Daily Archives: September 23, 2020

What is it that unites us as citizens of a republic where a former slave becomes a great orator for the abolition effort and insists upon education as the means for keeping all men and women free?

Frederick Douglass a slave traveled to New England embraced by many and stated his case. Wisely, he resisted being drawn into politics and appealed instead to mans higher nature, Lincolns leadership, and The Declaration of Independence as guidance. He, after all, credited a white slave owners wife who taught him to read opening the door to thought and reason causing him to understand many things.

Race relations today and the vast achievement gap of Black and brown students that do not allow them to participate in that vision articulated over 150 years ago must be addressed. For this parents need school choice.

Equally important, all students need a long view of our countrys history that keeps us free and united. We are quickly losing this battle as politics and socialism replace our history and students hear different voices causing them to march, claiming systemic racism. Real progress in race relations relies on knowledge of our Declaration and Constitution as context for progress made: Progress evidenced by the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments; progress noted by the work of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders who looked to the past to build on the future, not to tear it down; progress made in the future for school choice which is a necessary hand up!

Todays high school students desire an end to racism, and focus on the history curriculum in their suburban schools as the culprit for not preparing them for race relations today. Yet racism doesnt exist in a vacuum apart from the history and civics which has been given short shrift in social studies since the early 1980s! Only when our countrys history is respected and focused on the past and present as a continuum to the future are we allowed to see the progress made in race relations since our founding in 1776.

At the same time students learn uncomfortable truths about our country, including slavery, which many have risen above. Our Declaration and Constitution must once again be understood.

Susan Harris is a retired U.S. History teacher from Cheshire.

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To overcome racism, students need a better understanding of our history, Declaration of Independence and Constitution - The CT Mirror

Museum of the Grand Prairie will begin its fall speaker series Thursday, September 24th. All events will be virtual, and free, and will stream live on their Facebook and YouTube pages.

Thursday, September 24 at 7 p.m.

FROM THE LOBBY TO THE STREET: STRATEGIES USED BY VOTING ACTIVISTS IN THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY

Lecture presented by Kyle Ciani, Historian, Activist, and Professor in Illinois State Universitys Department of History

Activism to secure women's right to vote changed in the 20th century as activists traveled across the country to educate communities. From lobbying politicians to staging spectacular pageants and marching in street protests, suffrage activists engaged in a wide array of strategies to communicate their message of voting rights. Kyle Ciani will virtuallypresent this engaging talk and will discuss some of those strategies and their outcomes.

Sunday, October 4 at 2 p.m.

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE: THE ROAD TO ANTI-SLAVERY ADVOCATE

Lecture presented by Christina Hartlieb, Executive Director of the Harriet Beecher Stowe House in Cincinnati.

Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Toms Cabin, the important anti-slavery novel, based on her experiences living in the border city of Cincinnati. Learn more about the woman Abraham Lincoln credited with writing the book that started the Civil War, as well as other members of her large, social reform minded family including suffragist Isabella Beecher Hooker and Illinois abolitionist, Edward Beecher. Christina Hartlieb is a former HS educator, she loves bringing together ideas of social justice advocacy, womens history, and historical literacy.

Thursday October 22 at 7 p.m.

THE DANGERS OF GIVING WOMEN THE VOTE: POLITICAL CARTOONS AND SUFFRAGE

Lecture presented by Dr. Julia diLiberti, Professor of Humanities at the College of DuPage and serves as the Global Education Faculty Liaison.

Many political cartoons of the late 19th century and early 20th century centered on the suffrage debate, Dr. Julia diLiberti will compare political cartoons from the suffragist era and those depicting female candidates today.

Sunday, November 1 at 7 p.m.

HISTORY BROUGHT TO LIFE: SUSAN B. ANTHONY

First-Person Interpretation presented by Annette Baldwin, Historian, Director, and Professional Actor.

It had been a 72-year struggle for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing women their right to vote, with thousands of women dedicating themselves to getting the vote, but it was Susan B. Anthony, a former school teacher and advocate for temperance and abolition who through her leadership for womens political equality, became affectionately and respectfully known as the mother of The Cause. Hear from Ms. Anthony herself as she describes her tireless work towards a more just society. Join Annette Baldwin, as Susan B. Anthony, for this informative and inspiring presentation.

Sunday, November 15 at 2 p.m.

WOMEN, POLITICS, AND ABOLITION A COMPLICATED COLLABORATION.

Lecture presented by Stacey Robertson, Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs at the State University of New York, Geneseo

Professor Stacey Robertson will reveal in this how women abolitionists in Illinois and the Old Northwest engaged in partisan politics as an avenue to end slavery and through this process found themselves increasingly aware of their own gendered disempowerment. Their efforts to expand their influence and power laid the groundwork for future womens rights accomplishments.

Thursday, December 10

HISTORY BROUGHT TO LIFE: ANN BRADFORD STOKES, AFRICAN AMERICAN CIVIL WAR NURSE

First-Person Interpretation presented by Marlene Rivero, Historian and Professional Actor

Ann Bradford Strokes worked aboard the Navys first Hospital Ship Red Rover of Mound City, Illinois. She worked with sick and wounded soldiers aboard the United States Naval Hospital Ship throughout the Western Theater of the Civil War on both the Ohio and Mississippi rivers and their tributaries. She volunteered with the Sisters of the Holy Cross and Naval ship officers working as first class boy, cook, laundress, mender- anything to get food to eat. Eventually, Ann assumed the role of a nurse, leading to the beginning of a profession that would last generations. She was the first woman to earn a pension for her work with the U.S.N. Red Rover. After 18 months as an African American Civil War nurse, she left service in November 1864. Several years later, Ann learned to read and write. She settled, remarried, and remained in Southern Illinois for the rest of her life. In a fascinating reenactment, Marlene Rivero will breathe life back into Ann Stokes and her story, captivating audiences and informing new learners. Program is supported in part by Illinois Humanities.

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Museum of the Grand Prairie announced their fall speaker series : SPlog - Smile Politely - Champaign-Urbana's Online Magazine

Back in May, Teressa Raiford's yearslong bid to be Portland mayor appeared over.

Raiford, 50, announced her challenge of Mayor Ted Wheeler in late 2017, the year he first took office. In the primary this May, in a field of 19 candidates, she got 8.5% of the vote, finishing a distant third behind Wheeler and Sarah Iannarone.

Then Minneapolis police killed George Floyd. Starting May 28, Portlanders took to the streets by the thousands to protest the police killings of Black people. With six weeks remaining until Election Day, those protests continue.

For Raiford, such protest is nothing new. For most of the decade, she has shepherded demonstrators who decry the actions of police. She has confronted elected officials in City Council chambers and consoled the families of people shot by officers. This summer, her nonprofit organization, Don't Shoot Portland, successfully went to court to limit the cops' use of tear gas.

The issue she has spent much of her life championingpolice accountabilityhas never been more prominent. So in July, her campaign volunteers asked a question: Why shouldn't she be mayor?

"She has been doing the work that a mayor should have been doing," says Jacinda Padilla, Raiford's campaign manager. "After so much turmoil, people didn't know that she was running for two years, and we didn't want that work to go to waste. People who didn't even vote for Teressa in the primaries started to turn back to Teressa."

So increasingly, the city is plastered with posters featuring an illustrated portrait and a demand: "Write in Teressa Raiford."

Raiford declined to be interviewed for this story, saying her campaign staff could speak for her. Those volunteers say Raiford's experience as a Black woman whose family has endured racism and violence as well as her activism and outreach make her the right candidate for the times.

Susan Anglada Bartley, an educator, writer and activist, is among the supporters of the write-in campaign.

"Teressa Raiford has so much talent and expertise," Anglada Bartley says. "She is a multidimensional person and frankly a superior candidate, especially for this political moment."

That's frustrating for Iannarone, who is trying to position herself to Wheeler's left and whose campaign has repeatedly scuffled with Raiford's backers online. But it also displays the divergent views among Portland progressives over what result should come from four months of protests.

If the mayoral election is a referendum on the future of the Portland Police Bureau, the three candidates offer competing visions. Wheeler calls for balance: He celebrates the promotion of a Black man, Chuck Lovell, to police chief and the cutting of $15 million from the bureau's budget but says the police force is needed to ensure public safety. Iannarone seeks wholesale reform and says Wheeler's changes don't go far enough.

Raiford? She wants to dismantle the bureau and replace it with something better.

"If you know anything about Teressa, she's not a traditional candidate," says Token Rose, a community organizer who is volunteering for Raiford. "She's for [police] abolition. She's calling for defunding of police. She's calling for radical ideas. That's always been Teressa, that's always been her niche in Portland, and after May 19 people started to listen."

Raiford grew up in Portland. Her family owned the Burger Barn, a Northeast Portland restaurant that in 1981 was the target of a notorious incident: Two off-duty Portland police officers tossed four dead opossums on its doorstep. In her 20s, she moved with her two children to Dallas, Texas, where she worked as a manager at Bank of America. In 2010, she returned to Portland, shortly before her nephew was killed in an unsolved shooting.

That death propelled her into activism. The group she founded, Don't Shoot Portland, seeks to comfort and organize the survivors of gun violenceparticularly shootings by police. In 2016, she formed a nonprofit. (Don't Shoot Portland's most recent filing with the state, in 2019, reported an annual revenue of $36,407; Raiford, the executive director, received no salary.)

Raiford has sought office before. She challenged City Commissioner Amanda Fritz in 2012, receiving 3.2% of the vote. She sought to unseat former Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith in 2014 (she got 6.6%) and ran a write-in campaign for Multnomah County sheriff in 2016 (3.2%).

Meanwhile, she drew a fiercely loyal following of Black activists for her organizing, especially during protests of the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., in 2014. She was arrested marching to a Bernie Sanders presidential rally in 2015. Charges were dismissed, and she sued the police for allegedly targeting her for her statements. A judge dismissed the case last year.

Destiny Houston, an activist, doula, and organizer with the Kid-Centered March for Black Lives, says that history is part of Raiford's appeal. "Going through being harassed by the police and all the trials, she's somebody who can represent the Black experience in a police state," Houston says. "Her whole mission is to create a society where people aren't losing people to police violence."

Under Raiford's leadership, Don't Shoot Portland in July took organizational leadership of the most prominent display of resistance to Trump: the "Wall of Moms," a group of yellow-clad women who faced off in gas masks each night with federal officers. When that group dissolved amid internal rancor, Raiford founded another: Moms United for Black Lives. Don't Shoot Portland also briefly ran an all-you-can-eat, donations-only barbecue for protesters called Riot Ribs, until that operation also ended after organizers said an outsider hijacked it.

Raiford's volunteers say she isn't spending much time campaigning. Instead, she's focused on mutual aid effortsthat is, projects where citizens help each other through difficult times. This month, during massive wildfires, Don't Shoot Portland organized a donations drive to send air filters, personal protective equipment, and menstrual hygiene products to smoke-clogged neighborhoods on the edge of the city and the Warms Springs Reservation, where the Lionshead Fire raged.

Not everyone is impressed. Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, the most vocal critic of police on the City Council, quarreled with Raiford in 2016 during debate over a new police contract.

"Last time I had a conversation with her, we were in City Council chambers," Hardesty recalls. "She started attacking me. She said, 'The NAACP is just sucking up the all the money; you're going to jail.' I said, 'The only way I'm going to jail is if I kick your butt.'"

Hardesty hasn't endorsed in the mayor's race. But she doesn't support Raiford. "I don't find her someone that I would want to deal with," Hardesty says.

Some members of Raiford's coalition raise eyebrows. She has the backing of key members of Stop Demolishing Portland, a group of homeowners who oppose infill development.

Few people could find Raiford's write-in campaign as frustrating as Iannarone, whose campaign is trying to unite the left against Wheeler, only to find that some activists prefer Raiford, whom Iannarone thought she had already defeated.

"I respect her work," Iannarone says, "and we just had an election in May after she campaigned for several years, and she didn't break 10% of the vote. My singular focus this whole time has been on unseating Wheeler. And that's what I intend to stay focused on."

Anglada Bartley, the Raiford supporter, says Iannarone's candidacy is ill-timed.

"Given that she is, like myself, a white woman, she can't say she really understands all forms of marginalization Black and Indiginous people feel," she says. "That is knowledge Teressa Raiford walks in the door with."

Rose is more blunt. "People think that we owe something to Sarah," they say. "And we don't. She will never be the face of our revolution. We didn't ask for a white savior, and we didn't show up to protest for a hundred days now, risking all of our lives, for another white savior. We asked for Black lives to matter.

"Teressa had been talking about police brutality," Rose adds. "People are actually starting to see it. And so people are asking for ways to show up for Black lives. So now we're providing those answers. People noticing us is a win. Of course we're going to win. We anticipate winning, 1,000%."

Nigel Jaquiss contributed reporting to this story.

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Teressa Raiford Isn't on the November Ballot. Many Portland Activists Want Her to Be Mayor Anyway. - Willamette Week

American defense is dancing with its old nemesis. No, it is not an adversary per se, but the reemergence of questions on organization, enabled by the creation of the Space Force. This new service has attracted the ire of scholars, politicians, and even one of Starfleets most famous captains. It has also been subjected to no shortage of parody. The creation of the Space Force nestled under the Department of the Air Force has ignited debate and rivalries not dissimilar to those which nearly crippled American defense in the post-World War II decade.

The post-war defense unification debates were centered on the shape and scope of the roles and missions of the military services. Those who sought to referee the interservice rivalries found themselves searching for procedural panaceas that would lead to an organizational utopia. Questions pertaining to the role and function of each of the military services were not resolved with the abolition of the free-standing military departments. This led to compromises in the 1940s and 1950s, which focused on the unity of efforts towards workable strategy and defense policy. Although significant differences remained, it was agreed upon that if another service was ever created, combined experience and unity should emerge as its guiding ethos. Congress rejected the possibility that the American military would be held hostage to a system where one military department could alone control thought and theory, particularly where new frontiers of military activity occurred such as space. This is seemingly forgotten with the creation of the Space Force.

Congress, as the final arbiter on defense, increasingly fought service cultures and rivalries as the unification debates distracted decision-makers. This distraction made time an ally for the communist threat. Central to these debates were bitter divisions between the Navy and Air Force. The pitting of experience and new concepts against one another resulted in the rejection of limitations placed upon developing a coherent national doctrine where any single approach rooted in ideology became prominent. At the time, the near loss of the war on the Korean Peninsula exposed the perils of relying upon a single philosophy, doctrine, or weapon delivery system. The unification debates and global events resulted in pressure on Congress. They pushed for access to a broad pallet of concepts, experience and historical analysis from the strategic thinking community, because it was crucial to American defense. The newly formed Department of Defense was encouraged to not suppress free debate and thought. As a result, the Department of Defense faced the challenge of how to balance limits on emotive arguments and ideological dominance against being able to use and encourage open debate effectively. The challenge led to decades of the use and abuse of jointness. The experience of unification which highlighted that limiting breadth and depth of debate only served to hinder addressing strategic realities and the development of sound strategic thought. This was starkly apparent when reorganization related to changes to existing services or the prospect of the creation of a new service came to the fore.

The Perfect Solution That Never Was

The creation of Space Force was accompanied by debates that have demonstrated well-travelled and familiar divisions, which are rooted in rivalry, prejudices, and false narratives of the past. Arguments over space resonate with the rivalries of old, which were driven by loyal air power theorists. These theorists have viewed the creation of the Space Force as final vindication to not only the dominance of their theories but also misguidedly that space is an Air Force and air power domain alone. However, these debates which vary on a range of topics related to the Space Force and spacepower frame questions over the foundations, efficiency, and effectiveness of unified defense, and ask if rivalry and service culture reigns supreme against strategy-making.

Within months of the creation of the Space Force, air power advocates quickly turned to their prophet, Army aviator Billy Mitchell, who was the protagonist for an independent Air Force in the 1920s. His ghost deployed to define the culture of Space Force. The Air Force and their supporters attempts to expand their dominance are to service their cultural paranoia and perpetual insecurity over the question of the air forces existence since the 1920s. They sometimes add capabilities to their portfolio to prop up arguments for their existence rather than questioning if it serves their best interest or the interests of the Department of Defense. Notably, the Space Force underwent less scrutiny than the U.S. Navy or Marine Corps had undergone in the 1940s, when bitter conflicts between the Navy and Air Force mission were at their peak and the very existence of the Navy was in question. Suggestions and concerns raised across the defense community about the future of the Space Force were placated with offers of jointness. This ignored the fact that that organizational culture defines the environment in which thought can occur and that jointness should not be used to placate constructive criticism and feedback, nor manipulated to further single service agendas. Often, suggestions by naval thinkers were rejected and argued under the auspices that the Space Force needs a blank slate. Blank slates rarely exist or become possible when they are set within an existing organization that has already rejected ideas and set bounds and limits. Those who promote blank slates for the Space Force will presumably be the first to support removing the Space Force from the Department of the Air Force, enhancing the spacepower doctrine by protecting it from developing an ideological service bias.

Building a Strategic Space Community

Debates such as these echoed similar unification debates of the twentieth century. Unification debates fractured relationships, divided opinions and attempted to dismiss long-established experience while pushing new boundaries on civil-military relations, political oversight and fiscal control. The process of military unification failed to resolve anxieties of many of the services and culturally embedded concern of how easy it was to squander hard-earned experiences while demonstrating the perils associated with attempting to create something new. This was foremost in the mind of U.S. Navy Adm. Arleigh Burke. In the late 1950s, he observed other services rejecting changes to military funding of space and the creation of NASA. He realized that space would be a battleground for policy and warfare which would awaken old and long-held divisions, as he attempted to explain why space was best viewed in a maritime context but not bound to any specific doctrine, yet iterated space was still the best opportunity for all service participation. The negative response driven by interservice rivalries convinced Burke that the U.S. Navy would support the creation of NASA. Support for space through a different organization came with little surprise considering that navies had long been involved with exploration and working in conjunction with explorers, who often inherently militarized new frontiers space was no exception. Although hopes that space would be a frontier in which humanity would escape some of the trappings of its bloody past, the space race of the 1950s and 1960s was as much about beating the Soviets as it was about the challenge of a new frontier.

It can be no surprise that maritime thinkers and air power theorists debate space. A maritime strategic view of space is evidenced against the ideologies of warfighting and air power doctrine. Space warfare thinkers have lined up their complex assumptions, attempting to mold air power doctrine to space like it is a square peg in a round hole. The maritime-minded use Sir Julian Corbetts Some Principles of Maritime Strategy, identifying that similarly to the sea, space influences events on earth in support of military activity. Some of these concepts have started developing a spacepower doctrine. However, strategic space policy needs to be understood beyond military power instead, like maritime policy, where a broad spectrum of inter-relationships cross-ranging from science to trade, and from foreign relations to communications, amongst others. This is a reminder that organizations view mediums in different manners strategically, tactically and operationally. These are determined by how organizations view the art and theory of war, which reflects individual service specialties and preferences.

Those building a new strategic community to best serve strategic space theory and spacepower policy only have to look to NASA for inspiration on how to build a community of talented intellectuals. NASA avoided any particular culture, shaping its community by drawing on a diverse range of talent. The Space Forces substantial draw from the Air Force could undermine the rationale to its existence by pursuing a policy of cultural eliteness. This may be useful in limited circumstances but may be out of step with the Space Force mission such as special warfare. By contrast, Space Command has demonstrated the value of having a range of talent by being a joint operational command. Although intense scrutiny by Congress is vital, diversifying transfers would provide a crucial first step to enhance longer-term aspirations and funding for space within defense. At the present, hopes that space would avoid the fierce rivalry akin to the past have increasingly disappeared and have been accelerated by the creation of the Space Force. This acceleration has been further enhanced by the singlemindedness of some who view space more in a warfighting air power model than a domain in which to address strategic concepts first. The optics of an Air Force takeover of space aggravated deep wounds and concerns in the culture of each service. Understandably, military services facing great power competition and the cost from the exhaustion of decades in the Middle East approached the political mandate to create the Space Force with skepticism. They could ill afford to risk service or broader defense budgets by fiscally maintaining yet another service and potentially jeopardizing already struggling modernization programs.

Leave Behind the Eulogies

Todays vision for the Space Force, presented by the Air Force, hopes for a lean and agile organization with redirected Air Force funds within the Department of the Air Force. This was justified to reduce bureaucracy, costs and rivalry. Yet, it will have to be seen if it materializes as this has been elusive to planners across defense since 1947. The rise of the more is better philosophy demonstrates a lack of thoughtful reasoning and a requirement for an economy to support it. During the late 1940s, the Air Force criticized retaining the U.S. Marine Corps within the Department of the Navy, as according to them, it was an excuse to further justify the existence of the Navy. With Space Force increasingly within Air Forces control it could be argued that it presents similar optics. Depending upon the budget requirements to operationalize the Space Force, the military branches, primarily the Air Force, may face difficult choices or turn to Capitol Hill to face voices who already doubt space forces funding. If they are to retain strategic readiness across defense, revisiting long term planning may be the only option. If funding is not forthcoming, it could impact the broader defense budget, potentially deepening rivalry, where other service advocates reject funding changes that could impact their services.

Service loyalties become useless if they betray the development of sound thought and if minds are closed to being challenged by new, alternative and classic theories. Although jointness remains operationally essential, it should not hinder challenges that jolt thought patterns from comfortable paths of thinking. Challenges present the opportunity to hone and refine doctrine, policy and strategic models. Air forces around the world have pursued continental air force space models similar to the U.S. Air Force. Their own national air power dominance doctrines have also resulted in them promoting airpower and space as one, inflaming rivalry and doing little to advance thought and theory. For example, advocates for the British Royal Air Force openly declared that air force ownership of space forces and space operations is about the justification for an RAF, its funding and role in British defense. They promoted this role using outdated and distorted myths, such as the Battle of Britain in 1940. This demonstrates how space could be misused by advocates in the defense debate for alternative agendas. This undermines urgent calls to build a broad constructive forward-looking strategic space community, which is not disconnected from the wider strategic community behind a singular or departmental perspective.

Unification and Strategy: An Ancient and Troubled Relationship

The creation of the Space Force provides a warning marker that lessons identified in unification period had been lost: the dangers and damage of rivalry, the potency of old arguments, and the embrace of technicism over experience and outdated models. These are all emboldened by tightening resources. This may force fundamental questions buried wishfully or otherwise from the past to the fore. Strategic space strategy and space warfare will continue to grow in importance because of all-service usage of spaces resources and concerns in space itself with competitors, while retaining first and foremost its classic ability to influence events on Earth. The creation of new organizations presents the opportune moment for strategists to think again by utilizing past knowledge and experience while not being held back by it. Space forces should be looked at as an opportunity, rejecting dogmatic often-schizophrenic compromises where departmental oversight and agenda automatically defines culture and thought, displacing strategic realities. Furthermore, outdated land analogies place unnecessary cultural boundaries to the space community developing new concepts. Those interested in the affairs of other domains should be scrutinizing space forces due to the potential of division over resources, which renews old problems. Air power theorists demand that debate, thought and theory remain exclusively their own domains should be consigned to history, as an outdated and a negative force. Building a community that focuses on advancing strategic space theory through engagement between strategists, researchers and defense practitioners should be free from the culture wars. Retaining the development of defense space strategy, space theory and space warfare concepts within the cultural ideology of one service will hinder progress, giving new impetus to explore questions long avoided: How many services are needed, what are their roles, how are they funded, and how does this all work together to form a national defense strategy?

Americas space force has been brought to the forefront, showing that many of the hallmarks of a system that unification was meant to be superior to have been renewed and replaced in a new monolithic organization. Defense and service departments are temporary constructs, reflecting national choices that are therefore worthy of continual examination as they often lose sight of their beginnings. Considering all the promises of abolitionists of military services and the free-standing service departments, many should be reminded, at the creation of a new service, that many questions and problems remain unsolved by unification. The first U.S. Secretary of Defense, James Forrestal, stated in 1947: Defense organization is driven by emotion, not by intelligence. He could have added that sentimentality worshipping prophets and false narratives when creating an organization defines its culture and hinders its ability to find wisdom from the repository of experience while thinking of how to address and respond to genuine questions and challenges. Adversaries are unlikely to share such sympathy and sentimentality over their organizations as they develop and execute their strategies.

James W.E. Smith is a final year Ph.D. researcher in the School of Security Studies and Department of War Studies at Kings College London. His Ph.D. research focuses on British and American defense unification and its relationship with the development of strategic thought and theory. He was awarded grants to explore a variety of threads related to defense unification; one focuses on the relationship between maritime strategy theory and strategic space theory.

Image: U.S. Space Force

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Space Force Creation Warrants Revisiting Defense Unification - War on the Rocks

Chris Rock in FargoPhoto: Elizabeth Morris / FXTV ReviewsAll of our TV reviews in one convenient place.

Its good to be back in Fargo, which has always served as more of a feel or state of mind than a location in Noah Hawleys TV adaptation of Joel and Ethan Coens film of the same name. The wait between seasons three and four has felt nigh-interminableand that was before production shut down due to concerns stemming from the coronavirus pandemic. While absence has almost certainly made the heart grow fonder, the combination of another stellar cast and richly detailed storytelling proves a much greater lure. If Fargos ambitions get the better of it sometimes, at least its in keeping with season fours exploration of the elusive (for most) American dream.

The fourth season marks a few departures for Fargo, as the action travels to Kansas City, Missouri, over 700 miles from the series Minnesota birthplace. The tone of the new episodes is often bleaker than in previous installments: The winters in Kansas City may be milder than in Minneapolis, but the prospects for our central players are far from sunny. Which isnt to say that the show has lost all of its whimsy; the usual roster of delightful character names is very much present (theres even a U.S. Marshal named Dick Wickware). But aside from the occasional cacophonous fart fit, humor rarely ever breaks the ever-escalating tensions between the factions trying to rule this Midwestern city. By the end of the nine episodes available for review, the show has even been drained of its muted autumnal palette, shifting to black-and-white cinematography in a standout entry.

B

Noah Hawley; based on Joel and Ethan Coen's movie of the same name

Chris Rock, Jason Schwartzman, Glynn Turman, E'myri Crutchfield, Ben Whishaw, Salvatore Esposito, Jessie Buckley, Jeremie Harris, Andrew Bird, Anji White, Timothy Olyphant

Sunday, September 27 at 9 p.m. ET on FX

Hour-long crime drama/anthology series; nine episodes watched for review

And for the first time, the title cards that claim the story unfolding is a true one are more than cheeky openers. Kansas City might not call to mind organized crime as readily as New York City and Chicago do, but Hawleys clearly taken inspiration from that metropolis history of crime families. In his telling, the Jewish-led Moskowitz Syndicate stakes their claim to Kansas City at the turn of the 20th century, but ultimately fall to the Irish-led Milligan Concern, who then attempt to broker peace with the Italian Fadda family. By the 1950s, the Fadda family contends with a new challengerthe Cannon Limited, an organized crime outfit not unlike the Moskowitz Syndicate or the Milligan Concern. The difference being, the Cannon group is made up of Black Americans who left the Jim Crow South, like the Exodusters, seeking new opportunities in more northern states.

Chris Rock stars as Loy Cannon, who heads up what our perspicacious narrator describes as the latest group ready to get rich the old-fashioned wayin a country built on stolen land and with stolen labor, this means more stealing. A family man, Loy doesnt revel in behaving badly, but he rarely balks at it, either. Hes the type of ambitious, conflicted man whos often at the center of these tales of the seductiveness of power. But he isnt the hero of this piece; another divergence from seasons past is a refusal to dub any of its new characters good guys or outright villains. Hawley ventures deep into the moral grays, where hes previously thrived, finding new shades of slate and limestone. As befits real-life calls for police reform (if not abolition)not to mention working with Black writers like Stefani Robinsonsporting a badge isnt tantamount to being a white hat. The innocent dont stay that way for long; neither do the guilty.

Early on, that ambiguity costs the new season some of its cohesion, something that is also hindered by the ever-expanding cast. The premiere is welcome and witty, with inventive ritualswarring families trade their youngest sons as a way to foster peace and cultural understandingbut paired with the second episode (also helmed and written by Hawley), it can feel like the show is running through its call sheet. We meet Josto Fadda (Jason Schwartzman, as the Little Lord Fauntleroy of the manor), who represents Loys competition, but is himself beset by a brother Gaetano (Gomorrahs Salvatore Esposito) who has come to America from the old country to take his (arguably) rightful place at the head of the family. Josto crosses paths with Oraetta Mayflower (Jessie Buckley), a nurse and angel of death by day; Oraetta sizes up her young neighbor, Ethelrida (vibrant newcomer Emyri Crutchfield), whose intelligence makes more trouble for her at school than actual acting out would. Then theres the stately Doctor Senator (the equally stately Glynn Turman), Loys right-hand man; Constant Calamita (Gaetano Bruno), Jostos heavy whos on loan to Gaetano; Karen Aldridge and Kelsey Asbille as a pair of lesbian lovers who do crimes; and oh yes, Jack Huston as a guilt-ridden detective and Timothy Olyphant as the aforementioned Dick (who actually goes by Deafy), a federal marshal and a Mormon.

Thats but a fraction of Fargos playerswe havent even gotten to Dr. Harvard (Stephen Spencer), who mocks rubes in Minnesota in one of several callbacks, or the haunted Rabbi Milligan (Ben Whishaw), whos already seen so much upheaval in K.C.s demimonde, and whose last name may or may not establish a connection to season two. The shows most compelling characters still manage to come to the fore, but even the detours are a surprising amount of fun, thanks to wonderful performances across the board. As Josto, Schwartzman has the best grasp of the humor thats always on the verge of going pitch-black, and he can be formidable when needed. Ethelrida is the closest to a moral compass that we get this season, and Crutchfield shows considerable range playing her as a searching adolescent. Huston makes Odis flop sweat as palpable as his post-traumatic stress, while Olyphant radiates rugged charm as he effectively channels Raylan Givens.

Rock holds his own in a rare dramatic role: Loys speeches about who is allowed to achieve the American dream are tinged with the comedians familiar cadence from his previous onstage railing. But Rock comes to inhabit the role of Loy, someone whose ruthlessness and geniality inspire loyalty from his men in equal measure. He falters a bit in some of the quieter scenes, but when Loy visits his youngest son, Satchel (Rodney Jones), at the Fadda home, Rock shows some inspired character work, tenderly touching his sons hair, which, along with his dietary needs, is hardly being looked after. Instead of racing to hit the highest dramatic register, he seeks out the notes in between.

Fargo season four is similarly studious, filling its world with pieces of this countrys history, including migration, immigration, colonizationeven xenophobic legislation like the Mormon Extermination Order. In a sense, the themes of Fargo remain in place, but the scope has been widened greatlythis isnt the story of a flawed individual, but of flawed governance. These are not the sins of a few corrupt people, but of an entire nation. That would be a tall order for a more straightforward drama, and Fargo occasionally strains under the weight of what its attempting to accomplish: a lively examination of the history of different groups of Western European immigrants who have gradually been granted whiteness, and the many Black Americans, whose ancestors were brought here by force (and greed), but are now, as Doctor Senator puts it, a part of this land, like the wind and the dirt. While that doesnt offer the same hook as a possible UFO sighting in Minnesota, it still has the potential to be Fargo at its best.

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Ill confess: There was a time when I would have considered the question facing Republicans a no-brainer. Of course they should seize this opportunity to replace the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg with a conservative. Moving the courts especially the Supreme Court rightward has been a conservative lodestar for generations. It remains one of the last tenets of pre-Trump conservatism that still largely unites the right.

In fairness, the conservatives who take these matters seriously would say the issue isnt so much moving the courts rightward as it is restoring the courts to their proper role. They we believe the primary reason these fights have become so ugly is that the judiciary has taken upon itself legislative functions it does not have. (This is why even pro-choice conservatives, and even pro-choice liberals like Ginsburg, believe Roe v. Wade was deeply flawed.) When Supreme Court justices do the job of politicians, it shouldnt be a surprise that confirmation battles resemble political campaigns.

One of the benefits of this high-stakes moment is that many conservatives have shelved the old arguments about Senate precedents and hypocrisy and stated the matter clearly.

In reality, there are only two rules, both set forth in the Constitution, writes National Reviews Andrew McCarthy. A president, for as long as he or she is president, has the power to nominate a person to fill a Supreme Court seat; and that nominee can fill the seat only with the advice and consent of the Senate. Thats it. Everything else is posturing. Everything else is politics.

As is often the case, McCarthy is right.

But this argument is also why Im going wobbly. One of the reasons we are where we are is that then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid took this position when he invoked the nuclear option in 2013 i.e., lifted the filibuster for appellate judges. Mitch McConnell, the minority leader at the time, warned that doing so would invite a response in kind. In 2017, now-Majority Leader McConnell was true to his word. He lifted the filibuster on Supreme Court nominees.

In other words, what happens when both parties embrace the doctrine of do whatever you can get away with?

Even before Justice Ginsburgs demise, Democratic support was building not just for packing the Supreme Court by increasing the number of justices (which Ginsburg opposed), but also for Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rican statehood and the abolition of the legislative filibuster. Now, Democrats are all but vowing to go through with expanding the court in response to a rushed replacement for Ginsburg.

What will be the GOPs argument against such schemes?

What some now dismiss as politics and posturing are actually important considerations that honor the conservative distinction between can and should and fall under such antiquated notions as statesmanship, prudence, legitimacy, consistency and precedent. These concepts put maintaining the long-term health of our institutions above the demands of the moment.

Take Sen. Lindsey Graham, who promised in 2016 that if an opening were to come in the last year of President Trumps term, a nominee would not be considered until after the election. By going back on that promise in such spectacular fashion, Graham isnt merely debasing himself, hes also teaching people that nothing politicians say matters.

Moreover, merely on the level of realpolitik, abandoning all considerations other than what you can get away with amounts to preemptive disarmament for the wars to come. The pernicious logic of apocalyptic politics works on the assumption that the long term doesnt matter. But the long term always becomes now eventually.

This is why the Senate could have used more posturing and politics, not less. Republicans have the ability to fill Ginsburgs seat before the election or immediately after in a lame-duck session. Thats a huge bargaining chip, and given that the GOPs Senate majority is so slim, its a chip that could have been traded by even a handful of Republican senators.

A few Republicans could have agreed to postpone the process until after the election in exchange for a few Democrats agreeing never to vote for a court-packing scheme, giving voters some buy-in for whatever happens next. If no Democrats agreed, then their issue is really with the system, and Republicans would have been free to vote for Trumps pick, even in a lame-duck session. Im using the past tense, because on Tuesday morning, McConnell collected enough GOP votes to proceed with a fast-tracked process that will surely invite tit-for-tat reprisals down the road.

I had high hopes such a deal could work. I was naive. After all, such a bargain required politicians to trust other politicians to keep their word and stand up to the bases of their own parties for the long-term good of the country. I should have realized everyone is too out of practice with that sort of thing.

Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.

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On September 23, a grand jury moved to indict only one officer involved in the killing of Breonna Taylor, who was asleep in her own home when police barged in to carry out a botched raid. Sgt. Brett Hankison was charged with "wanton endangerment" because some of the 10 shots he fired during the deadly encounter ended up in a neighboring apartment. He wasn't actually charged with anything directly related to Taylor's death and faces a maximum of five years in prison. No criminal charges were brought against officer Myles Cosgrove and Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly.

After a summer defined by loss and protests for Black Lives Matter, this indictment is understandably disappointing to so many. Sadly, it's not at all surprising. As defeating as this is, it's important to press on and continue to fight for Black Lives and demand justice for Taylor. We must. If you're thinking, "well, what now?" here are some actionable steps you can take:

As the Louisville chapter of Black Lives Matter noted, "There isnt a verdict in the world that will remove white supremacy from #louisvillethats up to us as a community." Allies especially white allies who benefit from systemic racism and their privilegecan help by donating and paying reparations so that Black families in Louisville can "have the resources they need to heal and survive in the midst of this ongoing nightmare."

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Donate here, and continue to contribute to national organizations like the National Action Network, the NAACP, Equal Justice Initiative, Colin Kaepernicks Know Your Rights Camp, and Unicorn Riot.

You can also direct funds to the official GoFundMe that Taylor's family set up. Donations to that link will go toward advocating for police reform, various charities, women who want to start their own businesses, and scholarships for people who want to become emergency medical technicians and registered nurses.

Ahead of the grand jury decision, the city of Louisville imposed a curfew and declared a state of emergency, which could mean a bigger police presence at protests. It's so important to support the protestors who are brave enough to go out and take a stand in the coming days. As was the case when the Black Lives Matter protests gained steam earlier this summer, make sure you donate to national and local bail funds to ensure that those who are arrested for protesting and exercising their constitutional rights won't fall victim to the predatory bail system and legal fees.

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Consider donating to The Louisville Community Bail Fund, The Bail Project National Revolving Bail Fund, LGBTQ Fund, Emergency Release Fund, and Trans Justice Funding Project.

Seriously, this isn't just a clich. No, voting won't automatically end police brutality or make systemic racism go away, but here's why it matters: When you vote for people who, for example, support your stance on police abolition or reform, they can help introduce legislation that has the ability to impact our communities. (The Minneapolis City Council recently submitted a proposal to disband the city's police department, for example.)

Plus, state positions like the Kentucky Attorney General are elected. Mind you, the current AG, Daniel Cameron, is up for re-election in 2024 and is the same guy who said the officers were "justified in their use of force" against Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend. And Cameron is on Donald Trump's short list to replace Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, so keep that in mind when it's time to vote.

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This might sound like a broken record at this point, but it bears repeating: Take care of yourself first and foremost. It's been a centuries-long journey to get to where we are today, and there's still so much more that needs to be done to achieve true equality and justice for slain Black people like Taylor. But you can't be of service to anyone else if you're not looking after your mental, physical, or emotional health. (For mental health resources for Black women, check out this guide.) If you need time, rest. Then, come back stronger and ready to work.

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Daniel Woolf has been in his current role as Senior Policy Adviser for Infrastructure and Energy at the CBI since January 2018. Last year, in coordinating the CBIs response to the governments Infrastructure Finance Review, Woolf and his colleagues outlined the barriers to businesses investing in and financing UK infrastructure. At the time, those barriers included political uncertainty, the perception of politicised regulators, negative procurement practices, government handling of risk transfer, the lack of a championed infrastructure finance delivery model and fragmented governance structures.

While collating the CBIs response to the government consultation, Woolf produced recommendations to address these challenges, and this year he has spent a great deal of time producing a new CBI report on Infrastructure Finance titled, Investing in infrastructure, published in early September.

This year has been challenging for the industry, Woolf says: It has been a very turbulent time and the infrastructure sector has been hit really hard by COVID-19. Members have told us about quite a few projects that have been delayed, with the construction sector in particular faced with real difficulties including whether to stay open and how to continue to operate safely. Members tell us that while around 90 per cent of sites have reopened, they are in many cases still making a loss due to adaptations they have had to make to ways of working.

He adds: Our members are consistently positive about the relationship with the public sector, with Highways England, for example, continuing with meaningful upgrade work. The notice to proceed that was recently issued on HS2 has also started to inject some much-needed cashflow into the supply chain.

Woolf says that prior to COVID-19, it was clearly important to the government to encourage private investment into UK infrastructure, which led to the Treasury and Infrastructure and Projects Authoritys consultation process about attracting private money into the sector. But we are still waiting for the publication of the governments response to that consultation, and that should be the priority now. It is our view that the pandemic has served as a really important moment in highlighting how important the private sector is to the governments aim of delivering the infrastructure that the country needs.

In March 2020, the government made its historic pledge of 640 billion to build UK infrastructure, which was a huge commitment. Since then, the government has had to spend billions to keep the economy afloat, says Woolf, so those commitments have clearly become more challenging as a result. I am increasingly of the view that the private sectors role is more important than ever.

The CBI does not see any evidence of a drop-off in the private sectors appetite to invest into infrastructure, so the government must now focus on facilitating that investment. It is our view that to increase private investment into UK infrastructure the government should focus on an attractive investment environment starting with creating a stable and enabling regulatory regime, says Woolf.

That means retaining the key regulatory principles that have facilitated the swathes of investment into the regulated utilities over the past 30 years, including evidence-based decision-making and keeping at arms length from short-term political considerations. It also means making decisions subject to a proportionate but robust appeals regime.

Other barriers that continue to put off private investment include an overly complex and fragmented governance regime, and the lack of clarity on finance delivery models. Woolf says, At the end of 2018, following the abolition of PFI and PF2 contracts, there was an expectation from our members that a new delivery model would be championed or proposed, and that didnt happen. That essentially signalled to the private sector to banks and investors that the UK government, at that time, was not really serious about attracting private finance into infrastructure.

He says CBI members are now keen for a clear departure from the notion that you can have a one-size-fits-all model: We would rather see the government outline, as part of the publication of the national infrastructure and construction pipeline, a series of models that they would permit for different sectors and different projects, he says.

The CBI also feels that the government should now consider setting up an infrastructure bank, similar in function to the British Business Bank, to plug the gap in funding lost by the conclusion of the UKs involvement with the European Infrastructure Bank. Plans for such a bank are rumoured to be in place.

We think a British infrastructure bank could play a similar role to the Canadian Infrastructure Bank, says Woolf, which allows the Canadian government to explore projects that would otherwise be difficult to bring to market. In Canada there is sufficient liquidity to finance many of their planned infrastructure projects, so there was a fear that the bank would crowd out private finance. But, our members have told us that it assists the market as a vehicle to present innovative and unsolicited proposals, to help manage risks that the private sector cannot accept, and to provide competitive financing when a project is too large for the market.

Such a model could serve to bridge the gap between the public and private sector on complex projects that require innovative solutions, he argues.

In the UK, the appetite from the private sector to invest in infrastructure has only grown with the advent of COVID-19, while the governments need for private capital to deliver its objectives is also clear. Woolf hopes Whitehalls response to last years consultation will soon start to unlock the standstill.

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In the second interview of the series, Daniel Woolf of CBI shares his recommendations on addressing the challenges of investing in infrastructure -...

by Xing Hey

Many years ago, I sat dejected as a judge sentenced me to life in prison for crimes committed as a 15 year old. At the time, I felt as if the world was falling away and I was hanging on without a parachute or a place for a soft landing. The arms of somebody that would catch and hold me couldnt be found. I never felt so alone as I did in that moment. Aside from three random strangers, the packed courtroom on that day was there to encourage the punishment of a criminalized teenage me. When the punishment was officially announced, the satisfaction of the audience in that room was eerie. I still feel the chills from that day years ago today.

On a grey overcast Thursday in a Seattle Courthouse on August 6, 2020, King County Superior Court Judge ODonnell, sentenced James and Jerome Taafulisia to 40 years in prison for crimes they committed when they were 16 and 17. As I had once been a teenager given such a sentence, as an adult I felt helpless and heartbroken upon hearing the punishment handed down to James and Jerome. The feelings when being told you are going to spend the rest of your life in prison as a teenager are indescribable, but those feelings came rushing back as I heard the judge attempt to justify sending James and Jerome to languish in prison for a lifetime. I sympathized with how they were feeling after being told that they were no longer fit to be a part of society.

Although James and Jerome have put on a tough facade to survive the trauma of abuse and neglect throughout childhood, on that day I witnessed emotions from them for the first time. James burst into tears, while Jerome burst into an original song declaring his unconditional love for his brothers. Despite the indisputable tragedy of the lives of these two young people, Judge ODonnell sentenced them to prison for a lifetime for mistakes and choices they made as traumatized youth.

Everyone in the courtroom grieved for James and Jerome that day. Everyone, it seemed, except the judge, prosecutors, and maybe even the lawyers defending them. For these agents of the system it appeared to be business as usual which, in this current moment in history, is the biggest tragedy. They simply smiled and shook hands, as if the totality of the situation was a normal function of the system. At the end of the day, they got to go home to children and families, while the systems victims, including families and friends of Jeannine Zapata, James Tran, as well as James, Jerome, Joseph (the youngest brother accused in this incident) and others, will continue to grieve the lives lost and live with the harms which the system ultimately caused. Every single individual impacted by the tragedy on January 26, 2016 in the homeless encampment known as the Jungle, will live with scars or resolution of some sort, but will never actually be healed by the remedy prescribed by the state.

Sadly this is the typical narrative in the history of law and justice in the United States of America where children, BIPOC community members, and houseless folx disproportionately make up the population of those oppressed, criminalized, and neglected by the state. For James, Jerome, and Joseph, the Washington State system of Child Protective Services (CPS), had been their legal guardian since they were toddlers. With no accountability, this state institution failed to provide them with the safety and protection that all children deserve. Yet the remedy imposed by the state for children they helped traumatize and forced into homelessness, was to punish them in the form of incarceration.

So it shouldnt surprise us when harm occurs in our communities, when our children are hurting and crying, their pain is customarily met with indignation rather than empathic understanding. The cries of our children sound different to those tasked with upholding the system. Just like us, our children are dangerous to them, deserving of criminalization and punishment. No matter what personal testimony or scientific evidence is put in front of them about the effects of childhood trauma and compromised brain development, our childrens behaviors and actions are criminalized and punished. Instead of treatment and restorative remedies, they increase the structure and capacity of the criminal legal system to punish us by investing in more policing, more prosecutors, more jails, and more prisons.

Accordingly, those responsible for creating and maintaining the legal system have always found a way, reformed a way, to lock us up and throw away the key. Time and again, throughout the history of this criminal justice system, they have found a way to kill us, while convincing us that they will reform the systems that are killing us. However, whether in prison or on the streets, we keep dying. We just keep on dying and they keep on convincing us we will be okay. They often dupe us with progressive narratives and strategies then push forward proposals and legislation that supposedly will fix the problem of our deaths by this system.

A reformist agenda is when a judge in the traditional criminal system of justice can attempt to convince us that sentencing James and Jerome to only 40 years was doing them a favor, stating that the time they will spend in the state system of corrections will give them a better opportunity to change themselves; ironically an opportunity to change themselves in a system that has never been kind to them, an opportunity they have never been given while free in society.

Reform of the criminal legal system has been shown not to work for us. Progressive promises to close down the youth jail within 5 years, Miranda Rights ordinances with young people, auto-decline legislation, zero youth detention, and Miller v. Alabama only matter on the surface if the system is going to continue to criminalize the traumas of our children. The truth is, if they cant put our children in youth jails, they will find a way to put them in adult prisons. They will always find a way. Reform is a strategy that will make us forget and be convinced. Reform results in a policy where King County Superior Court Judge Sean ODonnell, King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg, and King County Deputy Prosecutor Maria Barbosa, after the overwhelming evidence of childhood trauma presented, could make an argument that a 40-year prison sentence for James and Jerome is justice in light of the sentence they could have given. In good conscience, they actually believed that such a sentence would be in James, Jeromes, and societys best interest.

Unfortunately, though today we grieve the lives lost to the brutality of the police and the criminal justice system, tomorrow we will forget. While James and Jerome are sitting at Green Hill School pondering how to survive a 40-year prison sentence and all the additional traumas that come with it, we will go on with our lives. Months or years from now, we will forget about James and Jerome, as we have forgotten about the multitudes of young BIPOC men and women from our communities sentenced to die in prison. As we forget, more tragedies of state-sanctioned violence by the system will continue to happen to the young people of our communities.

As with James, Jerome, myself and many others, this system is working exactly the way it was built to work. My story, James and Jeromes story, is not unique when it comes to law and justice in America. There is no justice in this system for us. Our cries dont matter to them. Never have. The oppression of BIPOC bodies continues to maintain white Americas status quo.

Therefore, if we truly care about BIPOC bodies broken by the system, we must imagine a world where the systems that cause harm to individuals with those identities do not exist. We have to educate ourselves and our surroundings about the history of Black, Brown, and Indigenous liberation, and understand how an abolitionist imagination is key in that liberation. If Black lives truly mattered to us, then a world of abolition, where a carceral system of policing and prisons is not our default solution to social problems, should matter as well.

Imagine instead of criminalization and punishment, the likes of James, Jerome and I would have been provided the support and resources we needed to thrive as young people. Instead of further marginalization, imagine when I was suspended from school, dropped out of the 7th grade, or was a runaway, I was provided preventative support and resources I needed. Instead of further criminalization, imagine when James, Jerome and Joseph, were homeless teengaers doing what was neccesary to survive on the streets, they were given the preventative support and resources they needed. How might things have been different if we had caring and nurturing adults to intervene at some point, if community-based youth organizations had the resources to reach out to us? Part of an abolitionists imagination is the belief that we have the ability and brilliance to take care of each other, that we can keep us safe, without the complicity of the state. However, if we cannot begin to have such an imagination, how can we possibly protect our children from the harms the state can do to them?

Our accountability to the likes of James and Jerome is to not forget about them. Our accountability is in our willingness to hold such a reformist system accountable by not being easily convinced of the progressive promises and policies that end up killing us and our children.

We are in September now. Summer is over. After months of protest and civil unrest, we are still here: Jacob Blake, Dijon Kizzee, and thirteen-year-olds being charged as adults by a so-called progressive King County Prosecutors Office, not to mention countless other unnamed BIPOC community members dying from the injustices of this system. There is no time better than now that we come together and imagine a new way to restore humanity into our youth and wholeness to our communities. Abolition must be an initiative and policy now. The more we wait, the more we will continue to grieve the lives of our community members lost to this system.

Connect with James and Jerome:

James Taafulisia 848290Green Hill School375 SW 11 StreetChehalis, WA 98532

Jerome Taafulisia 851094Green Hill School375 SW 11 StreetChehalis, WA 98532

Connect with our abolition work:

http://www.Facebook.com/FreeThemAllWA/

http://www.Facebook.com/covid19mutualaid/

Xing Hey is a community organizer, youth advocate, educator, student, abolitionist and a member of APICAG (Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Awareness Group). Hes called Tacoma/Seattle home his entire life.

Featured image is attributed to Dennis Sylvester and belongs to the Public Domain under a CCO 1.0 Public Domain Dedication.

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