On Sunday, August 2, the documentary "William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe", will show in Berkeley as part of the Jewish Film festival. The late civil rights attorney William Kunstler was one of the most famous and controversial lawyers of the 20th century. He represented civil rights and anti-war activists, as well as accused terrorists and murderers.

On July 6, People gathered at Harry Bridges Plaza in the Embarcadero to remember the day, July 5, 1934, when two strikers were gunned down and killed by police. Several hundred union members and their supporters, many from around the world, marched in a reenacted funeral procession of the fallen men, Howard Sperry and Nick Bordoise. As the procession passed the memorial at Mission and Steuart Streets, across the street from the site of the deaths, they took off their hats.

Bonnie Tinker, a well-loved and much-respected Portland activist, was killed on Thursday, July 2, in an accident on the campus of Virginia Tech University. She was attending a conference of the Religious Society of Friends (Quaker). Bonnie was killed while bicycling on campus when a Mack dump truck turned into her.

Bonnie was an indefatigable and irrepressible peace and justice activist, who "spoke Truth to Power" about issues that impacted all of us -- and some of us more than others. She was a Quaker, a Seriously Pissed Off Granny and the Executive Director of Love Makes a Family. Bonnie's life witnessed the Quaker testimonies of Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community and Equality.

Memories: "For those who don't know, Bonnie was one of the rockin grandmothers who, among many other things, stood outside the army recruiter's office for months on end, demonstrating against the war. Remember when the office was decked out in hand prints of blood? Bonnie also founded a shelter for women escaping domestic violence, and stood up for all oppressed people."

--- "A few years back, she took part in a Gay Pride demo against the military, in which the theme was, "DO Ask, DO Tell, DON'T JOIN." She fought for equal rights and for the right to marry for lesbians and gays, and she fought for the right of women not to be bludgeoned and beaten by the men in their lives."

--- "Everyone who came into contact with Bonnie became a better person because of her."

--- "I met Bonnie over a decade ago when I was an organizer for the Oregon Farmworker Union. Unbelievable, a stunning loss..."

--- "Bonnie was an inspiration for me. I did attend some of the Grannies' demonstrations, and the court session, which they WON! I hope there will be a peace tribute for her. Let it be posted. This is so sad."

related articles: Three Grannies and a Gramps Arrested at Recruiting Office | Grannies Arrested Blocking Tank in Portland | Protest the Military for Gay Pride Saturday June 23 | Surge Brigade Action on March 30, 2007

The Rogue IMC Editorial Board was recently contacted by Joe and given an update for the "...memorial site for my good friend Joanie McGowan..." He went on to tell about a bad link, and that "the real memorial site is alive and well at  http://joaniemcgowan.com ... May her spirit live on in peace"

Joanie McGowan's Birthday is Monday June 29, 2009 and so Joe's note couldn't have come at a better time to remember Joanie and also to remember the others who we have lost here in our Southern Oregon community. Champions and Angels, we are talking about Champions and Angels.

* * J O A N I E * M C G O W A N * * T A N Y A * W R A Y * * D A V E * M A R S T O N * *

The Peoria Journal Star owes a long overdue public apology to the late Mark Clark, and especially to his remaining family members.

Peorian Mark Clark, then 22, was murdered by Chicago police authorities during the infamous predawn raid on December 4, 1969 at a West Side apartment where he and a group of fellow Black Panthers were sleeping. The renowned and charismatic Panther Fred Hampton, age 21, also was killed by police, shot point blank in the head while still on his mattress.

The incident became a landmark event in the urban civil rights movement with both Clark and Hampton considered martyrs to the causes of worldwide black liberation and the revolutionary human rights struggle. According to published newspaper reports, 14 police officers assigned to the office of then Cook County State’s Attorney Edward V. Hanrahan (who died just last week, on June 9, at age 88) stormed the apartment at 2337 W. Monroe St. occupied by seven Black Panthers in a 4:40 a.m. raid.

On Wednesday, Latino leaders decried the sentences of two teens acquitted in the beating death of Luis Eduardo Ramírez, for related charges to the July 2008 fatal incident in Shenandoah, Pa. "There was no Justice done for Luis Ramirez, and we should not and will not rest until all four perpetrators of such a hideous crime are duly prosecuted under federal hate crime statues and found guilty of murder," said Reverend Miguel Rivera, chairman for the National Coalition Of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders (CONLAMIC). Read more at Media Mobilizing Project

A decade ago, tens of thousands of people converged in Seattle, Washington to protest the ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization. Directly confronting some of the planet's most powerful corporations, governments and security forces, those activists made history by successfully derailing the WTO's expansionist agenda.

Today, we find ourselves in the midst of the worst economic and environmental crises in generations. The same corporate interests activists confronted in Seattle are attempting to exploit these crises in order to concentrate their own power. We need to fight back. It is time to reclaim the "Spirit of Seattle," come together as affected communities and take control over the policy decisions that affect our economic and ecological well-being.

On June 5, a sniper in the Israeli military killed Yousef Akil Srour, aged 36 years in the chest with 0.22 caliber live ammunition. Srour is the 5th Palestinian to be killed by the Israeli army in Ni'lin during a demonstration against the theft of his land for the construction of the Annexation Wall. Israeli occupation forces have murdered five Ni'lin residents during demonstrations against the confiscation of their land and critically injured one international solidarity activist - Tristan Anderson.

The Stonewall Inn, a gay and lesbian neighborhood bar with a large number of African American and Latino patrons, was also well-known as a safe space for those who did not conform to gender norms: butch lesbians, effeminate gay men, and transsexual and transgendered persons before the terms were in popular use. All of these factors brought the police to Stonewall in 1969 for the purpose of illegally raiding the bar, and arresting its occupants -- an action not unknown in New York in the 1960s....

After legal battles lasting nearly fourteen years, oil giant Royal Dutch Shell has been forced to pay a $15.5 million out-of-court settlement. Plaintiffs from the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta have successfully held Shell accountable for complicity in human rights atrocities committed against the Ogoni people in the 1990s, including the execution of writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. The legal action is one of the few cases brought under the U.S. Alien Tort Statute that have been resolved in favor of the plaintiffs. The settlement includes establishment of a $5 million trust to benefit local communities in Ogoni.