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reparations
My Application for $30 Million From Trump’s $1.8 Billion Slush Fund
A formal letter to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, faithfully submitted.
May 30, 2026
Dear Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche,
I am writing to formally submit my application to your newly established federal “Anti-Weaponization Fund” for compensation in the form of a cash payment for damages incurred at the hands of the United States government.
As you stated while announcing President Trump’s new $1.776 billion fund, “The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American, and it is this Department’s intention to make right the wrongs that were previously done while ensuring this never happens again.”
Todd, if I may, I saw your former client — President Trump, for whom you previously provided legal representation — backed you up, saying, “This is reimbursing people who were horribly treated.”
Additionally, Todd, I read an Associated Press report noting that during congressional testimony you stated that you “wouldn’t rule out the possibility that rioters who assaulted police on Jan. 6 would be eligible for fund payouts.” After hearing your remarkably broad interpretation of governmental victimization, I felt compelled to share with you what the government has done to me and my family by writing the letter below — which reveals several forms of government abuse my family and I have endured which, while you may not find as severe as the temporary loss of access to the U.S. Capitol experienced by individuals convicted of felonies related to January 6, nonetheless caused considerable hardship for us.
I was initially reassured that my request was reasonable after learning that Adam Johnson — best known for carrying Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s lectern through the Capitol during the January 6 attack — is reportedly considering a claim of up to $5 million himself.
However, after learning that Brandon Fellows — another January 6 defendant pardoned by President Trump — reportedly plans to seek $30 million from the fund, including $21.5 million for what he described as “wrongful imprisonment,” I realized that the harms experienced by my family and me may in fact fall closer to Mr. Fellows’s compensation range.
So, after reviewing your department’s stated principles, apparent standards, and anticipated applicant pool, I believe I am highly qualified for compensation and would like to make a modest request of $30 million.
In fact, Todd, I believe I possess two major qualifications that should place me among the strongest candidates for compensation, which I will detail below.
Claim One: Descendant of Enslaved People
First, since this appears to function as a reparations program for people harmed by state injustice, I should begin by saying that I come from a family with a long legacy of being brutalized by the United States. And if you think the January 6 defendants have a compelling claim for compensation due to governmental mistreatment, wait until you hear about this historical episode called slavery.
My great-great-grandparents, Laura and Thomas Lenoir, were enslaved in Marion County, Mississippi, and spent their lives laboring without compensation in a nation loudly proclaiming “liberty” while designating Black people as property. After decades spent tracing our family history, my father recently discovered the very plantation where they were enslaved— a breakthrough that finally allowed our family to identify the precise location where generations of uncompensated labor helped build this country’s wealth.
My ancestors worked this land they did not own, built wealth they could not keep, and endured violence they could not legally resist. No compensation was ever provided for the stolen labor, stolen children, stolen wages, stolen land, stolen futures, or the generations of poverty and discrimination that followed emancipation. Stories of Laura’s beatings and brutal treatment have been passed down through my family for generations.
In explaining why she believed January 6 defendants deserved compensation, Rachel Powell — who prosecutors identified as one of the first rioters to breach Capitol grounds and who was filmed using a battering ram to smash a Capitol window — recently stated: “We endured a lot. Our lives are still not the same. I don’t know what kind of price you can put on that.”
Todd, I must admit I found Ms. Powell’s reflections unexpectedly relatable. Indeed, many descendants of slavery have similarly struggled to determine what monetary figure might adequately compensate for generations of forced labor and legally sanctioned terror.
For many years, I was informed that reparations for descendants of slavery were unrealistic, unaffordable, divisive, or simply impossible. Republican and Democratic leaders alike repeatedly explained that while slavery was unfortunate, there was no practical mechanism for compensating descendants in the present day. However, your department’s new fund has helped me understand that no sum of money is too large for the government to produce once it decides that a great injustice has been perpetrated.
And then there is the symbolism of the fund’s exact amount — $1.776 billion — which is especially moving. President Trump, with his trademark subtlety and keen sense of gravitas, must have chosen this specific figure for providing reparations to people claiming mistreatment by the government as a fitting tribute to a nation founded by those who declared liberty for all in 1776 while simultaneously enslaving and brutalizing Black people.
Claim Two: My Arrest at a Capitol Building During Political Protest
My second major qualification is that, like many of the fund’s anticipated beneficiaries who stormed the capitol building on January 6, I was also arrested at a capitol building during a political protest.
In 2012, Washington state announced a special legislative session to determine how to slash education and healthcare budgets by some $2 Billion during the aftermath of the Great Recession. At the time, I was helping organize with the Social Equity Educators (SEE), a group of educators fighting against austerity and for educational justice.
We joined a much larger mass protest at the Washington State Capitol in Olympia to oppose billions of dollars in cuts to public services. Just before lawmakers gaveled in the special budget cutting session inside the House Ways and Means Committee meeting room, several of us managed to enter the chamber before they locked the door to the many protestors surrounding the building. The moment the session began, we mic-checked the room and read aloud the Washington State Constitution language that explicitly specifies funding education is the “paramount duty” of the state, and we declared therefore the state not only had a moral obligation but also a legal obligation to fully fund public education.
After finishing the statement, I produced a pair of plastic handcuffs I got at the dollar store and invited the legislators into my custody for what I announced was citizen’s arrest.
As I approached the legislators’ benches carrying self-made citizen’s arrest warrants to issue to each member, a police officer apparently arrived at a somewhat different interpretation of the law than I had. In an astonishing twist, he arrested me instead of the legislators.
He grabbed my arm, forced it behind my back, and cinched the handcuffs tightly around my wrists. Officers then moved me into a back room while they attempted to figure out how to remove me from the building as hundreds of protesters outside chanted, “Let the teacher go!”
Eventually, police whisked me out and pushed me into the back of a squad car and repeatedly questioned me about my actions even after I informed them that I wished to speak only in the presence of legal counsel. I was transported to a nearby jail, had my mugshot taken, ordered to exchange my clothes for a jail-issued orange jumpsuit, and placed in a jail cell with several other people for the evening.
While I was in jail, unbeknownst to me, my students at Garfield High School created a Facebook page titled “Free Mr. Hagopian.” When I returned to school the next day, students had changed the page into “Seattle Student Walkout for Education.”
Within twenty-four hours of my arrest, more than 500 Garfield students organized a mass walkout protesting the education cuts, carrying signs reading “Fund Our Future” and chanting, “We’re the future of our nation, no more cuts to education!” Students later formed a coalition called Students of Washington for Change to pressure the legislature through protests and letter-writing campaigns.
Importantly, Todd, not long afterward the Washington State Supreme Court ruled that the legislature actually was violating the constitution in what became known as the McCleary decision, so I trust that my legal vindication strengthens my application considerably. And if generations of slavery fall short in qualifying me for compensation, I trust my arrest at a capitol while protesting government lawbreaking will place me in strong standing under your department’s standards.
A Possible Weakness in My Application
Now Todd, in the interest of full transparency, I should acknowledge one possible weakness in my case. The Department of Justice fact sheet explaining your fund notes that “Claims are awarded on a case-by-case basis, and the Commissioners must consider a claimant’s personal conduct and character when making a determination.”
I must admit, Todd, this language gave me some pause.
While I was arrested at a capitol building during a large political protest — something I understand may weigh heavily in my favor given your department’s apparent sympathy for January 6 defendants — I did not use a battering ram to breach the Capitol building, assault police officers, carry Confederate flags through the halls of government, or attempt to overturn the results of a presidential election.
In retrospect, I recognize this may complicate my claim.
Still, I would respectfully submit that my application remains highly competitive. Unlike many January 6 defendants, when I protested at a capitol, the court later ruled that the government I was protesting had actually broken the law.
Instructions for Disbursement of Funds
Todd, thank you for taking the time to read and consider my formal application for compensation from the Anti-Weaponization Fund.
Once my claim has been approved, you may issue a direct payment in the form of a contribution to Where I Got My Name: Down in Mississippi — a documentary film project about my father discovering the plantation where our family had been enslaved and our journey to Mississippi to recover our family’s history — or to Rethinking Schools and the Zinn Education Project, organizations that have spent decades supporting honest education about the history of this country and the people who were truly “horribly treated” by their government (as President Trump put it).
Todd, I appreciate your department’s newfound commitment to reparative justice, and I look forward to receiving confirmation of my $30 million award soon.
Sincerely,
Jesse Hagopian
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From Revolution to Reparations: Black August and Haiti’s Ongoing Struggle for Freedom
Haiti’s struggle for restitution is not a historical footnote—it is the next chapter in the global struggle for Black liberation.
Aug 30, 2025
As we mark Black August, the struggle that launched the global fight for Black liberation—the Haitian Revolution—remains unfinished. Over 200 years after enslaved Haitians lit the first beacon of Black resistance in August 1791 and set a precedent for abolition by winning their freedom, they are fighting the next chapter in the struggle for Black economic and political liberation—one that could set another precedent, this time for reparative justice.
On August 22, 1791, Haitians revolted against their French enslavers, liberating themselves and forming the world’s first free Black Republic, and the first country to abolish enslavement. The Haitian Revolution was not just a simple victory against one of the world’s most powerful empires. It was a global rupture, proof that Black freedom was possible and European domination was not inevitable. It lit the fire of revolution globally, inspiring enslaved and colonized people worldwide. As Frederick Douglass, one of the 19th century’s leading advocates for Black rights in the United States, said in his speech to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, “[in] striking for their freedom, [Haitians]... struck for the freedom of every black man in the world.”
France and other enslaving countries realized the power of the Haitian Revolution as a herald of global Black liberation and a threat to their supremacy. They sought to punish Haiti for the crime of being Black and free. In 1825, France sent a fleet of 14 warships equipped with 528 canons to Port-au-Prince and demanded that Haiti pay 150 million francs as compensation for the loss of what they considered their “property,” including captive Haitians. In exchange for this payment, France would recognize Haiti’s independence—an independence already paid for by the blood and lives of the Haitians who fought Napoleon’s army and won.
The strength of Haiti’s claim poses just as much of a threat to the global white supremacist order now as the success of Haiti’s revolution did in 1804.
Under threat of attack and re-enslavement, Haitian President Jean-Pierre Boyer and his allies agreed to pay. The ransom—and subsequent extortionate loans by French banks to finance payments—crushed Haiti’s economy, prevented it from investing in its own development, and left it vulnerable to foreign intervention and exploitation that further impoverished and destabilized the country. Many of the conditions used to paint Haiti as a “failed state” today can be traced directly to that original grave injustice.
The Independence Ransom and other measures delayed broader liberation, but the promise of Black freedom and autonomy that Haiti gave the world remained alive. In his speech, Douglass called Haiti “the Black man’s country, now forever”—and Haitians are still fighting for their freedom and inspiring others. These are the struggles we honor during Black August, born in the 1970s in California’s prison system to commemorate the lives and assassinations of revolutionary brothers Jonathan and George Jackson: the Nat Turner rebellion in Virginia in August 1831; the March on Washington on August 28, 1963; and every uprising that has dared to defy enslavement and racial capitalism.
This August, Haiti stands at the heart of another urgent struggle: the fight for restitution for the Independence Ransom. Calls for France to pay restitution have increased in recent years, not just from Haitians but from all around the world. The strength of Haiti’s claim poses just as much of a threat to the global white supremacist order now as the success of Haiti’s revolution did in 1804. In fact, when the United States and its powerful allies realized the power of Haiti’s claim to balance the global economy in 2004, they overthrew Haiti’s democracy rather than risk its claim succeeding.
Haiti’s struggle for restitution is not a historical footnote—it is the next chapter in the global struggle for Black liberation. Restitution would not only address the grave injustice done to Haiti, it would also lay a powerful legal and political foundation for broader reparations. Just as Haitians won their freedom in 1804, they will eventually win restitution for themselves and unlock the door to reparations for all. But that victory will require sustained pressure—on France, the United States, and the banks and companies that facilitated and profited off this economic extraction—not just from Haitians, but from all people who wish to honor the memories of those who paid the ultimate price in the fight for liberation. This means support for restitution, but also for a democratic, sovereign government that will assert the claim and otherwise be accountable to the Haitian people.
This Black August is not just a commemoration, it is a call to action. It is a call to join the 60-plus leading organizations from Haiti, the United States, the Caribbean, France, and beyond that sent a letter to French President Emmanuel Macron demanding restitution and reparations. And it is, above all, a call to remember Haitians’ pivotal role in the global Black struggle for liberation and to recommit ourselves to the unfinished work they started in 1791.
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How to Use 197 Forbidden 'Woke' Words and Still Get a Grant From the Trump-Musk Government
A grant proposal concerning reparations for the descendants of slave owners, submitted in good faith to Elon Musk during this cruel and unusual time of oppressive wokeness.
Mar 27, 2025
Dear Elon,
On behalf of the Diversified Organization of Grant Enablers, (the original DOGE), thank you for ordering the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation to flag proposals that contain certain oppressive “woke” words you don’t like. We’re not wild about them either.
Forbes leaked the list of the 197 terms, rendered here in bold italics. (And kudos, dear sir, for not banning George Carlin’s seven dirty words!)
BTW, the biased media is inflating the number of forbidden words, trying to make you look bad. For example, it counts as individual terms diverse, diverse backgrounds, diverse communities, diverse community, diverse group, diverse groups, diversified, diversify, diversifying, and diversity. Fake news, is it not?
But we have a suggestion. Rather than ban them, giving the liberals something easy to roast you with, why not put them to work in an anti-woke context? That’s what our professional team of DOGE grant writers has done in a model culturally appropriate proposal. You will love it, even though it uses just about all the barred terms. (Sorry, we failed to squeeze in people + uterus.)
We don’t want to brag, but this can’t-miss proposal will shake up the lunatic left. You will want to immediately fund it, even while chain-sawing so many others into sawdust. And when you spread the word on X, your popularity with anti-woke key groups is going to skyrocket! Even Steve Bannon will snuggle up to you.
Thanks for purifying our thoughts and bringing your antiracist Afrikaner sensibility to our great nation.
Proposal For Reparations for the Descendants of Slave Owners (DSO)
Britain abolished slavery in 1833 and provided former slave owners 20 million British pounds (the equivalent today of $22.1 billion US dollars) as compensation. Racial justice demands a similar response from the U.S. federal government for the descendants of U.S. slave owners.
In South Africa today, oppressed white farmers face land confiscation without compensation from its BIPOC government. Slave owners in the U.S. were victims of a similar injustice after the Civil War, punished for their identity. Without reparations, which have been too long denied, their descendants are victimized again generation after generation.
To promote a truly inclusive society based on equity, equality, and diversity for all, we must recognize and celebrate our cultural differences. While we are a nation of immigrants, we also are a nation of slaveowners!
For too long implicit bias and hate speech have been used against those, due to no fault of their own, who were born into slave-owning families. These key populations, labeled DSO here, should be considered at risk minorities. They helped create our national identity and contributed significantly to our cultural heritage. Racism in America would have little meaning without them.
Our proposal is a multicultural exploration of race and ethnicity among the slave-owning class, and their extended contact with indigenous communities and the Hispanic minority along the Gulf of Mexico. These marginalized non-white groups, including males and females, also owned slaves and suffered losses due to emancipation.
We must put aside our stereotypes about the plantation class. This underappreciated and undervalued population is difficult to analyze due to our own unconscious bias against all aspects of slavery. The DSO have lost their voice and its once fearsome power, since some ancestors of slaveowners are burdened by a crippling sense of guilt and so are underrepresented in modern political discourse.
To advocate for reparations for DSO members is not to whitewash their faults. Slave-owners promoted systemic racism, segregation, and white privilege— even for white non-slave-owners— but we should acknowledge their genuine sense of belonging formed though the intersectionality of sociocultural and socioeconomic factors in plantation society.
Even though white women were systematically placed on a pedestal, they were never excluded from institutional slave-owning power. They adored their narrow gender identity. These women of high status were never marginalized by aggressive feminists. They were totally at ease with being biologically female and with the gender they were assigned at birth.
Also, we can find no transgender and transexual members of slave-owning society and the DSO. Women did not run domestic plantation life in order to overcome disparities or spew meaningless pronouns in polite society. This wholesome tradition has been carried on by the DSO and provides another reason for just compensation.
A key, but seldom discussed factor, is the gender-based violence suffered at the hands of marauding Yankee soldiers. The DSO may deserve additional compensation for the trauma suffered as well as any resulting mental disabilities of their forebearers.
Meanwhile, slave-owning men were real men, biologically males with no wanton legacy of men having sex with men (MSM). And please forgive us for a personal judgement: These god-fearing slaveowners left their descendants with not the faintest expressions of non-binary awareness, thank goodness.
Because of the uncompensated destruction of the slave-holding structures, we regret to report that more than a few white plantation women became commercial sex workers in order to survive the marauding armies. The anguish and mental health problems facing white plantation prostitutes should be considered when awarding reparations. While it is too late to do something for them, our unconscious bias about sex should not distract us from a path of justice for their descendants.
Another important thread connects the slave owners to the climate crisis they and their descendants experienced. Monocrops repeatedly planted to raise cash in trade depleted the soil on Southern farms, creating pollution in their drinking water and a more generally degraded environmental quality. Westward expansion of slavery took more and more land from Native American tribes. Without climate science to inform them, effective solutions were missed and succeeding generations paid the price. We compensate farmers today for crop failures and tariff losses, why not do the same for the DSO including tribal DSO?
We hope that grant reviewers will look beyond their built-in anti-slaveowner confirmation bias, as well as their preconceived notions about race and ethnicity. It’s time to hone our cultural sensitivity and embrace a true cultural diversity, one that includes both descendants of slaves and slave owners. Our all-inclusive survey will make plain the biases we hold against this DSO class.
Since the Civil War, polarization has led to oppression and vilification of our great but marginalized plantation heritage. This injustice can only be rectified by fair and equitable compensation for the undervalued and underserved, whose relatives had their Black human capital stripped from them.
Our project asks only that we adjust our orientation and increase the diversity of those considered the victims of slavery. We must foster inclusiveness, devising just and equitable compensation programs for all descendants of slavery, including the DSO.
Social justice requires that we overcome our own prejudices and promote diversity of thought. By doing so, we all should recognize that slave-owning descendants too should be considered among our most vulnerable populations, entitled to equal opportunities when reparations are considered.
Now is the time to rectify the historical inequity faced by the DSO.
Now is the time to enhance the diversity of reparations recipients and the way they are viewed.
Now is the time to fund our bold proposal which strives, like no other, to bring community equity to all our people.
Cc: Rober Kennedy Jr., J.D. Vance, and the descendants of Robert E. Lee
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A Counter Proposal to Trump's Ethnic Cleansing Plan for Gaza
The U.S. has spent nearly $20 billion on blowing up Gaza at an estimated cost of more than $400,000 for every Gazan killed. Surely we can afford the reparations now owed the Palestinian people.
Feb 05, 2025
After meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump repeated his assertion that “the Palestinians have no choice but to leave Gaza.” The utter destruction of buildings and infrastructure is almost incalculable.
Trump’s solution is to depopulate Gaza of Palestinians by sending them to Egypt and Jordan. This would be a continuation of the war crimes in the furtherance of the Israeli agenda of ethnic cleansing. Furthermore, the displacement of so many refugees would result in political instability in both countries and the festering of future conflicts with Israel.
Trump’s insights should be applied to a better, more just and longer lasting solution. If Gazans were to go anywhere during the reconstruction, it should be to the United States. We are the country most responsible for suppling the IDF with the means of blowing up Gaza. We should invite up to 2 million Palestinians giving them Green Cards and a road to citizenship or dual citizenship as is common among Israeli Americans.
We cannot ignore the human costs. We must be deeply committed to supporting the rebuilding of Gaza but also to the rebuilding of human infrastructure by enabling Gazans to live and reconstruct their lives.
Gazans should be welcomed to this country and provided free medical care, and education to make up for the loss of schools, universities and hospitals as a direct result of explosive armaments sent from the United States. They should receive access to employment, and credit to establish businesses given the destruction of Gaza’s commerce. Of course, the people of Gaza would be able to return to their homeland at any time of their choosing.
We must squarely face up to two issues. The first is the obligation by the United States and Israel to pay for the bulk of the cleanup and for the physical reconstruction of Gaza. The U.S. has spent nearly $20 billion on blowing up Gaza at an estimated cost of more than $400,000 for every Gazan killed.
We cannot ignore the human costs. We must be deeply committed to supporting the rebuilding of Gaza but also to the rebuilding of human infrastructure by enabling Gazans to live and reconstruct their lives.
I am certain the American President will lead the country to endorse this plan given his pragmatic insights regarding the scale of destruction and the required relocation of Palestinians. Furthermore, we will have ample human space to welcome Palestinians as the result of Trump’s vigorous program of ethnic cleansing of people currently residing within our borders.
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Reparations Demanded 20 Years After US Launched 'War-for-Profit' in Iraq
"We should not let the difficulty of securing justice deter us from seeking it—for Iraqis and for all others harmed by U.S. imperialism, exploitation, and genocide," said the Center for Constitutional Rights.
Mar 15, 2023
Ahead of the 20th anniversary of the George W. Bush administration's illegal invasion of Iraq this weekend, the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights on Wednesday renewed its call for reparations "for those harmed as a result of the U.S.'s unlawful act of aggression in its cruel, senseless, and baseless war-for-profit."
"Ten years ago, we teamed up with Iraqi civil society groups and U.S. service members to demand redress," the nonprofit explained, "and this need only becomes more urgent as the incalculable human toll of the war continues to grow: hundreds of thousands dead, some two million disabled, some nine million displaced, environmental devastation, countless people tortured, traumatized, or otherwise harmed in ways unseen, occupation and embrace of torture as policy in the so-called 'War on Terror,' and an entire generation that was born and raised in only war."
As Common Dreams reported earlier Wednesday, the Costs of War Project at Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs estimates that already, "the total costs of the war in Iraq and Syria are expected to exceed half a million human lives and $2.89 trillion" by 2050.
The project also said that "an estimated 300,000 people have died from direct war violence in Iraq, while the reverberating effects of war continue to kill and sicken hundreds of thousands more."
"Justice also entails accountability for the perpetrators of these horrific crimes, including those responsible for the torture."
Such figures have fueled calls from groups like the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), which asserted that "reparations are rooted in precedent and international law, as well as a strong tradition of justice-based organizing by civil rights movements, and we should not let the difficulty of securing justice deter us from seeking it—for Iraqis and for all others harmed by U.S. imperialism, exploitation, and genocide."
"Justice also entails accountability for the perpetrators of these horrific crimes, including those responsible for the torture" in Iraq and beyond, argued the center—which since 2004 has filed three lawsuits against U.S-based military contractors on behalf of Iraqis tortured at the Abu Ghraib prison and also sued Erik Prince and his company Blackwater over the Nisour Square massacre
"Legal efforts against high-level political and military leaders for the invasion itself and the many crimes committed in the 'War on Terror' pose a different set of challenges, as demonstrated by our efforts to hold high-level Bush-administration officials accountable at the International Criminal Court for crimes in or arising out of the war in Afghanistan or under universal jurisdiction," CCR noted. "Those of us pursuing accountability can draw inspiration from activists in other countries like Argentina and Guatemala who waged successful campaigns over several decades."
Highlighting that "Congress continues its overbroad authorizations for use of military force," the center argued that "such authorizations must be repealed, and the unlawful policies of endless war and militarization must be replaced with international-law-based, rights-respecting policies and practices."
The U.S. Senate is expected to vote Thursday to repeal both the 1991 and 2002 authorizations for use of military force against Iraq. While the measure's sponsor, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), has been publicly optimistic about passage, it would then need approval from the GOP-controlled House of Representatives before being sent to President Joe Biden's desk for signature.
In a move decried by progressives as "madness," the president last week proposed a budget for fiscal year 2024 featuring a historic $886.4 billion in military spending, including $397.5 million to fight what is left of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
Meanwhile, as CCR pointed out Wednesday, "just this month, the House voted 414-2 to maintain unilateral sanctions on Syria even though—or because—they have caused widespread suffering and hindered earthquake relief efforts. The U.S. has imposed similar deadly sanctions on Cuba for decades. Such manifestations of imperialism differ from the war on Iraq only in degree. Indeed, deadly sanctions on Iraq were a precursor to the U.S. invasion."
In its lengthy statement, the center also said that "as we call for justice for Iraqis, we stand in solidarity with all people who live in countries targeted by U.S. imperialism, and in particular, in Afghanistan, whose civilians have been subjected to endless war and destruction, politicization, and then abandonment of human rights protections, and state-facilitated humanitarian suffering."
"They include not only those killed and maimed by the U.S. military and its proxies but also those harmed by U.S. sanctions and coups, corporate plunder and extraction, and austerity regimes imposed by U.S.-dominated colonial institutions," the center added, pointing to the International Monetary Fund. "It also includes Palestinians, who are subjugated by Israel, a U.S. imperial outpost."
"U.S. warmaking has long fed fascism at home," the group continued, calling out police violence, immigration restrictions, racial and religious profiling, and mass surveillance. "The trillions of dollars spent on militarism and criminalization abroad and in the U.S. must be reallocated to address the material needs and fulfill the human rights of our most marginalized communities."
"On this ignominious anniversary," CCR concluded, "we recommit to our vision of a world in which revolutionary movements across countries and continents struggle together for liberation from U.S. imperialism and all other oppressive systems of power."
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Japan Offers Reparation to Korean 'Comfort Women'
Dec 29, 2015
The Japanese government recently agreed to pay $8.7 million to dozens of Korean women who were forced to become prostitutes serving Japanese soldiers. The payment is meant as compensation for their suffering. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed his "deepest regrets" and "contrition" deep in his heart to the victims.
Among the estimated 100,000 to 200,000 women recruited from different countries to serve Japanese soldiers, 80 to 90 percent were from Korea. Girls as young as 11 years old were forced to serve between 5 and 40 soldiers a day and almost 100 soldiers on weekends. Those who resisted were often beaten, burned, or wounded. The abuse was such that many women took their lives. During the Japanese retreat, many were left to starve or were executed to eliminate any trace of the atrocities the Japanese military subjected to them.
After the end of World War II, the Japanese government insisted that the "comfort stations" were private brothels administered by private citizens. Only in 1993 did the government admit that the Japanese military had been "directly or indirectly" involved in establishing and operating the "comfort stations" and transporting the women.
The first Korean former comfort woman to tell her story was Bae Bong Ki in 1980. Another comfort woman, Kim Hak Soon, who died in 1997, related in 1991 how she was abducted by Japanese soldiers when she was 17 years old and forced to carry ammunition by day and serve as a prostitute by night. Her testimony sparked several other testimonies by women who were obliged to work as sexual slaves in military comfort stations. Evidence of such stations has already been found in Korea, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Myanmar, New Guinea, and Okinawa.
Illustrative of the ordeal comfort women went through is the testimony of Chung Seo Woon in the book titled "Making More Waves" (Beacon Press, Boston, 1997). Chung was an only child born in Korea to the family of a wealthy landowner. Because of his activities against colonial rule, her father was sent to prison and badly tortured. When she was 16, she was allowed to visit her father. The Japanese official who allowed her to see her father later visited her house. He told her that if she went to work in Japan for two years, her father would be released. Despite strong objections from her mother, she agreed to do so.
Chung was placed on a ship with many other girls and women. She was hopeful that at the end of the two years, her father would be released from prison, as the officer had told her. After being taken to Japan, the women were sent to several other countries,s and a group of them left in each country. After reaching Jakarta, the group that included the young Chung was taken to a hospital where she was sterilized.
The group was then taken to Semarang, a coastal city in Indonesia, and placed in a row of barracks. From then on, they were obliged to perform sexual intercourse every day with dozens of soldiers and officers. In the process, she was forced to become an opium addict. Chung attempted to commit suicide by swallowing malaria pills.
Two of her friends reported her to the authorities, she was revived; and she remarks, "It was then that I made up my mind to survive and tell my story, what Japan did to us." When the war ended and she returned home, she found her house deserted. From neighbors who came to help her, she learned that her father had died while in prison. Her mother, humiliated by the Japanese soldiers' attempt to rape her, committed suicide.
Chung decided to rid herself of her opium addiction. She could do this after eight months, and she worked hard to regain her dignity. She was never able to attain a normal sex life but found companionship and care from a physician who had had a nervous breakdown after serving in the Japanese Army. In 1993, the Japanese government apologized to the comfort women, although it didn't admit that the military coerced the women into serving against their will.
In November of 1994, an International Commission of Jurists stated that "It is indisputable that these women were forced, deceived, coerced and abducted to provide sexual services to the Japanese military . . . [Japan] violated customary norms of international law concerning war crimes, crimes against humanity, slavery and the trafficking in women and children . . . Japan should take full responsibility now and make suitable restitution to the victims and their families."
Japan has made the right decision by apologizing and financially compensating the remaining victims of abuse by Japanese soldiers. However, the gesture only renders partial justice to the Korean "comfort women." There are tens of thousands of Korean women who are not alive to claim it.
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As of Today, Humanity Has Exhausted its 2015 Supply of Natural Resources
According to the calculations of the Global Footprint Network, the planet will be running on 'ecological deficit' for the rest of the year
Aug 13, 2015
As of Thursday, August 13, humans have officially exhausted the planet's yearly supply of natural resources. For the rest of 2015, the earth will run an "ecological deficit"--accumulating carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and depleting the planet for future generations.
This is the disturbing estimate of the Global Footprint Network (GFN), which calculates the planet's "overshoot day" annually. The troubling milestone occurred less than eight months into 2015 and six days earlier than last year's, a symptom of what the organization warns is a "looming catastrophe."
"We have a metabolism problem," Mathis Wackernagel, president of GFN, told Common Dreams. "In the end, the biggest knowledge gap we have is whether physical reality matters or not. Most of our planning assumes resource reality is a minor issue."
"Earth Overshoot Day" is calculated by dividing the planet's biocapacity—defined by the group as "the ability of an ecosystem to regenerate biological resources and absorb wastes generated by humans"—by humanity's overall ecological footprint and multiplying this ratio by 365.
According to the group, in the 1970s, the earth passed a "critical threshold" where human consumption began outpacing the planet's ability to restore itself. Today, humanity's "demand for renewable ecological resources and the services they provide is now equivalent to that of more than 1.5 Earths."
"In planetary terms, the costs of our ecological overspending are becoming more evident by the day," GFN warned. "Climate change--a result of greenhouse gases being emitted faster than forests and oceans can absorb them--is the most obvious and arguably pressing result. But there are others--shrinking forests, species loss, fisheries collapse, higher commodity prices, and civil unrest, to name a few."
Others have pointed out that the world does not contribute to planetary depletion equally. For example, a report released earlier this year by Oil Change International finds that wealthy countries are driving the global expansion of coal extraction and power generation. Meanwhile, poor people and nations across the world are impacted the most by the ongoing effects of climate change. Social movements and countries from the Global South have argued that rich countries owe a "climate debt"--to be paid in the form of reparations.
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Ezell Ford's Shooting Death Shines Light on LAPD Brutality
Jun 11, 2015
Just two days after Michael Brown was killed by policeman Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Mo., 25-year-old Ezell Ford was fatally shot in South Los Angeles by two officers of the Los Angeles Police Department. Ford had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and was well known to residents of the area. Police say a struggle ensued when he was confronted. Ford then was shot three times.
In the last several years the LAPD has managed to clean up its tarnished image. There have been positive media reports, such as this KPCC story praising the police department's Mental Evaluation Unit as a "model" for the nation and this New York Times article claiming that the LAPD is a "police force transformed." Such coverage creates the impression that the third largest police force in the nation has emerged from controversies like the Rodney King beating and the Ramparts scandal and is now a standard-bearer in law enforcement.
But a new investigation by The Guardian newspaper has found that the LAPD leads the nation in officer-involved deaths. This year alone, LAPD officers have been responsible for killing 10 people, five of whom were unarmed. That count does not include Ford, who was killed on Aug. 11, 2014.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, although progressive on economic justice issues, has taken relatively little action on police killings of unarmed blacks. A dozen or so activists with Black Lives Matter (BLM) have attempted to force the mayor's hand by camping out in front of his home since Sunday. On Tuesday the campers headed to a Police Commission meeting in downtown L.A. where the five-member appointed panel planned to weigh recommendations made by LAPD Chief Charlie Beck and Inspector General Alex Bustamante. While Bustamante maintained that Officers Sharlton Wampler and Antonio Villegas had approached Ford inappropriately, he agreed with Beck that the fatal shooting was consistent with policy.
Reporting from the commission meeting, I witnessed not only the public rage against police killings like that of Ford but also the brutality of police as they proceeded, in full view of the public, to arrest one of the activists present. Dozens of people were gathered in a room packed with reporters, and dozens more watched from an overflow room as one speaker after another expressed their anger at the commissioners, Chief Beck and Inspector General Bustamante.
One man wore a red Ku Klux Klan robe, complete with pointy hood, to make the case that police violence is a symptom of white supremacy, regardless of the color of officers' skin (neither Wampler nor Villegas are white). He accused Beck of being a "goddamn train wreck." A woman led a mass chant, "Ezell Ford's life matters." A young African-American man addressing the hearing elicited gasps when he angrily tossed a sheaf of comment sheets into the air to represent the countless people killed by police. The man, who later identified himself to me as Evan Bunch, said to the commissioners, "You are numb to the killing of a human being. This means now, you're like Hitler."
As Bunch made his way out of the room I asked him if I could interview him after the meeting and he immediately agreed. But a few minutes later, a commotion ensued and people ran outside, saying Bunch had been arrested.
I followed with my video camera until I reached the opposite end of the building. There lay Bunch on the concrete immediately outside the building with his hands cuffed behind his back and three LAPD officers hovering over him. Bunch's friends stood yelling at the cops, demanding to know why he was being arrested. A few seconds later two officers roughly lifted Bunch by his arms and, as he screamed in pain, dragged him back into the building down a flight of stairs, his legs and feet thudding against each step. I immediately posted the raw footage of him being dragged away on social media, and within hours it was shared hundreds of times and viewed thousands of times. Immediately a call to #FreeEvan went out, and, in a testament to the power of instant Internet communication, people mobilized rapidly. Bunch was freed later in the day.
Commander Andrew Smith of the LAPD's media relations and community affairs unit, a congenial white officer, explained to me that Bunch was not arrested, he was simply "detained for disturbing the peace." I asked him whether it was an embarrassment for the LAPD to treat an African-American in this manner on a day when community members were so outraged over police brutality. Smith's response: "That's a good opinion; you're welcome to it."
LAPD officers might be living in an alternate reality, in which they are a besieged minority under attack from all sides, accused of misbehavior constantly and under scrutiny for the tiniest of missteps. The truth is that that exact description applies more accurately to Black America. Armed to the teeth, police officers wield their deadly weapons with impunity and have a massive structure of institutionalized support behind them in the form of police unions, elected officials, the court system and appointed officials like members of the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners.
Through that support system, officers enjoy a form of immunity that is not available to civilians. Ford's mother, Tritobia, told the commissioners before they issued their ruling, "All my son wanted to do was live. ... How can [the officers] not have a reason to stop him, but yet you clear them? Please, I have faith in you yet. He had been stopped before and lived. These officers did wrong."
But Ford's killers are likely to walk. Hours after the public comment period ended, the five commissioners ruled that Wampler "acted out of policy" when he shot Ford, while Villegas didn't. Both officers were out of policy in drawing their weapons. Now it is up to Beck to determine what punishment, if any, to mete out to Wampler. In the few cases where the commission has ruled against an officer's actions, Beck has generally ignored its recommendations. In the meantime, BLM activists have asked City District Attorney Jackie Lacey--the first black D.A. in Los Angeles history--to file charges.
Steven Lerman, the attorney representing the Ford family, plans to bring a wrongful death lawsuit against the officers in federal court. Lerman, who was present at the commission hearing, characterized the shooting as "not only not justified, but a homicide with evil intent" and declared that the officers ought to "be in federal prison for their violation of Ezell Ford's civil rights." Lerman, who also represented Rodney King in 1992, sees the Black Lives Matter movement as part of a "continuum [from 1992] ... with the rash of shootings of unarmed black and Latino men across the country."
BLM activist Dawn Bodkins, who has been camping out in front of the mayor's house, also attended the hearing. For Bodkins, justice means the firing of Chief Beck at the very least. She added, "If Mayor Garcetti doesn't handle [Beck], then we can consider taking him [Garcetti] out of office." Bodkins also wants the police commissioners to deliberate in public instead of behind closed doors. And activists like her are eyeing the recent court victory of Chicagoans who won reparations for the horrific abuses they suffered when they were tortured by police in the 1970s and '80s.
The story of Ezell Ford has not received nearly enough national media attention despite being on par with other high-profile cases across the nation of police brutality against unarmed African-Americans. Whether that is because the LAPD continues to cling to its positive image, or whether the press has simply not highlighted the case strongly enough, is not clear. What is certain is that the Black Lives Matter movement--arguably the most important social and political U.S.-based movement in a decade--will not rest until there is justice for Ford and all the others unjustifiably killed by police.
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The Case Against Manifest Destiny
Jun 02, 2015
The disastrous consequences of the recent aggressions against Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen and Ukraine, to name just a few, show the urgent need to revive the principle of non-intervention into another state. This principle of international law includes, but is not limited to, the prohibition of the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, according to Article 2.4 of the Charter of the United Nations.
The Swiss legal philosopher Emmerich de Vattel is credited with being the first to formulate the principle of non-intervention in his Droit de gens ou principles de la loi naturelle (The Law of Nations) published in 1758. Essentially, the principle establishes the right of territorial sovereignty possessed by each nation. The scope of the principle, however, has been subject to debate.
For example, what constitutes intervention in practical terms? Does it include only the use or threat of military force, or it also includes economic sanctions, cyber warfare or other kinds of non-military intervention such as propaganda campaigns or control of media messages to other countries?
According to Michael Wood, a member of the UN International Law Commission, one of the earliest treaty formulations of the principle was included in the Article 15 (8) of the Covenant of the League of Nations and the Montevideo Convention on Rights and Duties of States of 1933, which precluded "interference with the freedom, the sovereignty or other internal affairs, or the processes of the Governments of other nations," together with the Additional Protocol on Non-Intervention of 1936.
Later on, the UN General Assembly issued a Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention and Interference in the Domestic Affairs of States (UNGA resolution 2131 (XX) 1965). According to Oppenheim's International Law, the prohibition of intervention "is a corollary of every state's right to sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence."
A paradigmatic case in which this principle was applied was that of Nicaragua vs. United States, following the U.S. support for the "contras" fighting the Nicaraguan Government and the mining of Nicaraguan harbors. The case was decided in 1986 by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
The ICJ ruled in favor of Nicaragua and against the United States, and awarded reparations to the Nicaraguan Government. According to the ICJ, the actions of the U.S. against Nicaragua violated international law. The U.S. refused to participate in the proceedings after the Court rejected its argument that the ICJ lacked jurisdiction to hear the case.
In a move that did no honor to the country, the U.S. later blocked the enforcement of the judgment by the UN Security Council, thus preventing Nicaragua from obtaining any compensation. In 1992, under the government of Violeta Chamorro, the Nicaraguan government withdrew its complaint.
According to the Court's verdict, the U.S. was "in breach of its obligations under customary international law not to use force against another State", "not to intervene in its affairs", "not to violate its sovereignty", "not to interrupt peaceful maritime commerce", and "in breach of its obligations under Article XIX of the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the parties signed at Managua on 21 January 1956."
Furthermore, the ICJ determined that, "...the laying of mines in the waters of another State without any warning or notification is not only an unlawful act but also a breach of the principles of humanitarian law underlying the Hague Convention No. VIII of 1907."
The principle of non-intervention has obvious limits in case of grave violations of human rights. For this reason, a norm called Responsibility to Protect (R2P or RtoP) was developed. The origin of this norm was the international community's failure to respond to tragedies such as the Rwandan Genocide in 1994 and the Srebrenica massacre in 1995.
According to this norm, sovereignty is not an absolute right, and states forfeit aspects of their sovereignty when they fail to protect their populations from mass atrocities crimes and human rights violations. However, to avoid abuses of this principle, any international action to curb mass crimes should have the approval of the United Nations.
Although the principle of non-intervention is extremely difficult to enforce in today's complex world, its principles should be revived again. This is particularly pertinent if one considers the tremendous loss of lives due to the violations of international law that recent interventions into other States have caused.
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