NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

I posted last week about Al Franken's first amendment that has passed in the US Senate. Named the "Jamie Leigh Jones Amendment" it was meant to keep Federal military contracts away from corporations who force their employees to sign secret arbitration contracts, which prevent them from taking to court anyone who sexually harasses or sexually assaults them, and furthermore prevents them from even suing their companies (should they find this foreclosing of justice a bit unfair). The amendment is named for a woman who had a horrifying experience while working for a military contractor in Iraq. Here is the short version of her story according to Senator Franken's office: When Jamie was 19, she was working for then Halliburton subsidiary KBR in Iraq, where she was placed in a barracks with 400 men. She complained about sexual harassment, but KBR took no action and she was eventually drugged and gang-raped by co-workers. When she tried to report what had happened, KBR loc

For those Al Franken fans, despensa yu', Senator Al Franken fans out there, just thought I'd post a little update about his time in the Senate thus far. Yesterday, Franken got his first ammendment passed, when he attached the Jaime Leigh Jones Ammendment to the 2010 Defense Appropriations Bill, and it successfully passed 68 - 30 . The bill is named after a woman of the same name who suffered sexual harassment and was gang-raped while working at Kellog Brown and Root (a subsidiary of Halliburton) in Iraq. Here's the short version of her story from an email release by Franken's office: When Jamie was 19, she was working for then Halliburton subsidiary KBR in Iraq, where she was placed in a barracks with 400 men. She complained about sexual harassment, but KBR took no action and she was eventually drugged and gang-raped by co-workers. When she tried to report what had happened, KBR locked her in a shipping container under armed guard. One of her guards smuggled her a cel

Alot of people who are working towards decolonization on Guam, and I mean this primarily in a political status sense, usually don't think very concretely about how it would actually happen or what it would entail. There is alot of emphasis on what is deserved or owed to Chamorros, but less talk about how we can make it happen and what we would need to do, and who we would need to get involved. Todu ma konfotme na bula na debi di u macho'gue, lao manu na gaige i diniskuti put hafa este siha yan taimanu sina ta na'fanhuyong este na guinife? The United Nations is always named as having a role in this, but while it provides the framework for how to do it, it isn't a major player or force in any way. Gi este na kinalamten, kulang daffe'. The UN is what is always has been, a symbolic force, which can be used for great good or evil if powerful nations are inclined to use it, and not much else the rest of the time. That's why, the United Nation's has been calling

Just go this from Al Franken's Senate campaign. I'll be posting more substantive things later today once I get to the Pepsi Center. ********************** Dear Michael, I'm grabbing a quick minute in between events here at the Democratic National Convention to bring you some good news. That energy, that enthusiasm, that excitement that's been giving us all hope that this November, we'll really be able to change our country is exploding this week in Denver. The energy is here – big time. And it will spread from coast to coast. Everyone I meet is fired up and ready to work hard every day to elect Barack Obama. But everyone also knows that President Obama will need a working majority in the Senate to help him carry out his agenda of real change. That's where I come in. And that, in turn, is where you come in. CAN YOU MAKE A CONTRIBUTION OF $25, $50, OR $100 TODAY TO HELP ME HELP BARACK OBAMA CHANGE THIS COUNTRY? With Barack Obama and Joe Biden at the top o

Wexler Wants Hearings A website everyone interested in justice and a new direction for the United States of America, should check out, and become involved in. For those in Guam and the other territories who don't vote for President, don't have a vote that counts in Congress, yet get sent in huge numbers to the frontlines every American war, the issue of impeachment is still very important. We may not be "full" members of the American family , but the abuses of power that take place at the White House, Congress, the Pentagon all very much affect us. I wrote last week about the ways in which Guam has been brought into the War on Terror. When Donald Rumsfeld and Company were looking for a place to detain their freshly captured enemy combatants, Guam was one option. This is just one instance where we on Guam could have been made accesories to the abuses and excesses of power and authority that the Bush Administration has wrought. Thankfully the island was spared this, b