There is an urgent need to go back to Kliptown and, like collecting the soul of the dead, collect the lost spirit of the Freedom Charter.

A few years ago, Cope adopted its name based on the historic meeting where this document was adopted, much to the irritation of the ANC, which even went to court to try and stop this move.

Next was the EFF, whose members believe they alone are custodians, especially when it comes to the crucial issue of land. In the process, the true meaning and spirit are lost in all the noise.

The sad reality is that, since its adoption, while it has served as a mantra of liberation forces marching to freedom, we have fallen very short of its intentions, and those that have so far claimed it as custodians have failed its bold pronouncements.

It requires a full paper to expatiate this point, and so I will focus on two cardinal clauses only: The people shall govern; and The doors of learning and culture shall be open to all. Have sufficient strength and courage gone into realising these high ideals?

In an interview on Power Perspective with the spokesperson of the youth league a few weeks ago, I inquired what the young lions have done about opening the doors of learning and culture through the implementation of the ANCs Polokwane resolution on free education.

This is because, a full decade later, all we see is protestation from young people who await the implementation of this resolution amid hollow promises and policy obfuscation.

The shocking answer was that the ANC took almost 100 years from establishment to freedom. This is the nub of the matter: a lack of urgency and a refusal to snap out of the underground and Marxist Leninist theories into the modern world, where policy shifts dont have to take a hundred years to materialise.

And so the clause of the Freedom Charter that the doors of learning and culture should be open to all doesnt even serve to excite the youth league to help open those doors.

And so a nation that is not educated, and therefore whose minds are still in bondage, is unlikely to realise fully the cardinal clause of the charter that the people shall govern.

While the people have been enfranchised and this must be celebrated as a step in the right direction, how can we safely say that the people are governing without land and without the means of production being in their hands?

Failure to resolve the land question with the necessary sense of urgency is robbing the people of meaningful governance. At this rate, someone else has captured the state and the markets are governing the country instead of the people.

There are far more protests by disillusioned people now than took place in the days of uprisings against an illegitimate regime. The numbers and frequency of such protests are simply staggering, painting a picture of hopelessness and a loss of confidence in the governing alliance whose mantra should be that the people shall govern.

The people, who clearly do not believe that governance is in their hands, even burn down libraries and other state-owned properties in the belief that these dont really belong to them.

Many assumed that when democracy dawned the new leaders would govern with the interest of the people in mind to give effect to this notion of government for the people, by the people. As soon as civil society was demobilised so much went wrong. The few developments over the last few years, be it the public protectors reports on various things or even the auditor-generals latest report painting a picture of chaotic management of municipal finances, shows that that notion simply doesnt exist.

There is an urgent need to go back to Kliptown and, like collecting the soul of the dead, collect the spirit of the Freedom Charter. Quite frankly, it is gone. The ANC gathers at the end of this week to assess the implementation of its policies.

The last time it so gathered it spoke of the second phase of the transition; this week we are not likely to hear anything other than the rather hollow slogan of radical economic transformation. It is actually sad to see our movement failing to take stock and instead moving the goalposts.

The concocting of what seems like a new policy a few moments before the next election is a tactic that the people have seen right through if the last elections were anything to go by; the ANC emerged with clear losses. It is clear from the utterances of the leadership that election results are seen as one big mistake and not really the will of the people. If you claim to listen to the people you cant keep finding excuses for why you lost elections.

The policy conference remains a golden opportunity for the ANC to re-look at its record of being the true and only custodians of the Freedom Charter and to answer truthfully what has caused its failure to keep the torch of the Kliptown founding fathers.

The forthcoming gathering will discover a dead alliance, a moribund youth league, a rogue MK veterans league and a shameful womens league.

Every part of the movement is coming apart. And despite repeated protestations, the centre is simply not holding.

And until this diagnosis is accepted, rebuilding the once glorious movement will remain a dream deferred. Its time to read the charter again and to remember what our forebears wanted to achieve. And therefore we, the People of South Africa, black and white together - equals, countrymen and brothers - adopt this Freedom Charter. And we pledge ourselves to strive together sparing neither strength nor courage, until the democratic changes here set out have been won.

Tabane is author of Power Perspective and host of Power Perspective on Power 98.7 9pm to midnight. Follow him on Twitter @JJTabane

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Freedom Charter is a dream deferred - Independent Online

The Freedom girls basketball program enjoyed a breakthrough 2016-17 season.

The Patriots' play during the Cedar Beach Basketball Showcase has them looking to take another step toward contending for titles in 2017-18.

Freedom handled all the local competition it saw this weekend. University City (N.J.) proved to be the one team too tough for the Patriots, beating them twice Sunday, including a 51-40 victory in the title game.

Tournament MVP Danielle Robinson scored a game-high 20 points as University City used a late 18-4 run to pull away. Hailey Selfies scored 19 points to pace Freedom and earn a spot on the all-tournament team.

"The thing that I'm really happy about the whole weekend is we battled," Freedom coach Dean Reiman said. "We had nine kids here today. We played with a lot of guts and courage and came back. We got down to them both times and came right back into the games both times.

"We showed a lot of character. All positive things to build off of."

Freedom earned its first league tournament berth since 2006 and first District 11 slot since 2010 over the winter. It graduated Meckenzie Herman, Kaitlyn Swint, Giselle Sanchez and Jaiden Coyne from that team, which went 14-10.

The Patriots lost both of their postseason contests in the winter, falling to Bethlehem Catholic in the EPC quarterfinals and Parkland in the District 11 6A quarterfinals. They still are trending upward thanks to returning talent like Silfies and a freshman team that went 18-0.

Silfies, a 5-11 rising senior wing, scored a team-best 11 points in Freedom's 33-25 win over Parkland in the winners bracket semifinals. She had 16 more when the Patriots beat Boyertown 51-37 to set up their second matchup against University City.

Jenn Kokolus led Freedom with 17 points against Boyertown. Fifteen of her points came in the first half, when the Patriots built a 31-19 lead.

"We knew that they were trapping because they were leaving their girl," Silfies said. "So we knew to skip the passes and move the ball quickly to get open layups.

"We knew they were going to be tough coming in, but we knew we had more size than them, so we attacked the boards and used our size as an advantage."

Freedom played with plenty of energy in its final game of the day. The Patriots trailed by 14 points early but used a 27-10 run to take 34-31 lead. Silfies put them ahead with a 3-pointer.

University City answered with the next 11 points. It never trailed again, winning the tournament in its first Allentown appearance.

"It was fun playing them," Reiman said. "I already exchanged numbers with their coach to try to play them in the fall. Maybe we'll schedule them because they have an open game. They're very athletic, quick.

"You keep playing teams like that and you're only going to get better. For summer, for us, that's what it's all about."

samiller@mcall.com

Twitter @mcall_smiller

610-820-6750

A tiring run

Boyertown lost its tournament opener to Nazareth on Friday, leaving it with a long road back through the losers bracket. The Bears reached the losers bracket final after winning three games Sunday but fell to Freedom 51-37.

Kylie Webb led Boyertown with 15 points. The Bears won the PIAA Class 6A title in March but graduated three key players from that team, including Bucknell recruit Abby Kapp and co-captain Alli Marcus.

"They're just trying to figure out their roles on the team," Boyertown varsity assistant and JV coach Troy Sweisfort said. "It's going to take time, but I think we'll be fine.

"I thought we played well here today. We weren't quite sure what to expect, because you come in with young kids. But they stepped up to the challenge and played very well."

Go, West

Pocono Mountain West reached Sunday's winners bracket semifinals before falling to University City (N.J.). The Panthers rebounded to knock Allen from the tournament but ended their run by forfeiting a matchup with Boyertown to attend an awards ceremony.

Jameka Pilgrim scored 11 points in Pocono Mountain West's 34-26 win over Allen.

Tip-ins

Parkland was the other local team to reach the winners bracket semifinals. The Trojans fell to Freedom 33-25 before Boyertown eliminated them with a 35-24 win. ... Allen won two losers bracket games Sunday before Pocono Mountain West eliminated it. Kion Andrews scored 41 total points in the Chicks' wins over Whitehall and Nazareth. She earned a spot on the all-tournament team.

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Freedom players encouraged by Cedar Beach performance - Allentown Morning Call

Balls carried off hitters bats on Saturday at GCS Ballpark, as the Florence Freedom, presented by Titan Mechanical Solutions, rode three home runs and a strong start from Tony Vocca to a 6-2 win over the Gateway Grizzlies.

Jordan Brower opened the scoring with a solo home run off Grizzlies (10-29) starter Will Landsheft (2-4) in the top of the fourth inning. The home run was Browers third of the season, and his second of the year at GCS Ballpark. The following inning, Jose Brizuela and Andre Mercurio drew consecutive walks with two out. Collins Cuthrell then drove a Landsheft pitch over the left-field wall for a three-run homer, extending the Freedom (26-12) to 4-0.

The Grizzlies would trim Florences lead in half in the bottom of the fifth, as Matt Hearn followed up base hits by Chase Simmons and Max Bartlett with a two-run bloop single to left-center field off Vocca (5-2). Though he allowed six runs and three walks over six innings, Vocca went on to record his sixth quality start of the season, stranding baserunners by inducing weak contact and benefitting from strong, error-free defense by the Freedom.

With Jackson Sigman on the mound in relief for Gateway in the top of the sixth, and after Austin Wobrock had doubled and advanced to third on a groundout, Daniel Fraga hit a high infield chopper that allowed Wobrock to score in spite of a drawn-in infield. Jose Brizuela added the final run of the night for Florence with a no-doubt solo home run, his team-leading seventh of the season, leading off the seventh.

Keivan Berges, Patrick McGrath, Evan Bickett and Michael Maiocco combined for three innings of scoreless relief. Berges encountered a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the seventh, but a snap throw by catcher Garrett Vail nabbed Cody Livesay at third, and Berges struck out Craig Massoni swinging to strand both remaining runners.

Collecting one hit each in the game, Fraga and Wobrock extended their hitting streaks to twelve and ten games, respectively.

The Freedom will play for the series sweep on Sunday, with first pitch scheduled for 6:05 p.m. at GCS Ballpark. Left-hander Marty Anderson (5-1) will start for the Freedom against Gateway right-hander JaVaun West (1-3).

The Florence Freedom are members of the independent Frontier League and play all home games at UC Health Stadium located at 7950 Freedom Way in Florence.

Florence Freedom

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Freedom defeat Grizzlies on the road again, go for series sweep today - User-generated content (press release) (registration)

Pentagon officials are welcoming the greater autonomy and decision-making authority under President Trump, after what they say were years of Obama administration micromanaging.

Within the hallways and offices of the Pentagon, top military brass and national security leaders have lauded the actions taken by the Trump administration, saying privately that the Defense Department now has an opportunity to take the fight to Americas enemies after being freed from the White Houses heavy yoke under President Obama.

Mr. Trumps decision to grant Defense Secretary James Mattis the authority to set U.S. troop levels for Afghanistan and the fight against Islamic State could ease the bitter bureaucratic battles that divided the Obama White House and the department over war strategy.

Mr. Mattis and his aides are now weighing whether to send 3,000 to 5,000 more troops into Afghanistan in the face of recent gains by the Taliban and Islamic State. Mr. Mattis, who said Mr. Trump remains heavily involved in setting the overall strategy, is expected to make his recommendations by next month.

Defense hawks on Capitol Hill have praised the approach, arguing that the military leaders have a much better sense of what it takes to fight and win in battle zones such as Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.

What a novel idea for the commander-in-chief to turn to his commanders and say, What do you need to win? Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, told Mr. Mattis at a budget hearing last week. Obama was a pretty lousy general.

Some skeptics warn that with great power comes uncomfortable responsibility for the Defense Department, given Mr. Trumps record of casting blame down the chain of command when certain operations go awry. If campaigns such as the one in Afghanistan fail to make progress, then the Pentagon will shoulder far more of the blame with far less political cover.

Mr. Trump previously agreed to give U.S. and coalition commanders in Iraq and Syria greater freedom on ordering airstrikes, further ingratiating the new administration into the good graces of top military brass.

Mr. Trump has finally given the military what it needed to win in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere, said David Sedney, a onetime Obama administration aide and now a senior analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

As Mr. Obamas deputy assistant secretary of defense for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia from 2009 to 2013, Mr. Sedney had a front-row seat to the administrations efforts to run war policy from the White House.

It took 11 months to come up with an Afghanistan policy, which [Mr. Obama] kept reviewing over and over again, Mr. Sedney said in an interview, recalling the endless White House meetings tied to the administrations internal debates over the Afghanistan War. Beguiled by artificial timelines and artificial troop caps with no relation to the situation on the ground, Mr. Obamas Afghanistan plan was a half-measure that extended the conflict instead of ending it, he said.

Mr. Obama cast a wary eye on the Pentagon during his tenure, reportedly complaining that the generals and admirals were trying to box him in to choose a military option in debates such as the one over troop levels in Afghanistan.

A lack of strategy?

Some analysts say the stepped-up tempo of military action under Mr. Trump including a cruise missile strike to punish Syria for using chemical weapons and the dropping of the worlds most powerful conventional bomb on Islamic State targets in Afghanistan are meant partly to obscure the fact that Mr. Trump has yet to formulate a concrete military and diplomatic strategy for either Afghanistan or the war against Islamic State.

Lots of DOD folks are Republicans and did find Obama frustrating, so I have little doubt that at an emotional level, there is some relief. But dropping a few more bombs isnt a strategy, and without effective strategies, the emotional uplift of having a new president wont last long, said Michael OHanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

I think its too early to draw conclusions [and] Id counsel folks at the Pentagon to avoid too many spikes of footballs in the end zone just yet, he said in an interview.

The presidents penchant to delegate blame when things go wrong is the negative flip side of the Pentagons freedom, said Hal Brands, a defense official in the Obama administration and now a senior analyst at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

Critics cite in particular Mr. Trumps remarks after an inconclusive covert mission in Yemen that he approved just days after taking office in January. Administration officials said the raid yielded valuable intelligence, but Navy SEAL Chief Petty Officer William Ryan Owens and a number of civilians were killed.

The raid, Mr. Trump later told Fox News, was started before I got here and was something that, you know [the Defense Department] wanted to do.

He added, My generals are the most respected that weve had in many decades and they lost Ryan.

In some ways, that leads to chaos, Mr. Brands said. I am sure that is creating frustration, and not just in DOD.

Policy planners inside the Pentagon are keeping a wary eye on their social media accounts for fear of being undercut by the next tweet from the White House, he said.

In the end, the Defense Department may ultimately not be happy with what they get from this administration, he said. When things go wrong, this is not a president who will say, The buck stops here.

Chain of command

Frustration with interference from the White House under Mr. Obama appears to have peaked near the end of his second term. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain, Arizona Republican, observed in late 2015 that theres a level of dissatisfaction among the uniformed military that Ive never seen in my time here.

National security policy faced significant White House scrutiny and interagency oversight over seemingly mundane matters under Mr. Obama, Mr. Brands said. While it was not unprecedented, it was fairly higher than the norm.

But Mr. Obamas apprehension over handing the U.S. military too much tactical control, over fears that those decisions would have political impacts far beyond the battlefield, catered to a narrow domestic audience at the expense of the overall war effort, Mr. Sedney said.

It kept getting us distracted. That was all inside-the-Beltway, navel-gazing, he said. It was really irrelevant to what was going on in the war.

Early setbacks

U.S. military leaders have suffered some setbacks while taking advantage of their newfound authorities on the battlefield. In March, U.S. Central Command chief Joseph Votel was forced to defend multiple cases of mass civilian casualties tied to increasingly aggressive U.S. airstrikes against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Command and coalition leaders conducted three inquires that month into U.S. airstrikes against Islamic State positions, including one in the western Mosul neighborhood of al-Jadida, which reportedly leveled several buildings and left hundreds of Iraqi civilians dead.

These are absolutely tragic and heartbreaking situations, Gen. Votel told the House Armed Services Committee at the time. He said each allegation of civilian casualties tied to U.S. operations is taken seriously.

Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, the top U.S. commander in Iraq and Syria, acknowledged days after the attack that there was a fair chance a U.S. airstrike played a role in the destruction and carnage in al-Jadida.

We probably had a role in those casualties, the general said, adding that the enemy had a hand in this. He was suggesting Islamic States use of civilians as human shields and questioning why so many civilians would voluntarily gather in a single building under assault by American air power.

The Pentagon on June 2 acknowledged that civilian casualties in the Middle East had risen sharply since Mr. Trump took office, reflecting in part the nature of urban warfare in the campaigns against Islamic State fighters in Raqqa, Syria, and Mosul, Iraq.

At least 484 civilians have been unintentionally killed by coalition strikes since 2014, U.S. Central Command, or Centcom, said in the June 2 statement. That number was up from 199 just four months earlier. Private watchdog groups say the civilian deaths from U.S. and allied bombing strikes are far higher.

The dropping of the Mother of all Bombs or MOAB on an Islamic State tunnel complex in Afghanistan may have secured a tactical win, but it also became an instant Islamic State recruiting tool, Mr. Brands said.

U.S. forces deployed in Afghanistan and the Middle East are filled with sets of capable, intelligence and sober military leaders, Mr. Brands said. But their battlefield decisions are driven strictly for tactical reasons, which at times usurp considerations for the strategic or political fallout, he added.

Gen. John Nicholson, head of all U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan, or any member of the command staff could have predicted that kind of reaction from the MOAB use, Mr. Brands said.

The hope inside the Trump White House that expanded tactical authority at the Defense Department will achieve strategic successes likely will not materialize, he said. I do not know if that is realistic.

Mr. Sedney said strategic considerations given so much heft by the Obama White House should mean less to combatant commanders on the ground. Gen. Nicholsons deployment of the MOAB was not driven by public opinion in Washington, he said.

Gen. Nicholson was trying to win a war, Mr. Sedney said.

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Pentagon welcomes greater freedom under Trump but is wary of blame - Washington Times

After a damp start in 2016, the Rotary Freedom Festival is expanding its signature fundraising event for the second year, and organizer Joan Wagnon is checking her Farmers Almanac regularly to track the weather.

Using all of downtown Topeka, from the Kansas River to the state capitol; vendors, entertainment, food trucks and live music will fill the city for a family friendly day of fun celebrating Topekas history.

The festival will take place Saturday, beginning at 9 a.m. with a 5K race. Runners will start at 9th and Jackson Street and run down around the capitol building. One lane of Kansas Avenue will be shut down during the 5K. The run is organized by YWCA of Northeast Kansas Girls on the Run program.

Wagnon has worked closely with the YWCA in the past, serving as the interim CEO in 2015.

Im well acquainted with them and their capacity of what they can do, and I needed somebody I could depend on, Wagnon said.

Wagnon has coordinated with more than a dozen groups to bring this festival to life.

From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. a kids area will be set up on the east side of the statehouse. Activities include face-painting, chalk drawing, games and various crafts. The Skys the Limit mobile gaming unit will be available for a small fee.

At the corner of 8th and Kansas, in the former Ray Beers building, artistic guests are welcome to join the students of Highland Park High School as they complete their window mural project. The collaboration began in the spring semester with high school students creating poetry about what freedom means to them. On July 1, they will use window paint to transform their words into designs on the window panes.

Carol Bradbury of Bloomerang Art Studios will also be organizing a community art project for anyone wishing to participate.

Similar to last year, re-enactors will be strolling through the grounds and giving demonstrations. Performances are scheduled every two hours, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Constitution Hall, 429 S. Kansas Ave., will again showcase historical re-enactments depicting the dispersal of the legislature on July 4, 1856 by Col. Edwin Sumner.

Tours of the State Capitol are also available from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The Capitol will be accessible through the visitors center on 8th Street.

Chris Meinhardt, a Rotary member and one of the organizers of the event, said an antique cannon will be available again this year to shoot every half hour.

The group, the Lecompton Reenactors, theyre kind of a big deal, Wagnon said. They have done several re-enactions for many years, and they often congregate around Constitution Hall.

Various churches will be selling food downtown during the festival. Our Lady of Guadalupe Church will be in the Rotary Pocket Park, and Assumption Church will host a food stand in front of their facility at 204 S.W. 8th Ave.

A free tour bus will operate from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., giving tours of some of Topekas most famous landmarks: the Kansas River, the Capitol, Constitution Hall and the post office courtroom where the Brown v Board of Education case was first tried. Guests can step off at any of these stops to explore.

Along the Kansas River, the Rotary Club has organized a pop-up park on the north side, near the location of a proposed Oregon Trail Park. The Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks will provide an air-boat to give rides and discuss river development; boating and canoeing will be available.

A cookout, guitar music, levee walks and stories about the river are also scheduled. Wagnon suggests parking at 4th and Kansas and riding the tour bus to the river if interested.

Pocket parks along Kansas Avenue will feature musicians and entertainment. Native American drummers and flute players will start at 10 a.m. in the Fidelity Bank pocket park, a magician will perform every hour from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Mars pocket park in front of Wolfes Camera, and The Capitol-Federal pocket park will showcase a variety of musicians. However, something is scheduled for every pocket park along Kansas Avenue.

At 4 p.m. the focus will shift to a free concert at 9th and Kansas Ave. The street, from 8th to 10th, will close and be filled with food trucks, Rotary beer garden tents and other vendors.

The concert will showcase the talents of Kelley Hunt, a blues singer from Lawrence; The Skirts, a womens bluegrass band from Chase County; and Maria the Mexican, two young women who play roots rock with a Mexican flair. Opening are the Smooth Tones, featuring Kelvin Ross.

Tickets are required for the evening concert but are free and may be printed at home or downloaded to a smartphone. A limited number of reserved seats for the musical entertainment are available for $10.

Wagnon explained the event is asking people to register for tickets to better understand the attendance numbers and as a way to notify people should the festival be moved indoors. By registering, guests will sign up for text alerts from the festival organizers alerting them to any changes in the schedule.

The Rotary Freedom Festival is funded by local businesses and individuals. Food and beer sales will go toward festival expenses, with remaining funds going to the Rotarys anti-bullying program.

The Freedom Festival began in 2016 as a way for rotary to raise community awareness for Topekas history, Wagnon explained. The event was dampened on two occasions by rainy weather, and if bad weather threatens this Saturday, Wagnon said the festivities will be moved inside to the Topeka Performing Arts Center at 214 S.E. 8th Ave.

To register for a concert ticket and find the schedule as well as other information, visit cityspin.com/northeastkansas/e/rotary-freedom-festival-2017.

Contact reporter Savanna Maue at (785) 295-5621 or @CJFoodFun or @SavannaMaue on Twitter.

Concert Schedule

4 - 5:15 p.m. - Smooth Tones featuring Kelvin Ross

5:15 - 6:30 p.m. - The Skirts

6:45 - 8 p.m. - Maria the Mexican

8 - 8:30 p.m. - Rotary members to host Freedom Festival program

8:30 - 10:15 p.m. - Kelley Hunt

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Rotary Freedom Festival expands events for second year of ... - Topeka Capital Journal

(L_R) Marguerite Avery, April Hathcock, and Jamie LaRue (speaking) at the American Library Associations 2017 Annual Conference and Exhibition in Chicago on June 24, 2017.Photo: Rebecca Lomax/American Libraries

How do the principles of intellectual freedom and open access intersect? That was the topic of the Intellectual Freedom and Open Access: Working Toward a Common Goal? panel discussion, sponsored by the Intellectual Freedom Round Table, which addressed the relationship from several different perspectives.

Marguerite Avery, senior acquisitions editor at Trinity University Press in San Antonio, Texas, spoke from a publishers point of view. Avery eagerly joined this conversation because, framing intellectual freedom and open access is seldom discussed over intellectual property and open access, she explains. Avery defines intellectual freedom as being able to seek and receive all points of view without restriction. Historically, this discussion refers to published sources, but now user-generated content is an area that needs to be addressed.

April Hathcock, scholarly communications librarian at NYU and a former lawyer, approaches open access as a way to bridge intellectual freedom, stating, [Open Access] allows users to gain access to the materials that they need to engage in true intellectual freedom. However, not everyone has intellectual freedom, Hathcock argues. We must look at the systemic reasons for why people dont have access to information and why people arent enjoying intellectual freedom, she says. In doing so, those who are underrepresented are then invited to this conversation and a better bridge can be built between OA and IF.

Jamie LaRue, director of the ALAs Office for Intellectual Freedom and the Freedom to Read Foundation, spoke from his experience as former director of Colorados Douglas County Libraries in battling costly library materials. LaRue offered a set of steps to take towards developing librarian-managed platforms for content as a counter. He says, first, have a vision by stating the problem and developing an alternative. Then, identify resources that can help with investing in the development of new platforms. Instead of asking what it will cost, LaRue argues, The right question is what does it cost if we dont do anything. Lastly, disseminate knowledge and contribute to the conversation.

Throughout the session, the three panelists answered a variety of questions on the topics of the socioeconomic dimensions and diversifying the homogeneous world of scholarly publishing, as well as making authoritative research publicly accessible to all. This conversation works in both directions, they summarize. Its important to make research available to the public, but equally essential to learn from what the public has to teach us as well.

Link:

Intellectual Freedom and Open Access: Working Toward a Common Goal? - American Libraries (blog)

This extract has been excerpted with permission from PEN Hong Kong from the essay My Journey as a Student Activist, by Joshua Wong, part of the anthology Hong Kong 20/20: Reflections on a Borrowed Place, out this month from Blacksmith Books.

Im a twenty-year-old university student, born a year before the handover.

Having grown up under Chinese rule, I dont have any memory of colonial Hong Kong or feel any attachment to it. Instead, I was spoon-fed daily a hearty serving of self-evident truths: that Hong Kong is and always will be an inalienable part of China; and that the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP, always has our best interests in mind under the one country, two systems framework.

But twenty years after the transfer of sovereignty, I now know an altogether different set of facts: that Beijing continues to deny us the right to a free vote in breach of the Joint Declaration, an international treaty it signed with Britain in 1984; that, as a result, Hong Kong is stuck in a rut on its never-ending path to democracy; and that the CCP has launched an all-out attack on our civil liberties

Six years ago, under Beijings directives, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) government announced a citywide plan to introduce a national education curriculum in all primary and secondary schools. It was a thinly-veiled attempt to inculcate in our youth a sense of unquestioning patriotism and blind loyalty to the CCP. Perhaps because veteran politicians had been so far removed from the classroom, the news drew little interest from the opposition parties.

I was fourteen years old at the time, just starting secondary two. I knew I couldnt stand quietly by while a brainwashing curriculum poisoned our education. It was then that I founded a student organisation called Scholarism with a small group of secondary school students to defend free and independent thinking in the classroom through demonstrations and other means of grassroots resistance.

Our campaigns had little traction at firstour street rallies drew only a few dozen participants and our soapbox speeches didnt get much press coverage. Our efforts were met with a general sense of resignation, as many people thought it futile to try to push back against Beijings agenda.

More critically, Hong Kong society had yet to fully embrace the idea of student activism. Our rote-based education system wasand still isso focused on grades and public exams that anything else was considered a distraction. This was understandable. For generations of Hong Kongers, the only means of upward mobility and the only way to meaningfully contribute to society have been to obtain a respectable university degree (preferably in business administration) and a professional accreditation (in finance, accounting, law or medicine). Politics was so far off the beaten path for a teenager that it must be discouraged at any cost.

But the Bible has taught me well. St Paul told us not to let anyone look down on you because you are young and I took that lesson to heart. The night before the national education curriculum was rolled out, not long after literature sponsored by the Department of Education described the CCP as a progressive, selfless and unifying ruling body, we finally succeeded in galvanizing the public to stand up against the governments propaganda. More than 120,000 citizens showed up at Civic Square outside the government headquarters in support of our movement, forcing the SAR government to withdraw the plan the following day

I believe elitism in politics is over, and a new path to achieving democracy should be charted by young people who have the most at stake in the future of our city. I also believe that real changes are brought about not by playing by the old rules but by civil disobedience and mass uprisings, and that young people, free from financial burdens and family demands, have the least to lose should they be arrested or convicted and therefore should take a more prominent role.

Those beliefs enabled us to embrace the Occupy Movement of 2014 by organising, in the lead-up to the actual street occupation, a citywide class boycott, various mass protests and a referendum on electoral reform in which over 800,000 citizens participated. In fact, it was our impromptu decision to retake the Civic Square on September 26th, two days before Occupy erupted, that led to the start of the 79-day struggle

Twenty years ago, the idea of a large-scale political uprising that would paralyse the city for months was simply unthinkable. Equally implausible was the notion that a university student could enter LegCo [Legislative Council of Hong Kong] as an advocate for the citys self-determination. Twenty years after the handover, what was once unthinkable and implausible is part of a political reality, proving that Hong Kongers are not just economic beings and are much more than what meets the eye. We desire and thirst for freedom, democracy and the rule of law just like anyone else. And we are prepared to fight tooth and nail for all of those things.

Translated from the Chinese by Jason Y. Ng.

Original post:

Joshua Wong reflects on Hong Kong's 1997 handover: We desire and thirst for freedom, democracy - Quartz

The Dunedin City Council has made a U-turn over its proposal to develop three new freedom camping sites in Dunedin.

After an outcry from those potentially affected, a proposal for camps at Rotary Park in Highcliff, Brighton Surf Life Saving Club and at Puddle Alley near Invermay has been dumped.

A report late last month said the sites were needed in response to an overflow of campers at Ocean View and Warrington.

But the plans were bitterly opposed by nearby residents of Rotary Park, and by the Mosgiel-Taieri Community Board and Saddle Hill Community Board.

The explosion of freedom-camping tourism in New Zealand has caused tension as locals deal with overrun campsites, litter and human waste.

At a council meeting on May 30 it was decided discussion on the report would be delayed pending information from a national freedom camping forum.

In the agenda for tomorrow's full council meeting the report appears, but all mention of the three sites is gone.

The report instead recommends a special consultative procedure to determine the community's views on the issue.

Options suggested were to limit freedom camping to self-contained vehicles, those with toilets, the status quo with increased enforcement of bylaws, or providing additional areas for non-certified self-contained vehicles.

Mayor Dave Cull said in a statement he acknowledged the issue drew ''impassioned debates''.

It was appropriate the council revisited its approach to freedom camping by way of public consultation because of a ''wide range of views expressed both formally and informally by the community and community board members in relation to the report, and on wider issues related to freedom camping over the last season''.

The original report proposing the new sites said there had been a 37% increase in vehicles using the Warrington freedom camping site in February and March this year, compared with the year before.

Dunedin City Council recreation planning and facilities manager Jendi Paterson said tomorrow's report was not site-specific, and consultation would focus on criteria rather than location.

Rotary Park freedom camping site opponent Sharon Weir, of Waverley, said she was pleased the council had ''seen sense''.

''The park is used very well by locals so we just didn't want trash everywhere and that would have been the risk if it had been opened up to freedom campers.''

Waverley and Andersons Bay residents were so opposed to the initial proposal to allow camping at the park they started a petition, she said.

Saddle Hill Community Board chairman Scott Weatherall, who was criticised online for supporting the proposal to allow freedom camping outside the Brighton Surf Life Saving Club, supported the U-turn.

''I think they have probably listened to what the community have had to say in the brief, unofficial consultative stage we have had.''

The board would continue to support freedom camping in the area, Mr Weatherall said.

Mosgiel Taieri Community board chairwoman Sarah Nitis said the board was most opposed to the community having to pay for the infrastructure.

''I believe non-self-contained freedom campers would be welcome in Mosgiel if central Government paid for it.''

Public consultation hearings were likely in August, Ms Paterson said.

margot.taylor@odt.co.nz

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U-turn on freedom camping - Otago Daily Times

Freedom will ring and boom in Richlands July 1.

The towns annual Freedom Festival ends a two day run with a fireworks display at dark. Prior to the big show there will be lots of entertainment starting June 28 when the midway rides open a four day run on the police department parking lot.

The midway will open at five p.m. June 28-29 with unlimited rides for one price. They will open at one p.m. on Friday and 10 a.m. on Saturday. Entertainment starts June 30 with the Fallen Warriors Tribute and the Jubalaires at six p.m.

The Fallen Warriors Motorcycle Honor Guard will present flags to families of veterans and pay tribute to those who died in combat. The Jubalaires will be performing patriotic music during the program.

Marcus Boyd takes to the stage at eight and Victor Lawson and Boogie Chillen will close the night at nine. The day starts with a 10k5k run and walk July 1 at eight a.m. Vendors will open at 10 and there will be face painting, history characters, window decorating contest and the Fallen warriors Wall.

There will be a cruise in to the Advance Auto parking lot for cars and bikes. Star 95 radio will have a live remote at 6:15 p.m. with a hula hoop contest and a wear your red, white and blue contest. The winners will be named Mr. and Mrs. Freedom Festival and the childrens winners will be Little Miss and Little Mr. Freedom Festival.

The Giles Artillery Battery will fire its cannon during the opening ceremonies at 8 p.m. and the National Anthem will be performed. The Benny Wilson Band takes the stage at 8:15 and will perform until the fireworks at 10 p.m. Wilson will play through the fireworks show which will last about 30 minutes.

This years theme is God Bless America and Our Veterans. Businesses and home owners are encouraged to decorate in red, white and blue. There will be a window decorating contest for businesses with prizes for the six best as well as most patriotic and Mayors Choice.

The class of 1997 will be having a reunion during the festival and will have a tent set up both days.

Read more:

Richlands readying for Freedom Fest - Southwest Virginia Today

KING 5 photojournalist Andy Wallace

KING Staff , KING 7:10 PM. PDT June 23, 2017

The Wings of Freedom Tour shows off World War II-era planes to pay tribute to the crews that flew and maintained them. (Photo: KING)

The Wings of Freedom Tour flew into Seattle Friday. The tour shows off World War II-era planes to pay tribute to the crews that flew and maintained them.

"You know, we've got four WWII aircraft that come out here. We travel the whole country, but what's really awesome is that they're all flying, they're all authentic, and you can actually walk through them, touch them, and go for a flight on them if you'd like to," said a Wings of Freedom Tour spokesperson. "It's really epic. We've been throughout the country, seen a lot of different reactions, but it's particularly the kids that are the biggest interest to me right now, because without them this is gone."

There are four planes the public can check out at the Museum of Flight this weekend, including a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress. You can even take a flight on board one of them.

WHERE: The Wings of Freedom Tour will be on display at Boeing Field in Seattle located at the Museum of Flight, 9404 East Marginal Way South.

WHEN: The Wings of Freedom Tour will be on display at the Museum of Flight until the aircraft departs Sunday, June 25 after 5:00 p.m. Hours of ground tours and display are 10:00 a.m. through 5:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 24th and Sunday, June 25th. The 30-minute flight experiences are normally scheduled before and after the ground tour times above.

2017 KING-TV

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WWII Wings of Freedom Tour flies into Seattle - KING5.com

Miami Herald

OAS chief offers to resign in exchange for Venezuela's 'freedom' Miami Herald The head of the Organization of American States on Saturday said he would step down from his post in exchange for a laundry list of reforms in Venezuela that he said would bring freedom to the embattled South American nation. In a video posted on ... OAS chief Almagro offers to resign 'for freedom in Venezuela'Reuters all 91 news articles »

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OAS chief offers to resign in exchange for Venezuela's 'freedom' - Miami Herald

Over the last century, secularism in America has triumphed so spectacularly that secularists now dominate the cultural mountains of influence: business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, the family and religion.

Raised upon the Christian cultural foundation laid by the American Founders in the 17th and 18th centuries, secularists have produced a structure that is the antithesis to the Founders intention.

Unless confronted by the men and women of Issachar, people who know the times and know what to do (1 Chronicles 12:32), secularism spells doom for freedom and liberty in America. Why? Because virtue is a key component of freedom. The glory of a nation lies in its righteousness, not in its military or economic prowess.

Nevertheless, give the Left credit on the grounds that they surely dont lack hubris. I mean, who possibly would have the chutzpah to toy with the four-thousand-year-old definition of marriage?

In the 5-4Obergefell v. Hodgesdecision in 2015, Justices Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan unearthed (in the bowels of Constitution!) the right to homosexual marriage. This gem of legal maneuvering found a Constitutional right to same-sex intercourse and marriage 230 years after the Articles of Confederation was signed in 1787. Apparently, the right to homosexual marriage was concealed from the legal giants of yesteryear like Joseph Story, Oliver Wendell Holmes, John Marshall, Earl Warren, etc.

Of course, this discovery commands a price from freedom in Gods everlasting order. The refusal to live within the God-given boundaries, intended by the Founders, brings consequences on the nation.

There are six things the Lord hates no, seven things he detests: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that kill the innocent, a heart that plots evil, feet that race to do wrong, a false witness who pours out lies, a person who sows discord in a family (Proverbs 6:16-19).

The first in Solomons catalog of abominations is haughty eyes. Dr. Bruce K. Waltke observed, No vice stands in sharper opposition to wisdom and fear of God than pride.* Re-defining the four-thousand-year-old definition of marriage has to reach the pinnacle of arrogance!

Would you care to guess the antidote for those who rebel against Gods unending order? Solomon wrote: The rebellious man seeks only evil; therefore a cruel messenger shall be sent against him (Proverbs 17:11).

Jewish Biblical scholar Michael V. Fox interprets, If a man rebels against the king, a human messenger is sent to punish him. If he rebels against Gods word, punitive angels are dispatched. It is possible that the punishment is executed by angels, because God himself, as this socially conservative book sees it, defends the political order, if it is just.

If you can, make application to the five U.S. Supreme Court Justices who ruled two years ago to codify same-sex intercourse and marriage. Solomon indicates that there is a certainty of punishment, not its proximity. Overconfidence in ones power breeds arrogance, which leads to disaster. If I were one of the five Justices, Id repent and ask for forgiveness. The beginning of wisdom is fear of the Lord (Proverbs 9:10).

Now to the larger point. Secularism has imposed its godlessness on Americas youth for the last three-quarters century, devastating public education and higher learning. American education has collapsed under the weight of Secularism. Moral and academic anarchy now reign. Something curious has happened to those who define themselves as anti-fascist, who in reality are the fascists.

As Mark Steyn wrote: The Left, the Western Left, is on the same continuum as the Charlie Hebdo killers. Theyre both in the shut-up business, who want to END the debate rather than win the debate.

Calling themselves anti-fascists, the secular Left is demonstrating its fascist inclinations by torching university buildings and shutting down speakers on college campuses.

If America is to survive, virtue and fidelity must be reestablished in public schools and universities. Loyalty and fidelity to God, is what guards the nation. Spiritual men must move to the front and lead their families. As goes the family, so goes the nation. Bill Bennett observed:

Someone once characterized the two essential questions Plato posed as: Who teaches the children, and what do we teach them?

We need to respond to this culture that sends confusing signals to young men, a culture that is agnostic about what it wants men to be, with a clear and achievable notion of manhood.

The Founding Fathers believed, and the evidence still shows, that industriousness, marriage and religion are a very important basis for male empowerment and achievement. We may need to say to a number of our 20-something men, Get off the video games five hours a day, get yourself together, get a challenging job and get married. Its time for men to man up.

Evangelical and Pro-Life Catholic Christians in the last century have deserted the responsibilities prescribed by Americas Founders for living free. We have assigned the making, enforcement, and adjudication of laws to those lacking Divine faith. Those antagonistic to Biblical values now control public education, higher learning, City Hall, Big Business, the Courts, Hollywood, media and politics.

Liberals welcome believers insofar as religion can be deployed in service of liberal causes, to be sure. But any expression of theological or moral judgment is met with hostility.

As long as there is no application, offering a moral standard to secularists raises no opposition.

If America is to be saved from the onslaught of Secularism, Gideons and Rahabs are going to have to lead.

David Lane is Founder of theAmerican Renewal Project

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How Secularism Threatens Freedom and Righteousness in America - CBN News

A freshman member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus is calling for special counsel Robert Mueller to recuse himself from the Russia investigation because he has brought on "highly partisan" lawyers to help with the probe.

"Special Counsel Robert Mueller should recuse himself because the integrity of his appointment is in question due to former FBI Director James Comey's manipulative leaks and the relationship between Mr. Comey and Mr. Mueller," Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., said in a statement Friday. "His ability to be impartial is doubtful because he has surrounded himself with highly partisan lawyers who make a special practice to line the coffers of Democrats."

News outlets have reported at least three lawyers Mueller has hired to help conduct his investigation have donated almost exclusively to Democrats. Also, Mueller and Comey are friends and former colleagues.

Biggs is at least the second House Republican to call for Mueller's recusal.

Earlier this month, Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, told the Blaze that Mueller should step aside from the probe because of his "cozy relationship" with Comey.

As part of his investigation into Russia's election interference, Mueller will probe for possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. The Washington Post reported Mueller will also investigate whether Trump obstructed justice by allegedly telling Comey that he hoped the bureau would end its probe of Michael Flynn, Trump's first national security adviser. Another report Sunday said Mueller hasn't decided yet whether to investigate Trump.

Most Democrats and Republicans in Congress have defended Mueller, the former FBI director whose leadership of the bureau lasted longer than anyone after J. Edgar Hoover.

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Freedom Caucus member calls for Robert Mueller to recuse himself from Russia probe - Washington Examiner

Four conservative senators hoped Thursday to do what the Freedom Caucus did in the House: push a Republican healthcare bill to the right and save it from near-certain defeat.

Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Mike Lee, R-Utah and Ron Johnson, R-Wis., announced they would not be able to vote for the recently unveiled Senate healthcare bill, which was designed to at least partially repeal and replace Obamacare, in its present form.

"Senator Paul believes that conservatives need to be included at the negotiation table," said Paul's communications director, Sergio Gor. "Staying united will be important, similar to the Freedom Caucus."

In the House, conservatives managed to establish themselves as the main faction the president dealt with in healthcare negotiations. After the first version of the American Health Care Act proved unacceptable to conservatives, they forced through another version that passed the House.

When Obamacare originally passed Congress, liberal Democrats were forced to negotiate with centrists. They discarded the public option and other liberal priorities to pass a bill that included insurance market exchanges and Medicaid expansion.

"Freedom Caucus members are still reviewing the bill but have a number of concerns that they hope to see addressed in the amendment process" said a caucus source. "Sen. Ted Cruz, in particular, has a market-based consumer choice measure he's been working on that would garner broad support from the group."

"This is basically an amendment to Obamacare, not repeal of it. So much for campaign promises, right?" said FreedomWorks' public policy and legislative director Jason Pye. "I recall [Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell saying he would repeal ObamaCare 'root and branch.' Yeah, this bill doesn't do that. We hope that Sens. Lee, Cruz, and Paul can guide the bill in a direction that lowers health insurance premiums."

Paul, who represents Kentucky in the U.S. Senate alongside McConnell, said much the same thing in his own remarks.

"It's gotta look like what we promised," Paul said Thursday afternoon. "I mean we promised I heard people, I traveled the country. I heard other Republicans say we are going to rip it out root and branch' thousands of times."

But it is not going to be easy. Centrist Republicans in the House were mostly able to vote against their chamber's Obamacare replacement, the American Health Care Act, once most Freedom Caucus members voted for it.

Republicans have a 24-seat majority in the House. There is only a 52-48 Republican Senate majority in the Senate. Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, are as important as any of the conservatives. These centrists want to fix Obamacare, not necessarily replace it.

Conservatives like Cruz are hoping for changes in the opposite direction. House conservatives insisted months ago that they wanted to get to yes on the House-passed bill, and it was centrists like the Tuesday Group, as opposed to conservatives, who were making it impossible.

"Ideally, we would like to vote for a bill that repeals Obamacare, yes," said Lee's communications director Conn Carroll.

This is similar to what Freedom Caucus members said before their bill finally passed the House. "The only thing we will be judged by is Do premiums come down?" Rep. Mark Meadows said in a meeting with the Washington Examiner.

The version of the bill that is being floated in the Senate jeopardizes centrist votes by allowing state-level waivers from major Obamacare coverage mandates, defunding Planned Parenthood and other well-known abortion providers and tweaking tax credits for consumers who need new health insurances.

Deleting any of these provisions carries the risk of losing conservative votes, after a number of them were won after major changes to the bill.

That hasn't stopped conservatives from either chamber of Congress from making demands.

"In general, the bill's going to have to look more like a repeal bill and less like we're keeping Obamacare" said Paul. "It has to look less like Obamacare lite."

President Trump, on the other hand, seems to be strengthening the centrists' position.

"I hope we are going to surprise you with a really good plan," he told a rally Wednesday evening. "I've been talking about a plan with heart. I said, Add some money to it!'"

That's not exactly music to conservatives' ears.

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Senate conservatives hope to have Obamacare impact similar to ... - Washington Examiner

Gun makers have boosted production in recent years, focusing on more high-caliber pistols and rifles designed for self-defense and shifting away from recreational firearms used for hunting and target shooting, the authors of a new study said.

Gun violence kills more than 36,000 Americans each year, according to statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Authors of the study, published Thursday in The American Journal of Preventive Medicine, said research has focused on victims of gun violence and government policies, while their study is one of the first to focus on gun industry practices.

Looking at data compiled by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the researchers noted a significant increase in gun manufacturing overall from 2005 to 2013, in contrast to a slight downward trend before 2005.

They also found that driving this growth was higher production of pistols and rifles, and the pistols tended to be higher-caliber models, or ones that fire larger bullets. The authors said that five major gun manufacturers control nearly 60 percent of the market, so changes in production of one manufacturer could significantly affect the others'.

"It seems clear to us that the trend is for self-defense," lead study author Dr. Michael Siegel told ABC News.

Siegel, a professor of community health sciences at the Boston University School of Public Health, further suggested that the findings provide evidence of a change in consumer demand.

"[Manufacturers] have reinvented guns not as a recreational sport or tool but as a symbol of freedom and security," he said.

The study authors further suggested that the issue of gun violence should shift from the criminal justice perspective to the public health arena a point that has been opposed by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a major industry organization for gun manufacturers.

"Guns are not a disease," Lawrence G. Keane, the foundation's senior vice president and general counsel, told ABC News in a statement. "There is no vaccine or health intervention for the criminal misuse of firearms."

Siegel, however, said the study is important because it points to the industry's responsibility in preventing gun violence.

He added that the goal of the research was not to deprive gun owners of their weapons.

"They are not the enemy in public health," he said. "There are ways to reduce gun violence while valuing gun owners' values It has been painted too long as mutually exclusive."

Siegel said that the group's next research steps are to identify the most effective methods and policies for isolating the small number of people who are most likely to commit acts of violence using guns.

"The solution lies in not taking guns away from people who are law-abiding but by being more effective at keeping guns out of the hands of the people who are at highest risk of gun violence."

Hong-An Nguyen, M.D., is a third-year resident physician in pediatrics at New YorkPresbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center.

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Study: Gunmakers ramping up production, focusing on 'freedom and security' message - ABC News

This Salon Talks video was produced by Alexandra Clinton

The indie folksinger Ani DiFranco, whostarted out performing in coffeehouses as a teen in the late 80s, has long beena feminist icon. She sings of love, pacifism,reproductive rights and progressive politicson her 20th album Binary,released earlier this month. For arecent episode of Salon Talks, she described herjourney as an independent musician in a world of big-media suits.

How does poetry play into the writing?

I was into poetry asa little kid, when I first learned about it in school. The whole idea of distilling language and making it communicate beyond its borders just really interested me. A little bit later I picked up the guitar and started getting into music and songwritingand so that the poetry fetish kind of found its natural extension through song. But Ive always continued to write poems just as poems, too, because its a very different sort of beast than songs.

I love the music of language. Evenbefore I was making songs just the music of the way we speak, the prosody . . . the musicality, the music of prose, the melody.

Im all about that in my writing, trying to echo the music of how we speak in a song so you can really feel it being spoken to you.

Whats the message of thenew song Play God?

That song really comes from a place of trying to frame reproductive freedom as a civil right.. . . Theres a whole area of unfinished business in civil rights that apply only to women, and we just seem to not even have that language yet that can sort of help us to put it in the realm where Ithink it belongs.

The song is just trying to talk about how women are much more deeply informed about reproduction and creation and how death is a part of life. I think every menstruation teaches us that. We spin dark every time because theres death involved, whether that egg is fertilized or not. Ive had several abortions. Ive given birth to several children. Ive had a miscarriage.

Like any woman, I think I know more than a man what it all means, so I think that I should be given that respect.

Catch more of DiFranco on Salon abouther latest album, musical inspiration and civil rights.

Originally posted here:

WATCH: Ani DiFranco demands reproductive freedom as a civil right - Salon

WASHINGTON, D.C. The U.S. bishops have launched a website and video to mark the beginning of this years Fortnight for Freedom, focusing on religious freedom issues both at home and abroad.

The video, about ten minutes long and viewable on the Fortnight for Freedom website, features a number of legal, religious, and other personalities discussing the importance of religious liberty. The Fortnight for Freedom takes place June 21 July 4.

Religious freedom is one of the basic freedoms of the human person because without religious freedom, the freedom of conscience, all other freedoms are without foundation, Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami says at the beginning of the video.

A government that doesnt acknowledge limits on its own power to regulate religious institutions is probably going to come after other institutions as well, said Professor Rick Garnett of the Notre Dame Law School.

The video chronicles the struggle between the Little Sisters of the Poor and the HHS mandate of the Affordable Care Act.

Its over three years now that this issue has been pursuing us, says Sr. Constance, L.S.P.

Testimonies from beneficiaries of the Sisters work are showcased in the video.

There is a spiritual component in the way that they live their lives that adds to not only enrichment of the residents lives but to those who are in contact with them, who work with them, who just hear about them, says Carmel Kang.

When religious freedom goes away, and there is no transcendent authority, then the law is the only norm, and the people in power now are always the only power, says Professor Helen Alvare of George Mason University Law School.

The video emphasizes the United Statess historical connection to freedom of religion.

The United States is the greatest country in the history of the world precisely because of the exceptional character of its relationship to faith which permeates every dimension of its evolution, says Eugene Rivers II, an activist and Pentecostal pastor.

The video also highlighted the struggle of religious peoples in other parts of the world.

Tragically, we see the killings, the martyrdom of Christians in Iraq, and Libya, and Egypt, Syria, says Wenski. The video then showed clips from the video of 21 Coptic Christians being martyred by the Islamic State in early 2015.

Professor Thomas Farr of Georgetown University noted the increased threat since the Obergefell vs. Hodges Supreme Court decision in June 2015, and also observed that viewpoints motivated by religion are being silenced.

The video also summarized Dignitatis humanae, the Second Vatican Councils declaration on religious freedom, as well as noting Pope Franciss concern for persecuted Christians around the world.

We have to bring not just optimism, but genuine Christian hope, says Archbishop Lori of Baltimore, head of the USCCBs Committee on Religious Liberty, which was made a permanent structure of the conference at their annual spring meeting last week.

The video closed with a montage of scenes and figures including the Selma to Montgomery March, St. John Paul II, and the collapse of the Berlin Wall.

The USCCBs Fortnight for Freedom website provides a host of prayer and practical resources on the topic of religious freedom.

The prayer resources are based in Scripture as well as the examples of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher, and are available in both English and Spanish.

Among the practical resources is a brief guide to the issue, which seeks to defend and clarify the bishops views, responding to concerns that defense of liberty is an affront to treating people with equal dignity.

Also included are summaries of religious liberty concerns in the United States and internationally. Domestically, issues listed include the HHS mandate, the right to practice faith in business, and religious institutes right to aid undocumented immigrants. Internationally, concerns are presented from the Central African Republic, Myanmar, and Mexico.

On May 4, the National Day of Prayer, President Trump signed an executive order on religious liberty while surrounded by faith leaders, including Cardinal Donald Wuerl of D.C. and the Little Sisters of the Poor.

RELATED:Bishops point man on religious freedom gives mixed verdict on Trump order

The order called for agencies to consider different enforcement of the mandate and looser enforcement of the Johnson Amendment. It was modified from an earlier, leaked version which critics claimed would have allowed for unjust discrimination of LGBT people.

On May 31, a draft rule providing blanket protection from the mandate was leaked.

The bishops website does not include the Johnson Amendment among its concerns.

Continued here:

US bishops launch 2017 Fortnight for Freedom with new video - Crux: Covering all things Catholic

The Freedom High School football stadium was packed full recently when more than 200 seniors bid farewell to their high school careers.

On June 10, as students faced a podium and stage in the middle of the football field, the Freedom High School Band played the National Anthem and Senior Braeden Personius lead the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance.

It is the moments like this that we should cherish the most (in how we are) finally being able to walk across this stage after 13 long years of hard work, Personius said. Absorb the joy of the classmates around us and remember the look on our families' faces as they are proud of us.

She spoke of how this graduating class represents many "last moments, including being the last class of the 1990s babies, the last time the class would be together at the same place at the same time and the last class under the watch of Principal Mike Swan.

For some of us, it is the last time we will see each other. But instead of dwelling on the many lasts we may have, think of it as a new opportunity to further our lives beyond Freedom High School, Personius said.

Garret Ward, Student Government Assocation president, shared a few facts about Freedom High School within the last four years: Having the best (advanced placement) scores in the county, having the certified nursing assistant class pass with a 100 percent passing grade for the first time in five years, and the school winning four state championships.

The staff here at Freedom have shown us how to care for others, how to carry ourselves in a professional manner and be successful in what we do, Ward said.

Salutatorian Railey Pitts shared a story about her grandmother to encourage her classmates.

As an individual, my grandmother was exceptional. She was the valedictorian of her class and the first person in her family to go to college and a teacher at Freedom when it first opened, Pitts said. She raised three kids and, knowing my dad, it could not have been easy.

Pitts would spend summers at her grandmothers house, saying it was her home away from home. Her grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimers when Pitts was in middle school.

The beautiful, smart (and) funny lady that loved so much was slipping away and, today, her life is far from perfect, she said.

Even though her grandmothers life is worse than most of us sitting here today, she paints the best possible picture even in her bad situation, Pitts said.

Pitts charged her classmates to have the type of spirit that takes each day and lives it to the fullest.

You might find yourself confused or clueless about what to do and there may seem like no light at the end of the tunnel, but instead of getting frustrated or giving up I want you to remember my grandma and just make up your own reality, Pitts said. There will be surprises and bumps in the road, but dont ever give up. And be yourself.

Drew McCracken, valedictorian and Patriot of the Year, spoke to his classmates about obstacles they may face.

Together, we have accomplished many, many things but boy, oh boy, do we have a ways to go, McCracken said. It may not be a whole year from now, but I can promise you that sometime after walking away from this stage today that you are going to encounter bumps and obstacles in the road blocking your way.

He warned his fellow graduates about an acronym GCD, which stands for geometrically constrained disposition.

Friends, do not be square, he said. Despite the very defined and angular hats that sit atop our heads at this moment, do not let this shape define you.

Try to be bad at something and learn from the experience, McCracken said.

Hone down the edges of your comfort zone and round them off and take that leap, he said.

McCracken said a friend shared a quote with him: The point of maximum danger is the point of minimum fear ... it is bliss.

He said he doesn't want his fellow graduates to ever be satisfied with being good enough.

Fellow graduates, I look out this morning and see nothing but thriving potential, McCracken said. Go forth and achieve success, reach goals and arrive at accomplishments. However, dont stop there. Surpass expectations and soar above potential.

After receiving their diplomas, the graduates of Freedom High School faced their families and threw their caps in the air in celebration of reaching this milestone.

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Freedom graduates more than 200 seniors - Morganton News Herald

By Erik Zygmont Catholic News Service Posted June 23, 2017

BALTIMORE (CNS) When Henry VIII, as Englands reigning monarch, was declared a defender of the faith, the future must have seemed so bright to Thomas More and John Fisher, Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori said in a homily June 21.

He described an England which seemed to have been spared the painful divisions that racked the Catholic Church on the continent of Europe. Under Henry, he said, monastic life and learning were flourishing while ordinary Catholics showed their love and loyalty to the church.

Who could have imagined the severe test More, Fisher and English Catholicism would face in so short a time? Archbishop Lori asked.

He was the homilist at the opening Mass of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Fortnight for Freedom, an annual observance highlighting the importance of religious liberty.

The Mass was celebrated on the vigil of the English martyrs shared feast day at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Baltimore.

The aforementioned saints of the 1500s were, respectively, the lord high chancellor and the bishop of Rochester, both of whom had enjoyed peace and security as they faithfully lived their vocations. They lost their heads for refusing their assent to Henry as the defender of the faith when he declared himself head of the church.

While the West has not recently executed anyone for refusing to give up their beliefs, the archbishop borrowed Pope Francis phrase polite persecution to describe the burdens placed on schools, hospitals, employees, employers and other individuals and institutions that live and act according to their faith while navigating civil society.

Such fines, firings and threatened denials of accreditation indicate kinship, solidarity with those suffering overt persecution round the world, Archbishop Lori said.

St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher fulfilled their mission of bearing witness to Christ in their time, their place, their circumstances, he said. Dear friends, weve gathered in prayer tonight asking to acquire in the power of the Holy Spirit, a greater measure of holiness, so that we too can use our freedom, not for ourselves and our own desires, but rather for Christ and the mission of spreading the Gospel far and wide.

In far too many parts of the world, Archbishop Lori said the Catholic Churchs mission is conducted amid raging persecution. He cited a 2016 report from the University of Notre Dame, titled Under Caesars Sword, that chronicled the persecution of Christians in 25 countries around the world.

He said the reality behind such statistics is seen in the suffering of Christians and other religious minorities including some Muslims, including Chaldean Christians beheaded in Iraq simply for professing their faith and Coptic Christians killed while praying in church on Palm Sunday.

To be sure, we Christians in the West do not experience severe repression, Archbishop Lori said, but in recent years there have been serious curtailments of religious freedom with regard to sexuality, marriage, and the sanctity of life.

The archbishop Lori noted that some have advised that Christians withdraw from the fray.

While he acknowledged the importance of rest and spiritual renewal, he once again turned to St. More and St. John Fisher, and urged Catholics to develop in their hearts the holiness of freedom and freedom for holiness an irrepressible spirit of freedom, courage and mission that no earthly power can take away from us.

Then we shall be truly free, the archbishop said. Then we shall be true missionary disciples.

Those gathered for the Mass included members of the Catholic Business Association, Legatus, the St. Thomas More Society and the Catholic Medical Association. Their presence illustrated their solidarity and involvement with the Fortnight for Freedom.

This kind of shows, to everybody, that we have to act on what we believe, said Dr. Okan Akay, who recently completed his residency in internal medicine and had his hands blessed by Archbishop Lori following the Mass.

It strengthens us in our ability to provide healing for people without having to go against what we believe in, he told the Catholic Review, Baltimores archdiocesan news outlet.

Akay said there is increasing pressure in his line of work for those who would opt out of prescribing contraception or performing an abortion, for example. He was lightly mocked, he added with a shrug, for attending the annual March for Life in Washington.

Interestingly, it was an overt display of faith ashes on foreheads that initially drew Akay, a former Muslim, now a basilica parishioner, toward the Catholic Church.

The Fortnight for Freedom ends July 4. Archbishop Lori will celebrate another Fortnight Mass July 3 in Orlando, Florida, for the Convocation of Catholic Leaders.

***

Zygmont is a staff writer at the Catholic Review, the news outlet of the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Read more from the original source:

Catholics urged to work for 'holiness of freedom, freedom for holiness' - CatholicPhilly.com

This article originally appeared on Grist.

Last week, the Standing Rock Sioux celebrated what they believe isa ground-breaking legal victoryin the protracted fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in its expedited review of the pipeline, which was ordered by President Trump shortly after taking office. According to Judge James Boasberg, the Army Corps did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice.

On Wednesday, the parties in the DAPL case will appear in court for a hearing about how to respond to the NEPA ruling. Oil could stop the flowing under Lake Oahe, the fourth-largest dam reservoir in the Dakotas. But that stoppage would be temporary.

If the Army Corps does revise its environmental assessment, the court could allow the pipeline to resume operation. The court and the Army Corps would have served environmental justice under NEPA merely by paying lip service to the struggle for indigenous rights in the United States.

Lake Oahe stands at the center of a painful, decades-long story regarding the marginalization of Native Americans. In 1958, the Army Corps took over 200,000 acres from the Standing Rock and Cheyenne River Sioux, forcing them from their homes and sacred religious sites, so it could build a dam. Fast-forward nearly 60 years, and the reservoir created by the dam draws a million yearly tourists to its more than 50 recreational sites. Its under the Siouxs once hallowed ground now at the bottom of Lake Oahe where the Army Corps decided to route part of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Earlier this year, as I was completing my law degree at New York University, President Trump fast-tracked the projects completion. In the legal battles that ensued, teams of lawyers both large and small took up the cause of the tribes and the thousands of pipeline activists that joined them, collectively known as water protectors.

Benjamin Eichert, director of the grassroots movement Greenpower, formed the Lakota Peoples Legal Project to highlight the statutory issues regarding the construction of the pipeline. I joined the effort as legal researcher.

The oil flowing under Lake Oahe is not only a potential environmental calamity, it is a dagger through the heart of the Sioux tribes and the NEPA ruling, while certainly a win, will not offer meaningful justice to those at Standing Rock.

One unlikely legal strategy that nearly did and could loom large in future fights to protect indigenous land is the Religious Restoration Freedom Act, a fan-favorite amongst the religious right.

Conservatives successfully employed the statute to argue that corporations with deeply-held religious beliefs, like the arts-and-crafts chain Hobby Lobby, could deny contraceptive coverage to female employees. In 2014, the Supreme Court sided with Hobby Lobby, finding that providing that perk against its corporate values constituted a substantial burden on the companys free exercise of religion.

In February of this year, attorneys for the Sioux tribes turned to the same playbook when seeking a preliminary injunction to prevent the completion of the Dakota Access Pipeline under Lake Oahe. They argued that its construction desecrated the sole water source for the sacredInipiceremony and would release untold calamities upon the Cheyenne River Sioux, as prophesied by their elders.

The argument framed the #noDAPL movement as an indigenous rights issue and not just an administrative violation for the first time in the legal realm.

Judge Boasberg pressed attorneys for the Sioux on whether they attributed the religious burden to the pipeline itself or the oil flowing through it. When the lawyers conceded that it was the oil which wouldnt flow for a few more weeks the court found the pipeline would not present an imminent harm to the Siouxs religious practices.

While the argument collapsed in this case of DAPL, its worked in the past. In 2008, a federal judge in Oklahoma granted an injunction in response to a religious freedom claim by the Comanche tribe against the United States government. The ruling prevented the construction of a military warehouse that would block the last clear view of the Medicine Bluffs, an essential vista for the tribes religious practices.

With numerous other encroachments onto indigenous land on the horizon, the religious freedom argument remains viable and relevant, with the Medicine Bluffs case as a hopeful precedent. The Trump administration may construct a border wall on burial sites in Arizonas Tohono Oodham Nation. And its moving toopen up the sacred Bears Ears National Monumentin Utah to industrial development.

Using the Religious Restoration Freedom Act to connect environmentalism with indigenous rights does far more for environmental justice than procedural laws like NEPA. In the legal and grassroots battles to come, we should remember that these legal challenges are not just about oil spills or environmental impact statements, they are about the very fabric that unites a people.

More:

Religious freedom isn't just for Hobby Lobby it's for indigenous rights, too - Salon