Fw: talking & action (was Re: carol and lou on religion)

----- Original Message -----
From: Alan Maki <alanmaki@hotmail.com>
To: <marxism@lists.panix.com>
Sent: Friday, December 29, 2000 1:52 PM
Subject: Re: talking & action (was Re: carol and lou on religion)


> I would urge everyone on this list to send this article on to everyone on
> their e-mail lists, etc. and urge people to flood congresspeople and
> senators--- especially those of you who may have some influence with
Hillary
> Clinton in New York-- to call, fax and write, picket and demonstrate to
> bring this issue front and center in the few days we have left while
Clinton
> is president.
>
> Alan Maki
>
>
> >From: Louis Proyect <lnp3@panix.com>
> >Reply-To: marxism@lists.panix.com
> >To: marxism@lists.panix.com
> >Subject: Re: talking & action (was Re: carol and lou on religion)
> >Date: Fri, 29 Dec 2000 12:37:52 -0500
> >
> >Chris:
> > >    Alan,
> > >    I am uninformed about Leonard Peltier
> >
> >
> >NY Times Op-Ed, December 29, 2000
> >
> >A Time for Human Rights on Native Ground
> >
> >By LOUISE ERDICH
> >
> >MINNEAPOLIS - In 1977, fresh out of Dartmouth College's Native American
> >program, I got a job in Fargo, N.D. I worked only blocks from the federal
> >court building, and one day, from my window, I saw a crowd collect near
the
> >courtroom entrance. I walked over to see what was happening and spotted a
> >few friends I had grown up with in Wahpeton, N.D.
> >
> >My political leanings were all surface, consisting mainly of fashion
> >statements. During the 1973 siege at Wounded Knee and the subsequent
> >murderous climate on Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota, in which
more
> >than 60 Native people and two F.B.I. agents were killed, I had been
trying
> >to get good grades.
> >
> >Now, here were my friends dressed in flamboyant vests, beads and black
hats
> >hung with eagle feathers. I, too, wore a hat, a brown Italian fedora,
only
> >my feather was a blue macaw's. On the basis of our hats, rather than any
> >political awareness, I joined the crowd entering the court building and
> >became immediately drawn into the trial of Leonard Peltier.
> >
> >I changed the hours in my job so that I could sit through the trial and
> >listen carefully until at last the cases were presented. Once I'd heard
it
> >all, I was confident that not one scintilla of hard evidence linked Mr.
> >Peltier to the murders of F.B.I. agents Jack Coler and Ronald Williams.
> >When the jury came back with a guilty verdict I remember extreme shock, a
> >surprise so visceral that I jumped up, shouted, and then found myself
> >quietly weeping in the swirl of subsequent chaos. I had, then, no
personal
> >connection with Mr. Peltier. I was not persuaded of his innocence, but
that
> >was not the point. I was positive that on the basis of what I'd heard in
> >court that there was reasonable doubt as to his guilt and that he should
> >not have been convicted. My horror was for the United States judicial
> >system.
> >
> >The court system had been influenced, as had I, by the black hats and the
> >feathers and the aura of paranoia. Only to me, these things were
> >attractive. To others, the mood at the back of the courtroom and the drum
> >beating in the street outside were threatening. No one at the time was
> >capable of impartiality, or dedicated to discovering the truth.
> >
> >Here are a few truths. There is no exact forensic evidence that links the
> >rifle said to have been carried by Mr. Peltier to the weapon that caused
> >the fatal injuries. There was no witness to the shooting of the F.B.I.
> >agents. The young witnesses who placed Mr. Peltier, along with some 30
> >other people, in the vicinity of the crime scene have since insisted that
> >they were coerced and intimidated by the F.B.I.
> >
> >Subsequently, it appears that the F.B.I. sought to avenge the murders on
> >the only person who could still be brought to trial after everyone else
> >involved in the fatal episode was acquitted, by withholding and
> >manipulating critical evidence.
> >
> >During the next few weeks, President Clinton has an opportunity to
> >demonstrate to Native American people and to the world that our country
> >practices some of what it preaches about human rights. By extending
> >clemency to Leonard Peltier, Mr. Clinton could make an enormous gesture
of
> >reparation and healing. Mr. Peltier's release is urged by the European
> >Parliament, Amnesty International, the Kennedy Memorial Center for Human
> >Rights; by Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Rev. Jesse Jackson,
the
> >Dalai Lama; as well as Canada's Assembly of First Nations, not to mention
> >Native rights groups and ordinary citizens throughout the United States.
As
> >long as Leonard Peltier is imprisoned, our country's relationship with
its
> >Native people is stained by ongoing dishonor, and our own human rights
> >statements are undermined by hypocrisy.
> >
> >After the Peltier trial, I immersed myself in writing and then
motherhood.
> >Having experienced some of the hysteria and hatreds of those times, I was
> >ambivalent about Mr. Peltier and the attendant posturing of other leaders
> >of the American Indian Movement. I was not a knee- jerk defense committee
> >member, although I am a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe, as
is
> >Leonard Peltier. But I was haunted because of the high degree of
reasonable
> >doubt that existed in the evidence against him. Eventually, I wrote to
> >Leonard Peltier.
> >
> >
> >
> >He is not a killer and never was. How do I know this? Because of the
person
> >he has become. Leonard Peltier lives, physically half-destroyed, in
> >Leavenworth Prison. He is 56 years old, and he has suffered a stroke and
a
> >jaw condition that left him in unalleviated pain. Everything has been
> >stripped away from him. He is transparent now; 24 years in prison do
that.
> >There is no rage, there is no blame in him. If his life were based upon
two
> >murders, he could not have grown, as he has, into a spiritual force, a
> >person of true humility and gentle humor. I believe the only way he could
> >have survived is on the strength of his innocence.
> >
> >Last summer, I walked my grandfather's Turtle Mountain land, side-
stepping
> >wild prairie roses, flicking off wood ticks, snapping the dry tall stems
of
> >sage into a bundle I would wrap and keep through the winter. As I walked,
> >the evening sun blazed beneath a low cloud and lighted all I saw with a
> >shivering golden fire. I felt in that moment the vast blessing of my own
> >freedom, and took out a letter I'd recently received from Leonard. Words
> >are the soul to me, so I neatly folded the letter and buried it, there,
in
> >his home ground.
> >
> >Leonard Peltier has paid a terrible price for all that the American
Indian
> >Movement was blamed for during the late 1970's. While other AIM leaders
> >have trekked to Hollywood, married, remarried, traveled first-class
around
> >the world and reaped the rewards of notoriety, Mr. Peltier has paid. He
has
> >paid for our nation's savagery at Wounded Knee in 1890 and 1973, and for
> >the shame of the F.B.I.'s treatment of Pine Ridge people. He has paid for
> >the violence of the AIM "warriors" who trashed government offices,
> >strutted, mugged, brandished weapons and used them. He has paid the debt
> >for whoever actually did commit those murders. He has paid every day for
24
> >years. He has paid enough.
> >
> >It is time to let him go home.
> >
> >Louise Erdrich is the author of the forthcoming novel, "The Last Report
on
> >the Miracles at Little No Horse."
> >
> >
> >
> >Louis Proyect
> >Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
>
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