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The Texas French Bread Bakery at 29th and Rio Grande is a hangout that epitomizes Austin cool. But Friday morning it was the heat of Homeland Security that came crashing in with “guns visible” hauling away five alleged illegal immigrants ranging in age from 28 to 59. Four were deported.
Owner Frederick Murph Willcott “said all of the arrested Austin workers have children and have worked at Texas French Bread for years, in one case about 10 years. He said the restaurant had checked the workers’ documents to make sure they were legal.”

“These people paid taxes. They worked like crazy,” Willcott said. “The people that they took away hadn’t done anything wrong.”

Talk about your wake-up call. Homeland Security is saying that the raid was initiated by the Texas Attorney General, who was busting up an alleged fake-document ring out of Dallas.

By the way, the Texas Attorney General was one of the first to know about militarization plans for the border. According to National Guard Chief General Steven H. Blum, the states’ Attorney Generals were involved in early legal assessments of the Guard deployment that is now official policy. How early is still unclear, but please stay tuned.

This might be a good time to point out that the Texas Attorney General is facing a Democratic opponent in November.

(See Austin American Statesman, “Five arrested on immigration charges after raid in Austin: Owner angry after Texas French Bread kitchen workers arrested, four deported,” By Steven Kreytak, Saturday, June 03, 2006)

Today’s New York Times article by Randal C. Archibold raises questions about the ability of the border patrol to replace National Guard troops within the official timeline of one to two years.

“But as the Border Patrol seeks more agents,” writes Archibold, “its training academy in Artesia, N.M., needs expansion, and some watchdog groups question its ability to prepare so many new agents in so little time.”
Archibold reports that the Homeland Security Inspector General is already concerned about the Border Patrol’s hiring practices. Meanwhile, ambitious targets for funding new patrol agents are being scaled back.

In last week’s Narcosphere, Bill Conroy presented memos from Homeland Security that indicate shortages of prisoner beds, prisoner transportation, and lagging information tools.

Conroy repeats what critics keep saying, that National Guard training is a mismatch for border work.

Like the famous “mission accomplished” celebration that the President staged for the war on Iraq, the political shimmer of this week’s “border fix” will very likely begin to dim as militarization proves to be yet again the ultimate sign of political impotence.

Report on Slidell Community Forum (June 1, 2010)

By Elizabeth Cook

This so-called community forum we found out last night was organized by NOAA, and not by local officials. It was paid for by BP. It was a PR stunt that went badly wrong because we attended. Christine Breault attended with myself and Cody. She spoke to PR consultants from New Orleans who were hired by BP to be there. Several of them kept walking up to me asking me either to calm down or what is my question or questions.

It was disturbing to see the state agencies represented there: DEQ, Coastal Restoration and the state department of health. Other than the state agencies, this was a forum of misinformation: EPA, NOAA, BP and the Coast Guard, all colluded on spreading lies. The Coast Guard, EPA and NOAA are embedded in BP.

The EPA official acknowledged that Corexit is banned in the UK, and that it’s never been used in such massive quantities. Rest assured though, they are studying its impact. He could not say how much is actually being dumped in the Gulf, nor what mechanism they have in place to assure that BP doesn’t use more than the EPA has approved. He pointed to the Coast Guard for those answers, and perhaps Christine will blog on this, as she spoke to the Coast Guard on these issues.

One BP official acknowledged the existence of “one plume”. I pointed out that university researches have discovered others, but he personally knew of only one. I overheard One BP official explaining to other BP employees that the Corexit will degrade the oil “naturally”. When I questioned him, he denied knowing how the oil has gotten into the marsh; he denied, essentially, that the dispersant is causing the oil to sink below the surface to move into the marsh, below the surface, rendering the booms incapable of stopping the advancing oil.

I spoke to folks from the state Coastal Restoration department. My father retired from that department, and they knew him. I asked them why hasn’t the state tapped into the vast wealth of research and information that’s already been conducted by LSU on oil spills and natural enzymes and such that can break down the oil and get rid of it out of the marsh. They replied they asked the same question in a meeting a couple of weeks ago, and didn’t get an answer.

The stranglehold that BP has on the flow of information and transparency is absolutely the problem with the “response”. I confronted the Coast Guard on this issue, and I accused them of protecting a corporation over and above the people of Louisiana. They looked pretty sheepish. These are lower level grunts of course, there to shill for the response “efforts” on behalf of BP. This is corporate fascism in action: a BP PR forum, with all attendant federal and state agencies dutifully attending and talking up the “response”.

At the end of the forum, which was really a set of tables with officials from various agencies talking to folks on an individual basis, I was approached by a woman who said they were “wrapping up”. She was interrupting me because I was confronting BP officials. It turns out, she was with NOAA.

I said, “Oh, NOAA is embedded in BP also.” This infuriated her, and she stalked off. I then held up Cody’s protest sign, looking right at her. She stalked off angrily to ask a police officer to escort me out of there. He approached me, and was actually nice about it. Other security also approached me, and I held the sign aloft as I backed out of the meeting room, declaring that it was my wish that more fisherman had attended to confront these officials.

It was held in Slidell we believe for the purpose of excluding as many folks as possible who have been directly impacted. They would never hold such a meeting in St. Bernard, for example, or Plaquemines Parish.

See Also: Oil-Eating Microbe Video

Dear Friends:
The enclosed letter from Ramsey Muniz describes his
spiritual and loving disposition in spite of his
suffering. The institution was released from lock down
on Tuesday. Please distribute.–Irma L. Muniz

5/24/06

Mi Corazon,

Yes, I’m back in the jungle of humanity of this
United States. I have been here only one week and I’m locked down with the entire institution. I can only say that it wasn’t as bad as one week in Oklahoma. Be that as it may, I continue to ponder on one issue at this time, and that is having me transferred to a Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) in Texas.

I have been 12 ½ years in this country’s hardest penitentiaries and that is enough for any
Mexicano in my position who doesn’t have a violent background, is not a member of any gang or group, and has not had an “incident report” in 12 ½ years of confinement. This in and of itself is cruel and unusual punishment. I can barely walk across the entire prison compound with my cane and yet I see all these younger convicts exercising as if getting ready for
war anytime.

Why? Why is it that they don’t want for me to be close
to my family and friends in Texas? Even those in this prison cannot understand what I’m doing here in this high security penitentiary.

As I was sitting on a bench by myself praying to the
Creator, I heard the sound of a gunshot and instructions to hit the ground, face down, on the gravel. Inside this institution there is no grass, no trees, all gravel, concrete and bars – the future of tomorrow to control your mind.

Guess what. They forgot about this heart – this heart
that is full of love and nothing destroys love. It doesn’t matter if there is a desert, no trees, only chains and shackles.

This Mexicano love overcomes all. This love from this Mexicano will one day free all our people. One can be old and think young, others can be young and think old. After God gave me life once again he took my heart and mind and said unto me, “Tez, you shall
once more think, feel, love, and lead young once again.” And when He said that unto my life, you were there standing next to me with tears pouring, holding my hand and saying, “Oh Ramsey, please get
well, for I love you so much.”

This is the power that embraces me this very minute even in this lock down tonight. I can feel you tonight, I can feel your corazon in my hands. Oh Irma, oh my Citlalmina, I love you, I adore you, I admire your strength.

We must continue with the faith and courage we have in our hearts. I know at times we feel all the odds are against us, but without sacrifice and sorrow, freedom has never come about, and I know that because of our suffering and sacrificing, many others will
never feel the pain. Imagine how Christ felt the days before His execution – the nights before knowing that He was going to die for the sins and freedom of all humanity. And how weak some people are about everything in life. No discipline, no faith, no courage, and no love. I pray for them constantly.

Amor,
Tez

“Thus I love you, love.
Love, thus I love you.
thus as your hair
lifts up and as
your mouth smiles,
light as water
from the spring upon the pure stones,
thus I love you, beloved…

Tezcatlipoca

http://www.freeramsey.com