All 18 pages…

Thanks to Wonder!

CLEVELAND, Ohio (AP) — A man who was shot in the wrist when National Guard troops killed four Kent State University students during an anti-war demonstration says he has found an audiotape that reveals someone gave a command to fire.

Alan Canfora wants the government to reopen the 37-year-old case because he thinks it will give both the victims and shooters a chance to heal.

“We’re not seeking revenge; we’re not seeking punishment for the guardsmen at this late date,” Canfora said Monday.

“All we want is the truth because we seek healing at Kent State for the student victims, as well as the triggermen who were ordered to fire. And healing can only result from the truth, and that’s all we want.”

Canfora planned to release CD copies of the recording Tuesday at a news conference at Kent State, about 30 miles southeast of Cleveland.

Four Kent State students were killed and nine were wounded in the 1970 clash, which followed several days of Vietnam War protests. Four years later, eight guardsmen were acquitted of federal civil rights charges.

Canfora said he recently requested a copy of the nearly 30-minute tape from Yale University, where a government copy has been stored in an archive.

He said that just before the 13-second volley of gunfire, a voice on the tape is heard yelling, “Right here! Get Set! Point! Fire!”

“I was shaking when I first heard it,” Canfora said. “I shed tears.”

He said he was convinced from his research — including other tapes and photos — that the command was issued by one of three Guard officers at the shooting site.

“The time has now come to where it’s impossible to deny the verbal command to fire,” Canfora said.

The government should analyze the recording using new technology, he said.

After the shooting, the FBI investigated whether an order had been given to fire, and said it could only speculate. One theory was that a guardsman panicked or fired intentionally at a student and that others fired when they heard the shot.

The FBI would look into any new inquiry about the shootings, spokesman Scott Wilson said.

The Ohio National Guard had no comment on the tape, spokesman James Sims said.

Canfora said the reel-to-reel audio recording was made by Terry Strubbe, a student who placed a microphone at a windowsill of his dormitory that overlooked the anti-war rally. Strubbe turned the tape over to the FBI, which kept a copy.

Strubbe, who still lives near Kent, keeps the original tape in a safe deposit box, said Canfora, who heads a nonprofit organization at Kent State that leads a candlelight vigil every May 4 to mark the anniversary of the shootings.

Strubbe didn’t return a message seeking comment Monday. Joe Bendo, a friend who spoke for him, said Strubbe has not listened to the tape in years and does not know whether a command to shoot can be heard.

“He’s just curious, like everybody else. Is it possible? Yes, it’s possible,” Bendo said.

When government officials listened to the tape, it was to evaluate such things as how frequently shots were fired and for how long, Bendo said.

He said Strubbe isn’t sure what he will eventually do with the original recording.

America’s Premiere Homeland Security Event

“Seemingly endless sonic flame-throwers of phased white noise streak across your inner landscape, as stupidly loud and overly-backlit lead guitar emissions perpetrated by a perpetually be-shaded longhair pummel the similarly be-shaded but barely adequate musical backing that sags and creaks under the wattage. Occasionally, lead vocals of a singular variety are provided by said be-shaded mad axeman, whose paranoid personality ensures all songs are delivered in a voice of querulous subterranean gargling from beyond the valley of Alan Vega… My giddy aunt, what’s this, then, a MEATY BEATY BIG & BOUNCY from the Underworld? A rough guide to Japrock’s most intuitive non-career movers? Has the world’s most revolutionary rock’n’roll band released a compilation album of leader Mizutani’s most frequently requested tracks due to overwhelming popular demand? Ja, mein hairies, this certainly seems to be the case. For, with the arrival of this superb FLIGHTLESS BIRD compilation, obsessive fans of Les Rallizes Denudés (are there any other kinds?) finally have a proper ‘early career’ overview of Mizutani & Co. at their fingertips, a 70-minute-long super distillation of this most contrary of band’s choicest musical moves executed between 1967-82, a superb sounding and partly/mostly chronological trawl through the freaked out and perpetually-yelping mindscape of singer and avant-avalanche guitarmonger Mizutani, and his sinister-yet-interchangeable pool of black clad world-to-rights acolytes. Indeed, except for the somewhat shocking omission of Mizutani’s time-honoured set-closer ‘The Last One’, it’s all right here on this CD in truly gargantuan proportions, as FLIGHTLESS BIRD unloads on both fans and champions of Rallizes a very enormous something with which to petition those seething multitudes of Doubting Thomases among their friends and relatives, whom they will have undoubtedly regaled with blasts of shrieking Mizutani feedback – for the past decade or so – via dodgy vinyl bootlegs, third or fourth generation C90 cassette copies, or expensive handmade CD-Rs….” (continued)

from Becky Stark:

hello everyone!
Hello! Come celebrate with us at the Echoplex on May day!
Come to a special benefit concert for the Downtown Women’s Center in LA!
I’ll be singing with The Living Sisters- that’s me, Eleni Mandell, and Inara George singing together in harmonies!
also singing will be the incomparable Chapin Sisters- who are real-life sisters!
and the Watson Twins- true life twins who sing the prettiest harmonies you ever heard!
This concert will be sexy and amazing!
Come join the party!
Bring your friends!
See you soon!
love,
becky
the address of the echo is
1822 Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles
8 pm – $10 – all ages!
here’s a flier-

The Apotheosis of War (1871) by Vasili Vereshchagin (1842–1904), “dedicated to all conquerors, past, present and to come”.

April 20, 02007 Angeles Times

They also serve their conscience

California veterans, including some still on active duty, are speaking out against the U.S. presence in Iraq.

By Rone Tempest, Times Staff Writer

WALNUT CREEK, CALIF. — Off duty in Baghdad, Army Sgt. Ronn Cantu operates an antiwar website.

When not repairing Black Hawk helicopters for the California National Guard, Jabbar Magruder conducts counterrecruiting sessions with would-be enlistees.

Fresh from two tours each in Iraq, decorated former Marines Sean O’Neill and Mike Ergo give antiwar speeches at Northern California high schools.

Although their numbers are still small compared with the draft-fueled Vietnam veterans’ movement four decades ago, California’s Iraq veterans are gaining a voice in opposition to America’s continued military presence in Iraq. Recent antiwar demonstrations in Los Angeles, San Francisco and other cities have seen the first sizable contingents of veterans from the conflict.

The protesters even include some soldiers — like Cantu, of Los Angeles — who are still on active duty. “I’ve taken a public antiwar stance,” Cantu, 29, recently e-mailed from Baghdad, where he serves in intelligence with the 1st Cavalry Division, “but I didn’t shirk my responsibilities.”

O’Neill, a 24-year-old Marine veteran from Fremont, said he likes to take the antiwar message to conservative areas of the state “to add legitimacy and to show that it is not just crazed leftists who are against the war.”

For the most part, the military has tolerated the antiwar activities of its active-duty soldiers and reservists.

“While not on duty or in uniform, our service members maintain similar rights as other Americans,” said Lt. Col. Jon Siepmann, director of public affairs for the California National Guard. “There are, however, limitations that exist to ensure the good order and discipline of the service and to maintain an effective chain of command.”

The only significant court case related to antiwar activity, the court-martial of Army 1st Lt. Ehren Watada at Ft. Lewis, Wash., ended in a mistrial in February. Watada was charged with “conduct unbecoming an officer” for antiwar statements he made before Veterans for Peace and other organizations and for refusing to deploy with his unit to Iraq. A new court-martial is set for July.

Cantu belongs to an organization called Iraq Veterans Against the War and is an active antiwar blogger. Except for a letter of admonishment he was given for his largely antiwar website http://www.soldiersvoices.net , he said, “the Army has respected my rights.”

After he registered his website and promised not to post pictures of himself in uniform, he was left alone.

“A lot of soldiers have the belief that freedom of speech doesn’t apply to us, but that couldn’t be further from the truth,” Cantu said. “Since speaking out, I’ve been part of two Army briefings where we were explicitly told that freedom of speech applies to us.”

Legal scholars sense a softening on the part of the military on free-speech issues since the discordant Vietnam era.

“There is a much more nuanced idea of what it means to ‘support the troops.’ Both sides now use that slogan,” said Diane Amann, a constitutional law professor at UC Davis.

“It is a very different atmosphere from the last time around. It is much easier to see those in uniform as part of the great circle of society.”

Iraq Veterans Against the War is modeled on Vietnam Veterans Against the War, which was founded in 1967 and played a high-profile role in the antiwar movement of that era. But the Iraq group does not yet have the same political traction as its predecessor, which had the concurrent anti-draft movement to help fill its ranks.

With an estimated 700 active members nationwide, the organization has a simple platform: the immediate withdrawal of all troops, improved treatment for soldiers upon their return and a national contribution to the reconstruction of postwar Iraq.

Sgt. Jabbar Magruder, 24, served in Iraq in 2005 and is still a member of the California National Guard while he attends Cal State Northridge as a pre-med major.

In his civilian mode, he serves as secretary of the Los Angeles chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War, attends antiwar demonstrations and meets with students on college campuses. He recently traveled to Hawaii to speak to potential military recruits about the Iraq war and was one of nearly 1,000 regular military, National Guard and Reserve members who signed an Appeal for Redress that was delivered to Congress in January.

The three-sentence appeal reads: “As a patriotic American proud to serve the nation in uniform, I respectfully urge my political leaders in Congress to support the prompt withdrawal of all American military forces and bases in Iraq. Staying in Iraq will not work and is not worth the price. It is time for U.S. troops to come home.”

Like most members of his organization, Magruder is not a pacifist but is opposed to the U.S. policy in Iraq. “For me, it was all about the weapons of mass destruction. When we didn’t find any, that was the final straw,” he said.

But during weekend and summer training drills with the National Guard, Magruder said, he is all soldier. “I can’t go to drill and all of a sudden shout I’m against the war. When I’m in uniform, I have to play that role. I don’t like people who proselytize anyway.”

Magruder, who was posted at a U.S. airbase near Tikrit, Iraq, said he gets along well with his Guard colleagues, even those who still support the war. “I don’t have any trouble in my unit,” he said, “because I went with them to Iraq and they respect me for that.”

Mike Ergo, a 24-year-old former Marine who served two tours in Iraq, participated in the bloody assault on Fallouja in November 2004. “I lost my best friend,” Ergo said. “My battalion lost 21 people.”

The solidly built Ergo, an honors student at a Bay Area community college, has a large, colorful tattoo on his right shoulder that reads “Born to Fight.” His left forearm bears a tattoo of a sword-wielding St. Michael carrying the scales of justice and standing on a vanquished enemy. Ergo said he got that tattoo after he killed his first insurgent in Iraq.

Sitting at a Starbucks near his Walnut Creek home, Ergo explained how his views changed from being gung-ho on Iraq to being against the war.

“When I got back and had time to sort out Sept. 11 and the events that led to Iraq, I began to question things,” said Ergo, a jazz saxophonist who gave up a college music scholarship to join the Marines.

“At first, I didn’t understand that you could be proud of military service and still be opposed to a specific war. All of us are ready to die if necessary for a noble cause. I was just mad that this cause wasn’t worth dying for.”

Like Magruder, Ergo said his fellow Marines have responded mostly positively to his activities: “My former executive officer wrote me an e-mail saying he was proud of what I was doing.”

At demonstrations, the physically fit, buzz-cut veterans stand out among protesters drawn largely from the extreme left or special-interest causes.

“A lot of us were America’s poster boys,” said former Air Force Sgt. Tim Goodrich, 26, president of Iraq Veterans Against the War.

O’Neill, who now studies political science at UC Berkeley, sees his mission as providing credibility and legitimacy to the antiwar movement.

“Our job,” said O’Neill, the son of a University of California administrator and a schoolteacher, “is to change the image and the aesthetic and the language of the left-leaning antiwar movement to make it less polarizing.”

rone.tempest@latimes.com

The Golden Guide: Hallucinogenic Plants
by Richard Evans Schultes

What are hallucinogenic plants? How do they affect mind and body? Who uses them – and why? This unique Golden Guide surveys the role of psychoactive plants in primitive and civilized societies from early times to the present. The first nontechnical guide to both the cultural significance and physiological effects of hallucinogens, HALLUCINOGENIC PLANTS will fascinate general readers and students of anthropology and history as well as botanists and other specialists. All of the wild and cultivated species considered are illustrated in brilliant full color.

The entire book online here.
Via Boing Boing.