Phone Interview with Kristen Ess, Editor of PNN in Occupied Palestine on reciving License from P.A., The Gaza Pullout, Westbank Apartied Wall Construction/Destruction.

Audio: Direct mp3 Download of interview with Kristen Ess

The Palestine News Network, as the first operational independent Palestinian news agency, received the first official license in the West Bank from the PA Ministry of Information this week. PA Minister of Information, Nabil Sha'ath commented, "The license for PNN comes within the framework of democracy and freedom of the press."

After four years of operations, PNN is published in Arabic, English, Hebrew, and French, with Spanish and German soon to come in order to ensure that the international community receives unbiased, accurate, nd up-to-the minute news from the ground.

Kristen Ess Produces Daily Audio reports available here and is Looking for more stations to air Daily/Weekly Programs.

Free Radio Santa Cruz 101fm - Airs PNN Daily reports at 7:50am weekdays and week in review Fridays and Saturdays at 11am

Audio: FRSC: Gaza "Withdrawl"

August 6th and 9th mark the 60th anniversaries of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States. The San Francisco Bay Area's Livermore Lab is one of the national laboratories that serves as the brain of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex, which today is developing weapons to support U.S. wars of empire and continuing to contaminate the air and soil of cities surrounding it. On Saturday, anti-nuclear activists will meet there to proclaim, "No Nukes, No Wars!"

Photos: Anti-Nuclear Protest at Livermore Labs

Nationwide, peace advocates will meet at the four central US nuclear weapons sites to call for an end to nuclear weapons proliferation. Locally, activists will meet for a ceremony to remember of the victims of atomic bombings. Afterwards, they'll march to Lockheed Martin, world’s largest maker and exporter of weapons. On Sunday, there will be commemoration of the victims of war at the Collateral Damage statue in Santa Cruz.

Video: Santa Cruz Weapons Inspection Team Attempts Livermore Lab Inspection - 2002
Audio: SCWIT Press Conference - 2004

See Also: Santa Cruz Weapons Inspection Team and Lockheed Martin || Students Resist Nuclear Weapons Development || Helen Caldicott on the Profound Damage of Nukes || UC Students Demand Regents Sever Ties to Nukes | (Part Two)

[ Atomic Bombing Exhibit || Abolition 2000 || Western States Legal Foundation || Mindfully's Nuclear Pages || Radiation Used On Iraq Equivalent to 250,000 Nagasaki Bombs ]

Peace activists in Santa Cruz working with Code Pink & using the monicker SONG, Support Our National Guard, are organizing to collect petition signatures, and to get City Council and County Board resolutions passed in support of a California National Guard recall from Iraq.

At the July 12 Santa Cruz City Council meeting, a few of the SONG members spoke at oral communications. The Council will likely take up the issue at its next meeting, July 26.

Audio: SONG Activists Speak at City Council
Photos: SONG Activists Urge City Council to Help "Bring Them Home Now"

See also: California National Guard Caught Spying on Women's Peace Groups

During the past Independence Day weekend, several concerned residents bipassed picnics and fireworks in favor of a more thoughtful approach to the 229th anniversary of the United States' independence from Great Britain.

On Friday, locals gathered at Seabright Beach for an old-fashioned flag burning party, complete with a bonfire and a large improv band. They saught to draw attention to the current bill pending Senate approval that would outlaw flag burning. More.. Photos

Local college students gathered Sunday in downtown Santa Cruz amid pleased onlookers in a demonstration against the corporatization of our culture.

An unusual parade entry in the Aptos World's Shortest Parade generated both applause and boos as members of the MediaWatch and Art and Revoltion project simulated a global power struggle --- with George and Laura Bush behind the wheel of a massive truck and the majority of the world pushing it from behind. Story and Photos..

Report and Photos: Aptos Parade Entry -- More Response

Audio: PoP dEFECT Radio: Fourth of July 2005

See also: Flag Amendment and the Assault on Political Dissent

The Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees voted in favor (4 to 3) of a proposal to increase student and family awareness of the OPT-OUT choice parents have to deny military recruiters access to private student information.

As a result of the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act, a requirement of federal education funding is that high school administrations release student contact, and other information to military recruiters. Students and parents may “Opt-Out� of the information release list, but notification of this option is careless-to-nonexistent.

In the predominantly Latino district, where recruiters “descend on students like vultures on road kill,� (as one counter recruitment worker stated) how is family and student notification of Opt-Out best assured?

That the “opt-out choice be included on the [mandatory] emergency card for all high school students including those at alternative high schools� was the motion eventually approved.

A coalition of trustees, parents, students and community organizations wanted greater assurance of opt-out choice notification. Board chair Rhea DeHart bluntly stated, “I have talked to too many people where this important information gets lost in the shuffle.� story and photos...

photos and notes: PVUSD Supports Student Privacy

audio: Hidden Clause in No Child Left Behind Act Lets Parents Opt-Out
audio: Pajaro Schools Support Opt Out Option

see also: Being a Military Recruiter Must Suck || All around the U$, Recuiters are Feeling the Heat || 4/20 Watsonville Counter-Recruitment Action || UCSC Students Kick Military Recruiters Off Campus

A luncheon and celebration will be held on January 8, 2006, acknowledging those who went to Selma, directly participated in the Selma to Montgomery March, voter registration in Mississippi, bus Freedom Rides, or other events in the mid-1960's that resulted in universal voter registration, Civil Rights legislation, and an overturning of Jim Crow laws.

Sami Abed and Megan McNamara of Felton have safetly arrived in Bethlehem, West Bank, Palestine to attend a conference on nonviolent political action December 27-30. McNamara, a local EMT, and Abed, a local business owner, are representing the Resource Center for Nonviolence.

On the Judicial Branch, continued

Our War on Cuba: Trade, Travel, and Baseball

After viewing the short film Bloqueo, Rev Lucius Walker will speak about the efforts of Pastors for Peace to end the Blockade and embargo of Cuba.

New 2005 Retrospective Song “I Miss You� run time 3:05