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Oakland TribuneOCCUPIED
Monday | February 20, 2012 FREE
occupyoakland.org
by Kevin Cooper
It seems that many peopleare glad, and in some cases down-right happy, that the Occupy movements have taken placeacross this country. Many peoplearound the world are asking,“What took so long?” All of them
want it to grow and to include all of the people who are being affectedby the 1% and their policies.
SOLIDARITY WITH PRISONERS
OCCUPY SAN QUENTIN
Jack Bryson of Occupy Oakland (left) with Kevin Cooper of San Quentin (right).
One cannot live on thisplanet and not know the bed capi-
talism lays here within this coun-try. The roots from the tree of greed have spread to damn nearevery part of this world. They havehad an impact, directly orindirectly, on every person in this
world, to one degree or another.Capitalism, and the capital-
ists who run and control it, need very important ingredients to
make it work. They need “TheHaves” and “The Have-Nots.”
These days, as it once was when this country was first formed,it is very easy to tell the differencebetween the two. Some of thepeople, who for most of their livesconsidered themselves the“Haves,” are finding out that they
were living a lie. That now, they are part of the “Have-Nots.” Thisreality is (continued on page 7)
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Monday | February 20, 2012 2
When I heard of the call,
just raised in Oakland, California,
to “Occupy the Prisons”, I gasped.
It was not an especially
radical call, but it was right on time.
For prisons have become a
metaphor; the shadow-side, if you
will, of America, With oceans of words about freedom, and the
reality that the U.S. is the world’s
leader of the incarceration industry,
its more than time for the focused
attention of the Occupy Movement.
It’s past time.
For the U.S. is the world’s
largest imprisoner for decades,
much wrought by the insidious
effects of the so-called ‘drug
war’—what I call, “the War on the
Poor.”
And, Occupy, now an inter-
national movement, certainly has
no shortage of prisons to choose
from. Every state, every rural
district, every hamlet in America
has a prison; a place where the Con-
stitution doesn’t exist, and where
slavery is all but legalized.
When law professor,
Michelle Alexander, took on the
topic, her book, the New Jim Crow,
took off like hotcakes – selling over
100,000 in just a few months.
And where there are
prisons, there is torture; brutal beat-
ings, grave humiliations, perverse
censorship – and even murders –
all under a legal system that is as
blind as that statue which holds aloft
a scale, her eyes covered by a frigid
fold of cloth.
So, what is Occupy to do?
Initially, it must support
movements such as those calling for
the freedom of Lakota brother
Leonard Peltier, the MOVE veter-ans of August 8th, 1978, the
remaining two members of the
Angola 3: Herman Wallace and
Albert Woodfox, Sundiata Acoli,
Russell “Maroon” Shoatz, and
many other brothers and sisters
who’ve spent lifetimes in steel and
brick hellholes.
But, the Occupy Movement
must do more.
As it shifted the discussionand paradigm on economic issues,
it must turn the wheel of the so-
called ‘Criminal Justice System’ in
America, that is in fact, a destruc-
tive, counter-productive, annual
$69 billion boondoogle of repres-
sion, better-known by activists as
the Prison-Industrial-Complex.
That means more than a
one-day event, no matter how
massive or impressive. It means
building a mass movement that
demands and fights for real change,
and eventually abolition of struc-
tures that do far more social
damage than good.
It means the abolition of
solitary confinement, for it is no
more than modern-day torture
chambers for the poor.
It means the repeal of
repressive laws that support such
structures.
It means social change – or
it means nothing.
So let us begin – down with
the Prison Industrial Complex!
Mumia Abu-Jamal is a renown
journalist, author, and activist who has
been in prison since 1981 for allegedly
shooting Philadelphia police officer
Daniel Faulkner. Despite overwhelmin
evidence of his innocence, prosecutoria
misconduct, constitutional violations in
his trial, police coercion of witnesses and
documented racism, he remains on death
row.
Occupied Oakland Tribune
Editorial and Design
Sarah Morgan
Scott Johnson
Celeste Christie
Legal Counsel
Michael Siegel, Siegel & Yee
In Support Of
Occupy Oakland
Contact:
http://occupiedoaktrib.org
Special Thanks To:all supporters of Occupy
Oakland, 1984 Printing,
Art for a Democratic Society
The Occupied Oakland Tribune
is not in any way affiliated with
the Oakland Tribune or
Bay Area News Group,
its parent company.
Souls on Iceby Mumia Abu-Jamal
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Monday | February 20, 2012
“If you had free reign over classified
networks… and you saw incredible
things, awful things… things that
belonged in the public domain, and not on
some server stored in a dark room in
Washington DC… what would you do?” -Quotes from an online chat attrib-
uted to Bradley Manning
Bradley Manning, a 24-
year-old Army intelligence analyst,
is accused of leaking a video show-
ing the killing of civilians, including
two Reuters journalists, by a US
Apache helicopter crew in Iraq. He
is also charged with sharing thedocuments known as the Afghan
War Diary, the Iraq War Logs, and
embarrassing US diplomatic cables,
with the anti-secrecy website
WikiLeaks. The video and docu-
ments have illuminated such issues
as the true number and cause of
civilian casualties in Iraq, human
rights abuses by U.S.-funded
contractors and foreign militaries,
and the role that spying and bribes
play in international diplomacy.
Not a single person has
been harmed by the release of this
information. Defense Secretary
Robert M. Gates has called their
affect on U.S. foreign relations
“fairly modest.” Yet, Bradley faces
22 charges, including “Aiding the
enemy by indirect means,” for
which a conviction could result in
the death penalty or life in prison.
Although Bradley has not yet been
tried, he was held in solitary
confinement for the first 10 months
of his incarceration. During this
time he was denied meaningful
exercise, social interaction, sunlight,and has occasionally been kept
completely naked. These condi-
tions were unique to Bradley and
are illegal even under US military
law as they amount to extreme pre-
trial punishment.
In March 2011, chief US
State Department spokesperson PJ
Crowley called Bradley’s treatment
at the Quantico, Virginia Marine
Corps brig “ridiculous and counter-productive and stupid.” He was
forced to resign within hours.
Bradley’s treatment has sparked a
probe by the United Nations chief
torture investigator Juan Mendez.
According to Mr. Mendez, he has
been, “frustrated by the prevarica-
tion of the US government with
regard to my attempts to visit Mr.
Manning.” After also being rejectedan official visit, Congressman
Dennis Kucinich noted, “What is
going on…with respect to Pfc.
Manning’s treatment is more
consistent with Kafka then the US
Constitution.”
In one week in April 2011,
over a half million people signed a
petition calling on President
Obama to end the isolation and
torture of Bradley Manning, a
those conditions serve as “a chilling
deterrent to other potential whistle
blowers committed to public integ
rity.”
Over 300 top legal scholar
declared Bradley’s conditions o
detention a violation of the Eighth
Amendment’s prohibition again
cruel and unusual punishment and
the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee
against punishment without trial
Among the signatories is Laurence
Tribe, a Harvard professor who
taught Barack Obama. Prof. Tribe
was until recently a senior advisor to
the US Justice Department.
Partially in response topublic outcry, on April 21, 2011
Bradley was moved from Quantico
to Fort Leavenworth, KS, where hi
conditions greatly improved. The
very day he was moved, Presiden
Obama was surprised at a breakfas
fundraiser by a group of protesters
At the end of the fundraiser,
member of the Bradley Manning
Support Network, Logan Price
began questioning him abouBradley’s situation. The Presiden
stated that “He [Bradley Manning
broke the law,” a pretrial declara
tion of guilt that has caused concern
among many legal experts.
Now, at the start of the
second decade in the second
millennium, Bradley Manning has a
growing list of supporters. Included
among them is another famou whistle blower, Daniel Ellsber
who leaked the Pentagon Papers in
1971. We hope that you will join us
as well. See what you can do to
support justice in this historic time.
The above statement is from the Bradley
Manning Support Network. Go
www.bradleymanning.org for more info.
Free Bradley
Manning!
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nhumane
Conditions for
ailed Occupiersy Jason Cherkis
Alyssa Eisenberg just
anted her multiple sclerosis medi-
tion that she uses to allay fatigue
d help her concentrate.
A member of Occupy Oak-
nd, she had been caught up in last
aturday's police kettling and trans-
rred to the Santa Rita jail. Police
fused to let her keep her meds,
hich she takes a few times a day,
e said. Once inside, a guard
smissed her distress, she said,
ling her, "It doesn't look like
ou're having a medical emer-
ncy."
Eisenberg, 44, who claims
e was arrested without warning,
ent 18 hours in the Santa Rita jail.
efore her release, the guards told
r she could get access to her
edication only if a nurse observed
r for a few hours, she said, adding
at they implied that if she took
em up on the offer, her release
ould be delayed a day.
"It was so frustrating trying
understand what was going on,"
id Eisenberg, who became disori-
nted during what had already been
cramped, chaotic ordeal. "That's
e part that stuck with me," she told
he Huffington Post . "That's because
ey didn't give me my medicine."
In the wake of last
aturday's police actions, Occupy
akland and city officials are going
rough the now familiar routine of
sides expressing outrage. But this
me, the investigations won't end
th tracing the last tear gas canister
ed and last activist led away in
plastic cuffs. The controversy
extends to what occurred inside
both the Santa Rita jail and the
Glenn E. Dyer Detention Facility
after Saturday's arrests. Activists like
Eisenberg allege a range of miscon-
duct on the part of jail personnel,
from denial of critical treatment to
inhumane conditions.
None of the protesters
interviewed by The Huffington Post
were part of the unruly events that
took place in Oakland that night,
including a flag-burning and vandal-
ism to city hall, they said.
Incarceration violated law
Dan Siegel, Mayor JeanQuan's former adviser who quit her
administration over her handling of
Occupy Oakland's eviction in Octo-
ber, said incarcerating the activists
violated state law. "What is outra-
geous is that ... people were jailed
all weekend instead of cited and
released as required by California
law," he wrote in an email to The
Huffington Post .
Some activists were charged
with burglary for trying to escape
the mass arrest by running inside
the nearby YMCA building, Siegel
said. "Burglars generally enter to
commit theft," he wrote. "At most,
they trespassed. People say they
were invited in, so there was no
offense at all."
Rachel Lederman, an Oak-
land civil rights attorney with theNational Lawyers Guild, told The
Huffington Post she's received reports
that some of the activists had been
cuffed and left on the police buses
for as long as six hours without
access to a bathroom. One woman,
she said, reported nerve damage in
her hand.
Once inside, the activists
claimed to have been crammed into
Monday | February 20, 2012onday | February 20, 2012 4
shower rooms with no beds, no
blankets, no heat and not a single
chair, Lederman said.
Quan's office deferred a
request for comment to the Oak-
land Police Department. The
department did not answer the
request.
Sgt. J.D. Nelson, the
spokesperson for the Alameda
County Sheriff's Department,
which oversees the Santa Rita and
Dyer facilities, did admit to The
Huffington Post that the jail cells were
crowded and some services might
have been slowed. Santa Rita took
in more than 250 protesters, while
Dyer received 110.
The arrestees were not
denied care, Nelson said. "Every-
body that comes in sees a medical
staff," he explained. "Our job and
our issue is that people come in and
make all kinds of claims. We have
to verify those claims before hand-
ing out medication. You can't just
take everything at face value."
If conditions were tough at
Santa Rita, Nelson said, it was
because police decided to divert
more arrestees to that facility after
Occupy activists attempted to block
the entrance to Dyer.
Sean Keaveny, 32, told The
Huffington Post the sign in his cell
listed capacity at seven inmates. Asmany as 20 were crammed inside,
the water fountain did not work and
the cell went without toilet paper for
as long as 12 hours, he said.
The guards were constantly
moving people in and out of cells,
one of which contained at least 50
activists, Keaveny said. There was
no toilet paper and the only water
they had access to was scalding, he
said. "We requested water for hours
and hours before we gave up."
Denied HIV medication
"I saw a gentleman with
HIV who was asking again and
again for his HIV medications,"
Keaveny said. Every time a guard
would walk by, the man would ask for his meds; eventually, Keaveny
and others joined in, he said. At
one point, they began kicking
against a door to get the guards'
attention, Keaveny said, adding that
the man never got his HIV meds.
Noah Zimmerman, 31,
remembered hearing activists
chanting for some assistance for the
activist with HIV. Michael, 21, who
did not want his full name used,
remembers the HIV-positive man
asking for his meds as well.
Sgt. Nelson did not recall a
specific issue with an activist who
has HIV. "Just because somebody
comes in and says they need HIV
meds, we're not just going to start
handing out HIV meds," he said.
Salon reported that there
may have been one other HIV-positive activist who was denied
medication.
Michael told The Huffington
Post that at one point, women
nearby began chanting for a medic
since a protester had gone into a
diabetic seizure after not getting
enough food. "They were screaming
for a medic, going 'medic! medic!
medic!' and banging on the door,"
he said. "That happene
times."
Activist women de
sanitary napkins for an inm
had her period, Keaveny r
"They were singing the ent
chanting, banging," he said
slammed and banged
demanded tampons for h
took hours for them to get
toilet paper."
Keaveny was inca
until Wednesday at 5 a
claimed that he never had
a lawyer, had his Mirand
read, or was given a priso
"What we endured in Sant
suffered every day by miinmates in the United State
system."
Activists said they
similar conditions at Dyer
ney Wentz, 31, a preschool
who served as a medic
march before being snare
mass arrest, said she got pla
10-foot-by-10-foot holding
more than 20 other
During one inmate count,
went around and threw ou
food they had just been
Wentz said.
Matt Smaldone, 37
was placed in a shower r
seven hours. "One guy
broken wrist," he said. "H
asking for assistance. He d
looked at until 8 a.m. Th
him like a wrap with an icSmaldone said others with
were placed in isolation.
Jason Cherkis is a reporter and
for The Huffington Post . H
ously worked at the Washing
Paper where he covered socia
and law enforcement. This a
originally printed in The Hu
Post. Reprinted with permissioPolice kettle protesters at the Oakland YMCA. Photo from Occupy Oakland Media.
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Monday | February 20, 2012 6
Between 1990 and 2000,
the rate of female incarceration
increased 108%. Despite the fact
that the number of women incarcer-
ated is increasing more rapidly than
that of men, interest in women
prisoners’ organizing around their
conditions of confinement remains
much lower than that of their male
counterparts.
Why the cloak of invisibil-ity? Like their outside counterparts,
women in prison are perceived as
passive. Such neglect leads to the
definition of prison issues as mascu-
line and male-dominated, dismiss-
ing both distinctly female concerns
(i.e. the scarcity of sanitary hygiene
products, the lack of medical care
specifically for women, especially
prenatal care, threats of sexual
abuse by guards, etc.) and any actions, which women take to
address and overcome these
concerns. Thus, researchers and
scholars do not search out acts of
defiance among the growing female
prison population. Furthermore,
while male prisoners have well
known examples of figures like
George Jackson, and instances like
the Attica uprising among other well-publicized cases of prisoner
activism, women have limited
resources and well known people
or events that are relevant to them.
On the 28th of August
1974, inmates at Bedford Hills, an
all women’s prison, protested the
beating of a fellow inmate by hold-
ing seven staff members hostage for
two-and-a-half hours. However, the
“August Rebellion” is virtually
unknown today. All male state
troopers and (male) guards from
men’s prisons were called to
suppress the uprising. Twenty-five
women were injured and twenty-
four others were transferred to
Matteawan Complex for the Crimi-
nally Insane without the required
commitment hearings. This event
was virtually ignored because it
lasted only two-and-a-half hours,
and no one was killed. The story
was relegated to a paragraph buried
in the back pages of The New York
Times. The “August Rebellion” is
seen as less significant than the
Attica Rebellion. The women at Bedford Hills also did not have any
opportunity to contact media, big-
name supporters and politicians,
whereas the men incarcerated at
Attica were able to gain public
attention. The “August Rebellion”
is easily overlooked by those seek-
ing information on prisoner
protests and disruptions.
Similarly, women in a
California prison held a “Christmasriot” in 1975 to protest the cancella-
tion of family holiday visits and
holiday packages, inmates gathered
in the yard, broke windows, made
noise and burned Christmas trees
in a “solidarity” bonfire. Once
Invisibility of
Women Prisoner
Resistanceby Victoria Law
again, because there were no
blatant acts of violence, this was not
considered a major act of distur-
bance. This act is overlooked by
anyone researching prison distur-
bances.
Mainstream ideas about
prisoners are gendered masculine:
the term “prisoner” usually calls
forth an image of a young, black
man convicted of a violent crime
such as rape or murder. Politicians
seeking votes, as well as media
seeking specific audiences play on
this representation, whipping the
public into hysteria to get tougher
on crime and build more prisons.
The stereotype of the male felon,makes invisible the growing
number of women imprisoned
under the various mandatory
sentencing laws passed within the
past few decades. Because women
do not fit the media stereotype, the
public does not see them and are
not then aware of the disturbing
paradoxes of prisoners as mothers,
as women with reproductive rights
and abilities, and as women ingeneral.
A longer version of this article wa
originally published at Women and
Prison: A Site for Resista
womenandprison.org
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Monday | February 20, 2012 7
FREEFREE
SAN QUENTIN, continued from page 1
causing them, or at least some of
them, to become part of this
Occupy movement, and under-
standably so.
I have never considered
myself to be a “Have” nor has this
country ever treated me as a
“Have.” No man or woman on
death row in this state, or any other
state, is a “Have.” We are the
“Have-Nots.” We are the bottom
1%, who damn near everyone shits
on. We are scapegoated, ignored,
humiliated, disowned, and ritually
tortured and murdered by, and at
the hands of, the top 1%, and some
of the 99% as well!Those people who are truly
the “Haves” within this country
have not made it to any death row.
For the most part, they never have
and they never will. America has a
deep seeded philosophy in which it
only allows for the execution of its
poorest people. These seeds have
taken root and have grown in such a
way that no person who this system
sees as a “Have-Not” is safe from itsdeath machine. Whether they are
within this building, or on a BART
platform.
It seems that the 1% are
immune from the sentence of
death, even when their policies in
war, or peace, have killed untold
numbers of people around the
world. The bottom 1% is not
immune, and seems to be used aspart of entertainment, from the
media to the politicians.
While these truths must be
known to the 99% who are now
saying that they are the “Have-
Nots,” these truths are not acknowl-
edged by the majority of them. We
who are the bottom 1%, the histori-
cal “Have-Nots,” the ones who are
paraded before the public and
humiliated, strapped to a gurney,
tortured and murdered by the
powers that be; we ask “Why aren’t
we included in this Occupy move-
ment?”
While people are, and
should be, occupying Wall Street
and every other money street in the
country, as well as occupying every
city that they can, I ain’t hearing no
one say, "Occupy death row!"
Nonetheless, I have been
doing so since 1985. And death
row itself has been occupying this
country since even before this land
became a country. The various
ways that poor people have been
executed throughout the yearsprove that executions are part of
this country’s DNA.
So, I now respectfully ask
this to those of you who are part of
this occupy movement: Will you
please not make the same mistake
that was made by previous move-
ments seeking civil, or any other
type of rights? That mistake was
not to include the ending of capital
punishment as part of the demands.Our fight, and our plight
from here on death row is just as
important to us, as your fight and
your plight is to you! We under-
stand this and respect this. All we
ask, and all we have the right to ask,
is that you not leave us behind,
and/or out of the conversation. Any
house, even a house full of “Have-
Nots,” divided upon itself cannot,
and will not, stand. We must unite!
In Struggle and Solidarity
from Death Row at San Quentin
Prison.
Kevin Cooper is an innocent man on
Death Row in San Quentin prison. For
more information on his case, or to
support his struggle for freedom, go to
savekevincooper.org
National Occupy Day in
Support of Prisoners
February 20, 2012
Partial list of endorsers:
Organizations: All of Us or None, California Coalition
for Women Prisoners, California
Prison Focus, Californians United for a
Responsible Budget, Campaign to End
the Death Penalty, Committee to Free
Romaine “Chip” Fitzgerald, Critical
Resistance, December 9th Georgia and
International Prisoners’ Movement,
Decarcerate PA, DRIVE Movement,
Freed Woman Empowerment Associa-
tion, International Coalition to Free the
Angola 3, International Committee for
the Freedom of the Cuban 5, Interna-
tional Socialist Organization, Iraq
Veterans Against the War, San
Francisco Bay Area Chapter, Justice for
Shifa and Haris Support Committee,
Justice Now, Kevin Cooper Defense
Committee, Labor Action Committee
to Free Mumia Abu Jamal, Labor for
Palestine, Legal Services for Prisoners
with Children, Life Support Alliance,
Lynne Stewart Defense Committee,
Maine Prisoner Advocacy Coalition,
Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu
Jamal, National Coalition to Protect
Civil Freedoms, National Committee to
Free the Cuban Five, Oscar Grant Committee Against Police Brutality and
State Repression, Prison Radio, Prison
Watch Network, Prisoner Hunger
Strike Solidarity, Prisoners Are People
Too, Inc., Project NIA, Stanley Tookie
Williams Legacy Network
Individuals: Angela Davis, Anne Weills, National
Lawyers Guild (NLG), Barbara Becnel,
founder, STW Legacy Network,
Michelle Alexander, author of "The
New Jim Crow,” Carole Seligman,
Kevin Cooper Defense Committee,
Elaine Brown, Diana Block, California
Coalition for Women Prisoners, Kevin
Cooper, Michael Letwin, Former
President, Assn. of Legal Aid
Attorneys/UAW Local 2325, Noelle
Hanrahan, Project Director, Prison
Radio, Rabbi Michael Lerner, Sarah
Shourd, Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer,
former hostages in Iran and human
rights activists, Stanley Tookie
Williams IV, Corcoran SHU
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Education Not Incarceration!
FREE
by Dana Blanchard and Jesse Hagopian
One in 31.
As a public school teacher, I
am quite familiar with this figure –
it's a typical teacher-to-student ratio
in the classroom in California. In
recent years that proportion has
taken on new significance: a report
released on March 2, 2009 by the
Pew Center on the States found that
one in every 31 adults reside in the
U.S. corrections system – now total-
ing over 7.3 million people. That
means roughly one student per
classroom in America will end up in
prison, on parole or on probation.
In recent decades the U.S. has
experienced a surge in its prison
population, quadrupling since 1980
while at the same time violent crimeand property crime have declined
since the early 1990s.
In addition to adults, there
were 86,927 held in juvenile facili-
ties as of the 2007 Census of Juve-
niles in Residential Placement
(CJRP), conducted by the Office of
Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention. In California the typical
cost to keep a juvenile incarcerated
for a year is around $90,000. Many of us are also familiar with the idea
that California politicians use 3rd
grade reading scores across the
State to determine how many jail
cells to build in the future. The
prioritization of funding for prisons,
not for schools has meant that since
the 1980’s California has invested
in a dozen new correctional facili-
ties and no new institutions of
higher education.By putting massive amounts
of money into prisons for youth and
adults and starving our public
education system the state of has
made its priorities clear. If you like
these policies of planning prison
construction based on elementary
reading levels, of closing schools
while opening jails, you might
consider a couple of other equally rewarding ventures: smashing holes
in your boat and investing in buck-
ets to bail out the water, or, equally
clever, slashing holes in the tires of
your car and subsequently investing
in tire patches. We all know that
funding essential services and
education are crucial to building the
future we all want to see. If
we don’t change these priorities
now we will be dealing with a bleak
future for ourselves and our
children.
What can we do to advocate
for schools not jails?
A big first step towards this
is that teachers, students and
parents need to get organized and
demand California stop closing
schools, start closing prisons, and
tax the rich in order to get more
money for the things we need, like
public education and public
services. This is a fight that speaks
to the goals of the Occupy move-
ment: we are the 99% and we
cannot abide any longer with the
priorities of the 1%.The Occupy Education
movement in California is calling
for two days of action in March to
demand that the state fully fund
public education and social services
and that the rich pay their fair share.
March 1 is a national call for action
and will consist of local actions
across the country. In Oakland,
people will be protesting banks to
raise awareness of how they gotbailed out while local schools got
sold out – and closed. On March 5
Occupy Education is organizing a
statewide occupation of the Capitol
in Sacramento. The protests and
occupation in Sacramento will
demand that state education policy
makers and politicians stop cutting
public education and social services
and support tax initiatives to makethe rich pay their share in our state.
This is an important step in chang-
ing the narrative in California that
jails are a replacement for quality
education and services.
The authors of this article are public
school teachers in Berkeley and Seattle.
Monday | February 20, 2012 8
Children have the right idea. Source: Katie Stafford Strom