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Today's
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February 12, 2004
Saul Landau
Elegy to the Salton Sea
February
11, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Hail, Kerry: Senator Facing-Both-Ways
Steve Perry
Bush
v. Bush?
February
10, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
Inquisition in Iowa
Ron Jacobs
Politics and the Beatles: Don't
You Know You Can Count Me Out (In)
Elizabeth
Schulte
The Many Faces of John Kerry
Mickey
Z
Meet the Oxmans: "The Rich
Shouldn't Sleep at Night Either"
February
9, 2004
Michael
Donnelly
Will Skull and Bones Really Change
CEOs? Inside John Kerry's Closet
Chris Floyd
Smells Like Team Spirit: the Bush
B-Boys Replay Their Greatest Hits
Bill
Christison
What's Wrong with the CIA?
Dr. Susan
Block
Janet Jackson's Mammary Moment:
Boob Tube Super Bowl
February
7/8, 2004
Kathleen
Christison
Offending Valerie: Dealing with
Jewish Self-Absorption
Jeff Ballinger
No Sweat Shopping
Dave
Lindorff
Spray and Pray in Iraq: a Marine
in Transit
Alexander
Cockburn
McNamara: the Sequel
February
6, 2004
Ron
Jacobs
Are the Kurds in the Way?
Joanne
Mariner
Anita Bryant's Legacy
Saul
Landau
Happiness and Botox
Kurt Nimmo
Horror Non-fiction: A How-To Guide
from Perle and Frum
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The Real Intelligence Failure:
Our Own
February
5, 2004
Benjamin
Shepard
Turning NYC into a Patriot Act Free
Zone
Khury
Petersen-Smith
A Report from Occupied Iraq: "We Don't Want Army USA"
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
The 10 Worst Corporations of 2003
Teresa
Josette
The Exeuctioner's Pslam? Christian Nation? Yeah, Right
David Krieger
Why Dr. King's Message on Vietnam is Relevant to Iraq
Christopher
Brauchli
Monkey Business: Of Recess and Evolution in Georgia Schools
Norman
Solomon
The Deadly Lies of Reliable Sources
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Presenting President Edwards!
February
4, 2004
Brian
McKinlay
Bush's Australian Deputy: Howard's
Last Round Up?
Mark
Gaffney
Ariel Sharon's Favorite Senator: Ron Wyden and Israel
Judith
Brown
Palestine and the Media
Frederick
B. Hudson
Moseley-Braun and the Butcher: Campaign for Justice or Big Oil's
Junta?
Kurt Nimmo
Bush's Independent Commission: Exonerating
the Spooks
M.
Junaid Alam
Philly School Workers Fight for Fair Contract
Fran Shor
Whose Boob Tube?
Kevin
Cooper
This is Not My Execution and I Will Not Claim It
February
3, 2004
Alan
Maass
The
Dems' New Mantra: What They Really Mean by "Electability"
Nick
Halfinger
How the Other Half Lives: Embedded
in Iraq
Rahul
Mahajan
Our True Intelligence Failure
Neve Gordon
The Only Democracy in the Middle East?
Laura
Carlsen
Mexico: Two Anniversaries; Two Futures
Jordan
Green
Democratic Patronage in Northern New
Mexico
Terry
Lodge
An Open Letter to Michael Powell from the Boobs & Body Parts
Fairness Campaign
Hammond
Guthrie
Investigating the Meaningless
Website
of the Day
Waging Peace
February
2, 2004
Gary
Leupp
The Buddhist Nun in Tom Ridge's Jail
Justin
E.H. Smith
The Manners of Their Deaths: Capital Punishment in a Smoke-Free
Environment
Tom
Wright
The Prosecution of Captain Yee
Winslow
Wheeler
Inside the Bush Defense Budget
Lee Ballinger
Janet Jackson's Naked Truth
Leonard
Pitts, Jr
For Blacks, the Game of Justice is
Rigged
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Hollow Candidate:
The Trouble with Howard Dean
Website
of the Day
Resistance:
In the Eye of the American Hegemon
Jan. 31 / Feb 1, 2004
Paul
de Rooij
For Whom the Death Tolls: Deliberate
Undercounting of Coalition Fatalities
Bernard
Chazelle
Bush's Desolate Imperium
Jack
Heyman
Bushfires on the Docks
Christopher
Reed
Broken Ballots
Michael
Donnelly
An Urgent Plea to Progressives: Don't Give in to Fear
Rob Eshelman
The Subtle War
Lee
Sustar
Palestine and the Anti-War Movement
George
Bisharat
Right of Return
Ray
McGovern
Nothing to Preempt
Brian Cloughley
Enron's Beady-Eyed Sharks
Conn
Hallinan
Nepal, Bush & Real WMDs
Kurt Nimmo
The Murderous Lies of the Neo-Cons
Phillip
Cryan
Media at the Monterrey Summit
Christopher
Brauchli
A Speech for Those Who Don't Read
John
Holt
War in the Great White North
Mickey
Z.
Clueless in America: When Mikey Met Wesley
Mark
Scaramella
The High Cost of Throwing Away the Key
Tariq Ali
Farewell, Munif
Ben
Tripp
Waiter! The Reality Check, Please
Poets'
Basement
LaMorticella, Guthrie, Thomas and Albert
January 30, 2004
Saul
Landau
Cuba High on Neo-Con Hit List
Michael
Donnelly
Bush's Second Front: The War in
the Woods
Elaine
Cassel
Worse Than Jacko: Child Abuse at Gitmo
David Vest
More Halliburton News, Brought to You by Halliburton
Mike
Whitney
The Kay Report: Still Defending Aggression
David
Miller
The Hutton Whitewash
Sam
Husseini
How Many People Must Die Because of This "Mistake",
Senator Kerry?
January 29, 2004
Patricia
Nelson Limerick
John Ehrlichman, Environmentalist
Ron
Jacobs
Homeland Security and "Legalized"
Immigration
Rahul Mahajan
New Hampshire v. Iraq
Greg
Weiher
Bush Calls for Preemptive Strike on
Moon and Mars
Norman
Solomon
The State of the Media Union
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Does NH Mean Anything?
January
28, 2004
Kathy
Kelly
Bearing Witness Against Teachers of
Torture and Assassination
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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February
13, 2004
Saved from Execution,
But Still on Death Row
Kevin
Cooper's Fight to Live
By ALAN MAASS
The man the state of California was determined
to murder has been saved from execution. But Kevin Cooper remains
on death row--and we won't let him die.
With pressure building around the state,
across the U.S. and even internationally, a federal appeals court
stepped in February 9 to stop Kevin's execution and require testing
of evidence that his lawyers say will prove he is innocent in
the murder of four people in 1983. A few hours later, the Republican-dominated
U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld the appeals court decision.
Kevin's life was spared--no thanks to
California officials who were ready to see him dead rather than
allow an investigation that could expose a 20-year-old frame-up
by racist police and fanatical prosecutors.
California's new Republican Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger didn't even bother to hold a hearing before turning
down Kevin's clemency petition--something that hasn't happened
since capital punishment was reinstated in the 1970s, say opponents
of the death penalty. And when the appeals court first blocked
the execution on Monday morning, it was Democratic state Attorney
General Bill Lockyer who went to the Supreme Court to demand
that Kevin be killed.
But the growing pressure--mounted by
Kevin's lawyers in the courtroom and activists outside of it,
and inspired by Kevin's own determination from behind bars--became
impossible to ignore.
With the scheduled execution approaching
and the Supreme Court's decision still in question, a multiracial
crowd of some 300 people--surrounded by multiple TV crews and
journalists--marched to San Quentin Prison, near San Francisco,
for a protest at the execution site. As they rounded a bend,
they found an equal number of people camped out at the prison
gate.
At that very moment, Kevin's supporters
got the good news--and the spirited march turned into a joyous
celebration. "The things that happened tonight make me want
to fight forever," said one of the marchers, Shannon Anderson,
who joined the fight to save Kevin in recent weeks.
Rev. Jesse Jackson was among the people
who took turns speaking about the importance of activism in exposing
the injustices of Kevin's case. Cameron Sturdevant of the Campaign
to End the Death Penalty told the crowd: "A message has
gone out, unmistakably, that people who are not judges and who
are not attorneys can get involved in issues like the death penalty.
We can send a message that says we will not tolerate injustice.
We want real justice for Kevin Cooper."
For years, one court after another has
ignored the gaping holes in the case against Kevin. Prosecutors
had blocked DNA testing of blond hair found clutched in one of
the victim's hands--hair that could not have belonged to Kevin,
who is African American.
Kevin's lawyers argue that if the hairs
do not belong to a member of the victims' family, than it must
belong to one of the killers--contradicting prosecutors' claims
that Cooper acted alone. The appeals court decision said that
the hairs should be tested--along with a bloody T-shirt that
defense lawyers say was tampered with to implicate Kevin.
In 2002, after years of appeals, Kevin
finally won his request to have DNA testing done on the blood-covered
T-shirt, which prosecutors claimed was his. But before the tests
were performed, the T-shirt was removed from a police locker
by a prosecution criminologist--along with vials of Cooper's
blood and saliva. So it was no surprise when the DNA testing
tied the shirt to Cooper. Kevin's lawyers want the shirt tested
for the presence of preservatives, which would be evidence of
tampering.
These disclosures have led three jurors
in his 1985 trial to say they wouldn't have voted to convict
him. "We feel, as jurors, we had a right to that evidence,"
juror Kahloah Doxey told the New York Sun in an interview two
days before Cooper's execution date. "Do the DNA on the
hair. See whose hair it was. The state owes us that much."
Just eight hours before his scheduled
execution, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay--and
ordered the testing denied in earlier court decisions.
If the judges saw things differently,
it is because activists turned up the heat when Kevin's death
warrant was signed on December 10. The campaign to save Kevin
gathered momentum throughout January--and began to have an effect
internationally, reaching Schwarzenegger's native Austria, where
the pending execution became front-page news.
We have won a tremendous victory by stopping
this execution. But the fight is far from over. We can't stop
until Kevin wins the justice he deserves. And we shouldn't be
satisfied until we use this victory to build the struggle that
will put an end to this corrupt and racist death penalty system,
once and for all.
A surge of protest
that saved Kevin's life
When his execution date was set, Kevin
Cooper called on his supporters to fight back. "There can
be a vigil for me after I am dead," Kevin wrote in a widely
distributed statement, "but while I am alive, we must protest
against my murder and this crime against humanity!"
That call to action produced a tide of
opposition that grew and grew as Kevin's execution approached.
It reached a new stage last weekend when Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke
out at a well-known Black church in Oakland, packed with more
than 500 people. The crowd was simultaneously moved to tears
and filled with outrage.
The gathering protests, vigils and meetings
finally grabbed headlines in mainstream newspapers in California.
But they didn't come from nowhere. The growing opposition to
Kevin's execution was the product of many weeks of organizing
that began when activists from a number of anti-death penalty
and left-wing organizations met to map out a strategy after a
date was set for Kevin's execution.
At that meeting, Kevin's supporters decided
not to be silent and hope for justice from the courts--but to
wage a visible public campaign to shame Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Among the events was a January 31 "Live from Death Row"
meeting at Berkeley's First Congregational Church sponsored by
the Campaign to End the Death Penalty--where a rapt crowd of
200 listened to Kevin speak via speakerphone from San Quentin.
The Campaign also held solidarity meetings in New York City,
Chicago and other cities.
February 3 was a day of action for Kevin--with
protests organized across California that spread to elsewhere
in the U.S. In Santa Monica, 150 people came to a press conference
with Jackson, the auxiliary bishop of the Los Angeles Diocese
and more than 20 other religious leaders on the steps of Schwarzenegger's
church. Hundreds turned out to hear activist Angela Davis speak
at University of California-Santa Cruz, and 75 people held a
press conference and rally on the steps of the California capitol
building in Sacramento.
That same day, California residents read
a full-page ad in the San Jose Mercury News and the West Coast
edition of the New York Times asking "Does California have
the wrong man?" The ads were signed by Danny Glover, Howard
Zinn, Noam Chomsky and many other notable actors, intellectuals
and political figures.
Meanwhile, people across the state and
around the U.S. flooded Schwarzenegger's office with phone calls,
faxes and e-mails in support of Kevin. Over the weekend before
Kevin's scheduled execution, the governor's office turned off
its fax machine due to the large volume of faxes streaming in.
Protests against Kevin's execution surged
around the world. More than a dozen members of the European Parliament,
led by French socialist Alain Krivine, signed on to the signature
ad championing Kevin's case.
In Schwarzenegger's native Austria, the
pending execution became front-page news, and top officials in
the government called for clemency. In Schwarzenegger's home
state of Styria, the Green Party organized demonstrations and
called for the local Schwarzenegger football stadium to be renamed.
It was this campaign--from the grassroots--that
put the pressure on the federal courts to stop Kevin's execution.
America's death machine
exposed
THE CASE of Kevin Cooper is contributing
to the reexamination of the death penalty nationwide. From Illinois
to Maryland, from Florida to California, the fact that innocent
men and women routinely wind up on death row is undeniable.
The racism of the system is similarly
incontestable. One-third of prisoners on California's death row--the
largest in the nation--are, like Kevin, African Americans, even
though just 6 percent of California's population is Black.
The growing questioning of the death
penalty means that juries are shying away from imposing death
sentences. According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics,
the number of people sentenced to death last year fell to 139--down
from 319 in 1996.
Among Blacks and Latinos, the doubts
run even deeper. Asked by pollsters to estimate how many innocent
people are convicted of murder, Blacks said 23 percent and Latinos
said 16 percent--compared to whites, who said 9 percent.
Media coverage of the developments in
Kevin's case is sure to drive this process even further. In California,
the tone of articles in the mainstream press shifted radically
after Kevin's execution date was set in early December--when
stories portrayed him as a monster.
Because of the public campaign of activism
to expose the problems in the case against Kevin, the reality
began to seep into the media. The San Francisco Chronicle even
published editorials urging readers to call on Schwarzenegger
to grant clemency--along with an article that pointed out Kevin's
powerful writings, available on the Web at <savekevincooper.org>.
All this exposes the reality about the
supposed "overwhelming" support for the death penalty.
Support may be broad, but it's very shallow. The more that people
learn about the reality of the death penalty, the more they question
it.
The fact is that there are Kevin Coopers
across the <U.S.--innocent> men and women are trapped in
the criminal justice system, targeted by fanatical prosecutors,
unable to afford competent lawyers, victims of racist police
and "get-tough" laws pushed by Democrats and Republicans
alike. Kevin's case is the perfect illustration of why the criminal
justice system doesn't deliver justice--and why the death penalty
must be abolished across the U.S.
Todd Chretien, Danielle Heck, Eric
Ruder and Lee Sustar contributed to this report.
Alan Maass is
the editor of the Socialist Worker. He can be reached at:
maass@socialistworker.org
Weekend
Edition Features for February 1, 2004
Paul
de Rooij
For Whom the Death Tolls: Deliberate
Undercounting of Coalition Fatalities
Bernard
Chazelle
Bush's Desolate Imperium
Jack
Heyman
Bushfires on the Docks
Christopher
Reed
Broken Ballots
Michael
Donnelly
An Urgent Plea to Progressives: Don't Give in to Fear
Rob Eshelman
The Subtle War
Lee
Sustar
Palestine and the Anti-War Movement
George
Bisharat
Right of Return
Ray
McGovern
Nothing to Preempt
Brian Cloughley
Enron's Beady-Eyed Sharks
Conn
Hallinan
Nepal, Bush & Real WMDs
Kurt Nimmo
The Murderous Lies of the Neo-Cons
Phillip
Cryan
Media at the Monterrey Summit
Christopher
Brauchli
A Speech for Those Who Don't Read
John
Holt
War in the Great White North
Mickey
Z.
Clueless in America: When Mikey Met Wesley
Mark
Scaramella
The High Cost of Throwing Away the Key
Tariq Ali
Farewell, Munif
Ben
Tripp
Waiter! The Reality Check, Please
Poets'
Basement
LaMorticella, Guthrie, Thomas and Albert
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