492 Cafe

Two Boston Demonstrations

January 11, 2007

Featuring Veteran and Historian Howard Zinn, Guantanamo Attorney Jeffrey Gleason, Amnesty International's Josh Rubenstein and other patriotic Americans who won't sit still as our nation is attacked from within...by our Government.

Hooded Protestors

January 11 in Washington D.C.

Recordings

Stop The Troop Surge

(01:50) Howard Zinn
(44:00) All Others

Shut Down Guantanamo

(15:00) Jeffrey Gleason
(07:00) Josh Rubenstein

Copley speakers are Introduced by Amy Hendrickson of Brookline Peace Works

492 Cafe's famous SoniKart, a self-powered mobile sound system, amplified and recorded the voices of Historian Howard Zinn, Amnesty International's Joshua Rubenstein, Guantanamo Victim Attorney Jeffrey Gleason, and lots of other folks. The recordings posted below begin at Park Street Station at around 4:30.

I. Park Street -Stop Bush's Troop Surge

The demo was called by The Stop The Wars Coalition, United for Justice with Peace, Move on and other organizations in response to the Idiot Emperor's escalation. The goal has become one of lobbying Democrats to defund the escalation, and to force an order for withdrawal.

MBTA Police keeping the nearby transit station's entrances clear Former MBTA Police Chief Tom O'Loughlin explained to me in an interview in 2000, that this is the point of their presence. However, in 2002, Officer Brian Harer took it upon himself to forbid my photography of a demonstration unilaterally for the second time. He abused his authority, committing several crimes in the process, hence, work now includes keeping tabs on the often misguided and pooly trained MBTA Police. (more here ...and here) -Freeman Z
Mark Lipman sang his "Dear Mister President." The SoniKart allows for multipe microphones and central control, facilitating live verbal exchanges appropriate for a people's movement. This fellow has appeared at another rally on Boston Common for which 492 Cafe provided sound amplification and recording services. "Drive out The Bush Regime" The SoniKart was in police hands at the time, so we used the massive 24 channel console and recorded it in multichannel, with ProTools. Even the audience was recorded, in stereo.


The Stop The Wars Coalition table offered materials including flyers for upcoming demonstrations and Peacework Magazine, to which 492 Cafe's Freeman Z has contributed photographs (From demonstrations in Quebec City and Boston) as well as quotes.

the militant Paper of the Interntional Socialist Organization

The Militant, published by the Socialist Workers Party

Many Socialists and Communists see Capitalism as the root problem of American social ills manifested through greed and imperialism.

Imagine that.

The Industrial Workers of the World (the Wobblies) are still around. I met one of them on Manhattan as I covered the Republican National Convention. She told me that they had just unionized a Starbucks on Manhattan! My friend Howard Zinn was a wobbly.

Hear Freeman Z's report on the 2004 Republican National Convention which aired on WMBR's No Censorship Radio

revolution books

George and Owen, from revolution Books of Harvard Square

II. Copley Square -Shut Down Guantanamo

Call to Action

- Around 500 people from 35 countries continue to be held without charge or trial as of January 2006, four years after the Bush administration began locking up detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
- Detainees remain in a legal black hole, many with no access to any court, legal counsel, or family visits.
- Thereâs mounting evidence that detainees have been subjected to torture and other forms of mistreatment. This evidence comes not only from the few detainees who have been allowed to meet with lawyers and the fewer who have been released, but also from FBI agents and former military personnel who were assigned to Guantanamo.
- Many detainees are confined in small cells for up to 24 hours a day, with minimal opportunity for exercise. Detainees are often kept in isolation, sometimes for months, as punishment for the infraction of strict camp rules.
- Several detainees have attempted suicide. In desperation, between 100 and 150 have embarked on hunger strikes, kept alive, sometimes against their will, through painful forced-feeding procedures.
- The U.N. Commission on Human Rights, in a report of Feb. 2006, stated that ãthe legal regime applied to these detainees seriously undermines the rule of law and a number of fundamental universally recognized human rights, which are the essence of democratic societies,ä and concludes that ãThe United States Government should close the Guantanamo Bay detention facilities without further delay. Witness Torture .org

The Protest

Protestors marched from the earlier event on Boston Common to Copley Square. The SoniKart was quickly prepared for service. The 20" diameter horn provided a rich, mellow sound, and two smaller speakers filled out the remainder of the protest area.

Sofia Jarrin-Thomas of WMFO Radio at Tufts University, also recorded the event.

We heard from Attorney Jeffrey Gleason of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who spoke on his experiences defending so-called Enemy Combatants, a term he describes as "legally fictitious."

Attorney Jeffrey Gleason

"I'm a litigator here in Boston and I have been working on representing six men detained in Guantanamo Bay Cuba since January 20, 2002."

"I had the opportunity to go down to the base. I met with these guys. I looked into their eyes. I have spoken with them and have spoken extensively with their families"

"Guantanamo represents the use of torture in dealing with detainees. It represents the unchecked usurpation of power by the executive. It represents great injustice and it needs to close..." -Attorney Jeff Gleason

Josh Rubenstein of Amnesty Interntional

Josh Rubenstein

Josh Rubenstein of Amnesty International

"Torture is illegal, it's illegal under U.S. law, it's illegal under international law. And whoever uses torture, whoever supervises the use of torture, whoever orders the use of torture is breaking the law. And we are a country of laws and no one is above the law. And when the Bush administration decided that the prohibition against torture should be diluted, in Afghanistan, in Abu Ghraib, in Guantanamo, they were breaking the law..."

"Guantanamo needs to be closed and the individuals there need to be charged or released. That's what we expect for every other individual in this country and we should expect no less for prisoners our government is holding today in Guantanamo..." -Josh Rubenstein

The same day in Washington D.C.

Hooded Protestors

(Photographer unknown)

Three hundred hooded people in orange suits marched through the streets of Washington D.C. and into the Supreme Court. At least 90 people were arrested at the Federal Court and submitted the names of Guantanamo detainees to the police instead of their own, as a symbolic and strategic move to pressure the government to re-adopt habeas corpus for Guantanamo detainees and all prisoners in the U.S. "war on terror."

In Cuba, a 15-person delegation including former prisoners and family members of Guantanamo detainees, got as close as they were able to the detention camp and demanded it be immediately shut down, asking for fair trials, the overturn the Military Commissions Act, and for government officials to restore habeas corpus. (Sofia Jarrin-Thomas for Indymedia. Read the article Here)

More 492 Cafe Recordings

492 Cafe Videos

Photo Reports

Thanks to Sofia Jarrin-Thomas for transcribing the quotes provided above. Sofia also wrote the linked Indymedia article and recorded the Copley event. that recording is available as a link from the Indymedia article.

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