and its Chairman, Bob
> Avakian. For background, you can look at the article
> <http://www.revcom.us/a/274/dangerous-mischaracterization-in-national-defense-authorization-act-ruling-en.html> I
> have written for /Revolution/ newspaper. The legal steps taken to
> rectify this mischaracterization are summarized here
> <http://www.revcom.us/a/275/brief-filed-objecting-to-dangerous-mischaracterization-of-RCPUSA-en.html>.
> As for the RCP’s actual view on the struggle for revolutionary change,
> here is a link <http://www.revcom.us/a/055/crucialpoints.html>.
>
> This public statement below is aimed at broadly influencing public
> opinion and helping, along with other efforts, to galvanize the kind
> of opposition that is really needed to the widening assault on
> fundamental rights.
>
> I encourage you to become a signatory to this statement; if
> appropriate, include your institutional affiliation (any public
> manifestation of this statement will include the phrase “institutional
> affiliation is for identification purposes only and does not imply
> endorsement”). Please reply with your information.
>
> Any thoughts on projecting this statement, as well as your thinking on
> the larger situation to which it is addressed, would be greatly
> appreciated.
>
> In solidarity,
> Raymond Lotta
> [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
> ***************************************************************
>
> *A Call To Stand Together To Oppose The Obama Administration’s
> Dangerous Assault On Fundamental Rights*
> The administration of Barack Obama, which had promised to put an end
> to torture and other outrages committed by the Bush Administration, is
> in fact putting into place a dangerous system of repression and
> control. This is a serious assault on fundamental rights, and it must
> be answered not with silence and complicity but with heightened
> awareness and more determined opposition.
> The record of the Obama Administration is a chilling one. President
> Obama has preserved Bush’s rendition program, which relies upon
> torture, and has extended the Patriot Act. His Administration has
> adopted a quasi-official assassination policy, complete with secret
> “kill lists” reviewed by the President, which Attorney General Holder
> has brazenly asserted meets Constitutional standards of due process.
> In the 2010 case of Holder v HLP [Humanitarian Law Project], the Obama
> administration successfully argued before the courts that the “crime”
> of “material support” to “terrorists” be broadened to include merely
> speaking with and advising (even on some legal matters) any group
> designated by the government as terrorist. The ruling has already been
> applied to pro-Palestinian activists and endangers many others,
> including prominent public intellectuals, as well as groups upholding
> or advocating fundamental social change.
> The most recent expansion of dangerous and illegitimate government
> authority is the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). This
> law grants to any U.S. president the power to detain any person,
> including U.S. citizens, indefinitely and without charge or trial, for
> the alleged crime of associating with a broad and vague category of
> people, which could include people who have nothing to do with the
> 9/11 attacks or with terrorism in general.
> The pattern is disturbingly clear: not just a continuation but a
> further leap in the draconian measures taken by the Bush
> administration—under the pretext of the open-ended, so-called War on
> Terror—to detain, torture, and assassinate…not just a continuation but
> a further leap in measures to restrict and criminalize dissent and
> opposition to the status quo.
> This must not go unanswered—nor be allowed to continue to grow
> increasingly worse. In opposing these repressive moves, it is
> imperative that people not allow anyone, or any one group, to be
> singled out or targeted for repression. In this regard, the lawsuit
> Hedges et al. v Obama et al. that is challenging ominous provisions of
> the NDAA is quite salient. On May 16, a federal district court ruled
> in favor of the plaintiffs and issued a temporary injunction blocking
> the government from implementing Section 1021 of this law. But
> insinuated into this mainly positive ruling is a reference to the
> Revolutionary Communist Party, USA and its Chairman Bob Avakian which
> is an erroneous and potentially harmful characterization that could be
> used as a pretext to criminalize what is constitutionally protected
> freedom of speech and association and potentially sweep the RCP and
> its Chairman into a category of organizations identified by the
> government as terrorist.
> Those of us signing this statement cannot speak for the RCP and indeed
> have various levels of familiarity with and a variety of views on its
> philosophical and political principles and objectives. But we do not
> countenance—and recognize as very dangerous—the designation by the
> powers-that-be of groups as politically “acceptable” and
> “unacceptable.” History teaches, by negative and positive example,
> that we must stand against attempts to divide progressive, radical,
> and revolutionary forces along any such lines.
> In this there are very important lessons to be drawn from the
> self-critical summation by Pastor Martin Niemoeller of his experience
> when confronted with the heightening repression carried out by the
> Nazi regime in Germany during the 1930s:
> “First they came for the communists, and I didn’t speak out because I
> wasn’t a communist.
> Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak out because
> I wasn’t a trade unionist.
> Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a
> Jew.
> Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak out because I was
> a Protestant.
> Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak out
> for me.”
> The signatories of this statement call on people to step forward and
> stand together to oppose the assault on dissent and the moves to
> restrict and criminalize oppositional speech, association, and
> political activity, which are being carried out by the Obama
> Administration and which continue and expand dangerous precedents and
> mechanisms which can also be utilized by any future Administration.