Feminist Scholar Andrea Dworkin Dies at 58

Her ideas have challenged me more than any others as a young feminist. The strength she had to have to be so vocal and public must have been extraordinary. RIP.

Feminist Daily News Wire
April 11, 2005

Feminist Scholar Andrea Dworkin Dies at 58

Andrea Dworkin, a feminist icon and scholar, died on Saturday at the age of 58. Her cause of death was not known, but her agent Elaine Markson told the Guardian that she had become frail in the last week and had a series of falls. Dworkin was the author of over a dozen books, and was known best for her writings on pornography and violence against women, as well as her theories on how these issues contributed to sexual inequality.

“The women’s movement, domestically and globally, has lost one of its most moving, brilliant, and clear voices,” said Robin Morgan, a noted feminist author (her books include Sisterhood Is Powerful and Sisterhood Is Global) and former editor-in-chief and current Global Editor of Ms. magazine. “Andrea Dworkin was a fine writer, had a fierce intellect, and was an uncompromising feminist.”

Dworkin, together with feminist lawyer Catharine MacKinnon, wrote a law defining pornography as a violation of women’s civil rights, enabling women to sue those who produce and distribute pornographic materials. The law was passed in Indianapolis in 1983, but was overturned by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals two years later.

The works of Dworkin on sexual inequality and to end pornography have been highly controversial. The Guardian described Dworkin in 2001, saying, “Dworkin is a threat, of course, to exactly the extent that radical feminists have always posed a threat – pointing out unapologetically the degree to which violence against women and children by men remains rampant.”

Private volunteers patrol a porous border

These people are not asking the right questions. The question is, why do so many people continue to risk their lives for economic opportunity in the U.S.? Why do U.S. citizens feel threatened for their jobs? What have the effects of NAFTA been on the global economy that we all are tied to? This issue is much bigger than simply patrolling the border and stopping a few individuals. This is a worldwide economic struggle. Complexity should not be simplified.


from the April 04, 2005 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0404/p01s03-usgn.html

Private volunteers patrol a porous border
In April, a slice of Arizona will be monitored by 1,500 'minutemen.'

By Daniel B. Wood | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

TOMBSTONE, ARIZ. - With lawn chairs, two-way radios, and binoculars, they've come to save the Union. All volunteers, age four to 86, they've descended here from all 50 states via RV, motorcycle, sidecar, and sport coupe.

Across a remote corner of the American Southwest - a honeycombed terrain that helped Apache leader Geronimo elude the US government for years - they are providing eyes, ears, and vacation time to another cause they feel has long eluded the same government: effective immigration law enforcement.

Some 1,500 self-selected volunteers will begin fanning out to designated outposts along the Arizona border Monday in a highly visible - and controversial - bid to help reclaim part of the US-Mexican border. If successful, similar projects are planned in neighboring states in coming months.

"We are lighting the fuse to a grass-roots grass fire using the Constitution, the First Amendment, and Martin Luther King's philosophy to pursue our objective in a peaceful, rational way," says James Gilchrist, a former marine and cofounder of the so-called Minuteman Project. "This is just the beginning."

Taking strategic cover beneath glades of sage and piñon pine, behind buffalo-sized boulders, the "minutemen" will be stationed every 300 yards along a 40-mile stretch of border known as the San Pedro River Valley. The area has become a favorite corridor for illegal immigrants to enter the US.

The goal: monitor the problem of illegal entry firsthand, notify the Border Patrol of attempted crossings (taking strict care, they say, not to confront anyone), and spotlight the growing problem in the Tucson area. Last year, agents apprehended 500,000 illegals along this stretch of border alone.

As evident by rallies this weekend in the small border towns of Douglas and Naco, the Minuteman idea has sparked wide debate about the motivation of participants, concern about their methods, and apprehension that confrontation with illegals could escalate into violence.

"We think there is a strong possibility of conflict and misunderstanding," says Eleanor Eisenberg, head of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, which has trained dozens of volunteers to monitor the minutemen.

The US Border Patrol has also stated loudly that the minutemen will not help agents do their jobs. They worry about the civilian volunteers setting off ground sensors, complicating video surveillance, and creating security problems. "Having a large number of people walking purposefully around the areas of migrant trails is not beneficial to us," says Rob Griffin of the US Border Patrol's Tucson sector.

The minutemen say one goal is to draw attention to the underfunding of the Border Patrol. But officials counter they don't need the help: Last week, the agency's Tucson sector announced a 25 percent increase in staffing in Arizona, which includes 155 permanent personnel and 200 temporary. Twenty-three new aircraft are surveying the area as well.
Countering perceptions

The minutemen may have as much PR work to do about their own organization as they do about the Border Patrol. In advance of their highly publicized initiative this week, critics - including some state and federal officials - labeled some of the volunteers "vigilantes," "racists," and "white supremacists."

Clearly, the group is trying to dispel those perceptions. At rallies in Naco and Douglas over the weekend, volunteers waved American flags and stood politely outside Border Patrol offices. They provided biographies and explained their intentions. Most say they have sacrificed to be here. They have spent their own money on food and travel. Some are sleeping in tents or in dorm rooms at a local Bible college. Many are missing work.

"I'm easily giving up tens of thousands because I had to shut down two projects to be here for two weeks," says Scott Smith, who runs a real-estate consulting firm in Maryland. "I'd like to be here longer, but I can't afford it."

Organized nationally over the Internet, the group is fairly diverse. It ranges from blue-collar workers (construction, truck drivers, labor unionists) to professionals (teachers, chemists, engineers). There's a large contingent of veterans and career law-enforcement officials. Some 40 percent are, organizers say, women and minorities. Many are retired.

"The people here are really middle America, not one side or the other of the political and social spectrum," says Barbara McCutchen, a former school teacher and advertising saleswoman from Arkansas.

She and others say their concerns are practical rather than race-based - principally, worry about terrorists entering the US and the high cost of providing social services to illegals. They also see illegal immigration adding to crime and prison expenditures.

Some quote studies showing 500,000 illegals residing in Arizona alone - costing $1.3 billion in education, healthcare, and criminal justice. "That's nine percent of the state population," says Randy Graf, a former state representative who has been helping organizers. "The costs add up and up."

Volunteers say the impact shows up not only on government balance sheets, but in backyards. Kerry Morales, who came from Laredo, Texas, says she gets 200 illegals a day across her 80-acre ranch. Bands of illegals have broken into her house, attacked her numerous times, and damaged her property by leaving gates open, letting horses escape. Two dozen child abductions have been reported in Laredo in recent years, she says, with cross-border Mexicans demanding ransoms of $10,000 to $20,000.

"I want to bring attention that for people like me, there is physical danger," says Ms. Morales, who is married to a Hispanic. "The fact that our opponents are calling us racist and extremist is completely untrue."

Some complain about a diminished quality of life from illegals moving into communities from Oregon to California, Florida to the Carolinas. They decry the unfairness of giving illegals privileges that other immigrants have waited years to get.

"My son married a South Korean and they followed all the rules and it took two years," says Richard, a retired construction worker from Ventura, Calif., who declined to give a last name. "Why should we give privileges to people who just come across and blatantly disregard our system.?"
A double standard?

Tim Donnelly, who runs a small manufacturing supply company in Twin Peaks, Calif., says California has set aside $67 million for college tuition for illegals who have spent three years in high school, while active US military who move to the state must pay higher out-of-state tuition.

"I find that prejudicial and discriminating to military and legal immigrants," he says.

Wayne Holland, a novelist from Orange County, Calif., says the effects of illegal immigration on his state can be seen from the trash across the landscape that used to be pristine. Fifteen years ago, Mr. Holland participated in a San Diego rally in which 1,000 cars shined spotlights on the border to highlight the problem of illegals cutting through backyards. "That rally never really went any further because the numbers weren't there," he says. "Now we are seeing the problem grow to other states and people."

Whether the month-long vigil will have any effect is the source of great debate. Some say the initiative has gotten so much press that few illegals are likely to attempt entry in this region at this time.

But participants are at least heartened that illegal immigration is getting a closer look. "The national attention to this is beginning to shift," says Rep. Tom Tancredo (R) of Colorado, a speaker at one of the rallies.

US intelligence 'dead wrong' on Iraq weapons:


Dead wrong, huh? Most people with a brain knew this the minute the war started. How many people died for this gross mistake, again? It makes me wonder about all these religious folks who hold life sacred but who still support war. Utter bullshit.


WASHINGTON (AFP) - US intelligence agencies were "dead wrong" in their pre-war assessments of Iraq's weapons programs and still know dangerously little about current nuclear and biological threats, a US presidential commission said.

After a year-long inquiry, the panel warned in a scathing report that the decision to invade Iraq in March 2003, based on accusations that turned out to be false, had done damage to US credibility that "will take years to undo."

"We conclude that the intelligence community was dead wrong in almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction," the commission said. "We simply cannot afford failures of this magnitude."

The panel warned that US intelligence on the capabilities and intentions of Iran and North Korea -- both locked in nuclear disputes with the United States -- may be "disturbingly" shaky. A chapter on the subject was classified.

US President George W. Bush welcomed the report and said he had directed his homeland security adviser, Fran Townsend, to review the 600-page document and take "concrete action" on its recommendations.

"The central conclusion is one that I share: America's intelligence community needs fundamental change to enable us to successfully confront the threats of the 21st century," he said in remarks at the White House.


The panel called for bolstering the powers of the newly created director of national intelligence -- former US ambassador to Iraq John Negroponte awaits confirmation to that post -- as part of creating more centralized management and integrating what it described as a loose grouping of independence agencies.

"To win the war on terror, we will correct what needs to be fixed," Bush said with the commission's co-chairman, former federal judge Laurence Silberman and ex-senator Charles Robb, at his side.

The report took the US intelligence community severely to task for a series of shortcomings it said led to the false conclusion that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, justifying the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

It cited analysis compromised by assumptions about Saddam's intentions following the 1991 Gulf War; data collection problems; and the failure to communicate to policymakers just how little hard intelligence they had.

"The bottom line is the intelligence community operated on presumptions or assumptions based on what they had seen in 1991," Silberman told reporters. "What little evidence they did have, which was inconsistent, was tortured into those presumptions."

The commission report said it found no evidence that political pressures had warped US intelligence findings on Iraq, but steered clear of whether the Bush administration had exaggerated the intelligence to sell the war.

At the same time, the panel said that flaws that crippled analysis of Iraq "are still all too common" and warned that US intelligence on countries like Iran and North Korea lacks critical information.

"The bad news is that we still know disturbingly little about the weapons programs and even less about the intentions of many of our most dangerous adversaries," the commission said.

"Across the board, the intelligence community knows disturbingly little about the nuclear programs of many of the worlds most dangerous actors. In some cases, it knows less now than it did five or 10 years ago," it said.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said there were no plans to change US policy toward Tehran or Pyongyang, and other officials declined to say whether current US policy of "preemptive" military action would change.

Tehran denies the charge that its civilian nuclear program hides a quest for atomic weapons. North Korea boasts that it has nuclear arms.

The commission warned that the US intelligence community also "has not kept pace" with the spread of weapons of mass destruction and eagerness among terrorists like those behind the September 11, 2001 attacks to get them.

The presidential commission had some good news on at least one front, praising "innovative" US intelligence efforts on Libya's now-abandoned nuclear arms program as "fundamentally a success story."

It said the use of new techniques to penetrate the global sales network of Pakistan's disgraced nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan "allowed the US government to pressure Libya into dismantling these programs."

The United States invaded Iraq on grounds that Saddam possessed chemical and biological weapons and sought nuclear arms, but none has been found and US-led forces have abandoned searching for them.

The White House has since shifted its public rationale for the invasion from the weapons to the oppressive nature of Saddam's regime and what Washington says is the need to spread democracy in the Middle East.