News n noticias n a letter to the Prez

San Anto news

The Opening Reception for the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies National Conference to be held in San Antonio (May 20-23) took place this week (March 20). The reception included a Poetry Reading featuring Benjamin Alire Saenz, Nepthalí De León, Inés Hernández Ávila, Evangelina Vigil-Piñón, Reyes Cárdenas, José Flores Peregrino, María Limón, Eduardo Garza and Laurie Ann Guerrero.


Aztlan Libre Press officially unveiled their sixth publication: Reyes Cárdenas - Chicano Poet, 1970-2010, a forty-year retrospective of Reyes' poetry, with L.A. David, VatoCózmico, artwork on the cover of Reyes' book. Any comments about this cover should be addressed to Aztlán Libre, please.

Highland Park, Califas

Melinda Palacio will be the featured reader at Avenue 50 Studio in Highland Park, Califas, tomorrow, Sunday, March 24 at 2pm. 

Modesto, Califas

Saturday, April 6, 2013, 10:30am until 4:30pm, 1550 Crows Landing Rd. Modesto, Calif.
2-mile march from South Modesto to West Modesto Honoring Cesar E. Chavez!

Fresno, Califas
Vigilia Para Nuestros Campesinos: Pasado y Presente/Vigil for Our Farm Workers: Past and Present. Friday, April 5, 2013, 6:00pm – 9:00pm

M.E.Ch.A. de Fresno City and Fresno State are hosting a vigil to focus on farm worker's rights and the history of the struggle of the campesinos. We will have many activities, from danzantes to folklorico to activities for children. We will also have some guest speakers talking about farm worker's experiences. This event is open to everyone!

M.E.Ch.A. de Fresno City y Fresno State será el anfitrión de una vigilia en la que se centrará en los derechos de los trabajadores agrícolas y la historia de la lucha de los campesinos. Tendremos muchas actividades abiertas a la comunidad, como danzantes, folklórico, y actividades para los niños. También tendremos algunos invitados que hablaran sobre las experiencias de los trabajadores de la granja. ¡Este evento está abierto a toda la comunidad!

Stopping Keystone XL Pipeline, for now
News from 350.org

What just happened in the Senate this week: The oil industry's Senators did not manage to pass legislation that would force President Obama to build Keystone XL.

Because people all across the country, jumped into action this week, the oil lobby backtracked and held a vote on a nonbinding resolution that says it would be nice to build the pipeline, but doesn't actually do much about it. For that vote, they got 62 Senators to vote with them. As usual, the ones who had taken the most money from the fossil fuel industry lined up to cast their votes—the cosponsors of the bill, on average, had taken $807,000 in dirty energy money.

Estudiantes de UNAM, México

Congress is going on break, and for the next two weeks, these 62 Senators will be back in their home states, doing things like meeting with constituents -- people like you.

Home states are where some of the most heroic work took place the last week -- like Minneapolis, where 150 activists showed up on very short notice at Sen. Klobuchar's office in a snowstorm to tell her to vote no on Keystone, and she did.

Here's how the Senators in Colorado voted 'yes' for the pipeline: Mark Udall - No; Michael Bennet - Yes.

There are two ways to react in a democracy. One is to walk away in disgust. The other is to stand up and say: No more! Capitol Hill is not the center of the world. Around the country this week our friends at Tar Sands Blockade have been actively targeting Keystone investors; faith groups have been hauled off to jail in front of the White House to protest the pipeline; and the divestment campaign has expanded off college campuses and into municipal and state governments. The movement can’t outspend the oil industry, but we can out-organize them. In fact, we have to.

350.org is building a global movement to solve the climate crisis.

Dear President Obama,

[To Nobel Peace Prize recipient Barack Obama about secret targeting of terrorist suspects for death-by-drone and his expanding executive power to kill anyone.]

"Do the United States and its people really want to tell those of us who live in the rest of the world that our lives are not of the same value as yours?
That President Obama can sign off on a decision to kill us with less worry about judicial scrutiny than if the target is an American?
Would your Supreme Court really want to tell humankind that we, like the slave Dred Scott in the nineteenth century, are not as human as you are?
I cannot believe it.
I used to say of apartheid that it dehumanized its perpetrators as much as, if not more than, its victims.
Your response as a society to Osama bin Laden and his followers threatens to undermine your moral standards and your humanity." - Desmond Tutu, South African Archbishop, Nobel Peace Prize winner
[Space is available here if Mr. Obama would like to respond.]

Es suficiente, hoy,
RudyG