Texans Boycott Calhoun
Texans Boycott Calhoun
You Don
You Don
Legislative Upheaval Didn
Legislative Upheaval Didn
Nuclear Power: Will The Last One To Leave Please Turn Out The Lights
Nuclear Power: Will The Last One To Leave Please Turn Out The Lights Good grief! I
Insurance Premium Up? Thank My Clumsy Dog
Insurance Premium Up? Thank My Clumsy Dog
Each year, we gather as a family to have our pets blessed on St. Francis Day.
We do this because we want to give our pets every advantage, particularly if there
Yet Another Bush Family Favorite
Yet Another Bush Family Favorite
PREFACE
In the July 25, 2005 issue I performed the public service of exposing John J. Roberts, Jr. shortly prior to his Senate confirmation vote after being nominated by our Little Dictator as front man for The Supremes. Consider the events of the past week, and the rampage the legal
Flooded With Questions
Flooded With Questions During the past few weeks, Texans have morphed into ducks. How did this happen? Let
Top TEA Officials Accused Of Sweetheart Dealing
Top TEA Officials Accused Of Sweetheart Dealing As Uncle Hugh used to say, “If you can
Catalysts Of H.O.P.E. Due In Crawford This Week
PORTLAND, Oregon
Safety First
Safety First What
1.8 Million Veterans Uninsured
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Women
DALLAS, Texas
Peace House To Host
CRAWFORD, Texas
Peaceful Warrior — Gun Enthusiast, Veterans For Peace Activist Murdered
Gun Enthusiast, Veterans For Peace Activist Murdered Even with regard to his outspoken political views, Denton resident David Honish, 52, was a quiet man. “He was the first neighbor who’d greeted us when we moved in,” said Christopher Largen, Honish’s next-door neighbor. “He never really had many guests over, and he was always working in his garden. For the life of me, I can’t remember him ever saying a single negative thing about his brother, and we talked a lot.” On Thursday night around 11:30 p.m., Officer David Carol of the Flower Mound, Texas police department found Honish slumped over the steering wheel of his white Ford F-150, on the dirt shoulder off of Highway 377 at the intersection with FM 1171. He was discovered on routine patrol and declared dead on the scene. According to sources, Honish suffered two gunshot wounds not one, as reported by other media organizations with bullets impacting his face and neck. Honish had moved to Denton from Austin nearly a year and a half ago, with the intent of opening the largest indoor firing range in North Texas. His brother, Mark, 44, who now stands accused of the murder, was to be his business partner. According to David’s ex-wife, the two had an ongoing feud, although police and investigators have been reticent to speculate on a motive. In David Honish’s truck, a printed e-mail to his brother containing a seemingly ambiguous threat was discovered. “You don’t roar at me and wag your finger in my face, EVER AGAIN IN THIS LIFETIME [expletive]! I explained to you in Feb 2006 that I was finished taking [expletive] from you. I meant it. There will be severe consequences for noncompliance … because of your own stupidity and your ongoing felony possession of firearms,” David wrote. There was no further stipulation as to what consequences he was referring to, although the legal reference seemingly points to a detrimental, albeit non-violent series of events that had been set in motion. Flower Mound police made a cast of tire tracks found at the scene, and matched them to Mark’s black Ford pickup. Officers who went to confront Mark, who piloted chartered aircraft for a living, discovered him leaving his home in Trophy Club on his way to work. Officers then found several drops of blood on the driver’s side of the vehicle’s running board. Another portion of the pickup’s exterior appeared to have been recently wiped down. Detectives also matched the mud on the pickup’s tailpipe to mud from the scene. In spite of the firearms possession claim made by David Honish against his brother, Mark has not been charged with any such crime. Flower Mound Police Public Information Officer Wendell Mitchell was not aware of a murder weapon being found, and the investigation will be ongoing for some time. The Quiet Type Though known by many people, and highly regarded as intelligent, well-spoken, polite and courteous, few actually knew David Honish in any personal respect. “David used to play with my kids sometimes,” said a neighbor who asked her name not appear in print. “He got along really well with almos
Texans Demand ‘No Child Left Behind Bars’ — Nearly 500 Support Immigrant Families At For-Profit Prison
Nearly 500 Support Immigrant Families At For-Profit Prison
TAYLOR, Texas Nearly 500 activists from across the state and the nation gathered on Saturday, June 23, to demand, “No child left behind bars!” outside a detention center for immigrant families.
Located in Taylor just north of Austin, the Hutto Residential Facility is one of two privately-run, for-profit prisons in the nation that detain immigrant children and their parents.
But to the multi-ethnic, multi-racial participants of the vigil, Hutto is a prison that should be shut down and its prisoners, especially the children, moved to more humane accommodations since it is in violation of international law.
A few months ago, a United Nations expert on children’s rights received initial permission from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to inspect the facility. However, he was turned away because the United States is one of two nations that have not ratified the U.N. Treaty on the Rights of the Child. The other nation is Somalia.
Sarnata Reynolds, the director of World Refugee Services for Amnesty International, said, “All Americans would agree that children should not be held in prison. If more people knew about what is happening in Hutto, they would be outraged.”
The vigil participants Muslims, Christians, Latinos, Caucasians, Blacks, immigrants and indigenous citizens stood united before the facility in support of basic human rights for the imprisoned immigrant families.
“We are all one global community, and should be treated as such,” said Elizabeth Kucinich who has worked with detained asylum seekers in her native England. She reiterated that Hutto does not live up to “the ideals of this nation, which is based on freedom, liberty and justice for all.”
Many of the Hutto inmates are refugees who have applied for political asylum. In fact, most of the adults that are being detained for minor visa infractions usually had lawyers that missed deadlines or misfiled their paperwork, thus causing arrest.
“The people who are incarcerated here are average people like most Americans, raising their children and trying to hold down their jobs,” said Hadi Jawad, who attended Hutto Vigil X along with 70 people from the Dallas/Fort Worth area. “They are hard-working, honest families, trying to realize the American Dream. Hutto is an absolute nightmare!”
Under ICE jurisdiction, Hutto was once a medium-security prison. It was then contracted to the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), a publicly traded company (CXA), by the Williamson County Commissioners Court in May 2006.
When Jay Johnson-Castro, an immigrants’ rights activist from South Texas, began his vigils this last December, 450 people, nearly all children, were detained at Hutto. Now, there are roughly 280 inmates at the prison, but CCA still receives the same amount of money from the government per month to run the facility nearly $10,000 per person.
The ACLU and University of Texas have filed several lawsuits against Michael Chertoff, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, and six officials from ICE on behalf of the detained children for violating national a
Denton
DENTON
The Conservative Lunacy
According To
Decades before Al Gore wrote The Assault on Reason, Maestro Federico Fellini and I were on a Dantesque odyssey in the world beyond death. On that fantastic voyage of the mind, we shared a glimpse into the future. “There is no end. There is no beginning. There is only the infinite passion of life,” he would say. We saw it was so, and that story will soon be retold as it supports Gore
Supreme Court Leans Conservative In Four Cases
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Hippy Camper: Reigniting Activist Roots In Crawford, Texas — Bree Walker Has Big Plans As New Owner Of Camp Casey
Bree Walker Has Big Plans As New Owner Of Camp Casey CRAWFORD, Texas The new owner of property once occupied by a controversial anti-war figure is scheduled to make her first visit to Crawford this week with plans to introduce herself to the community. “I’m basically going to come and get educated about what can be done to repair whatever kind of rift might have occurred between Cindy [Sheehan]’s people and the locals,” said Bree Walker, a progressive radio talk show hostess from San Diego, Calif. The so-called rift dates back to August 2005 when Sheehan gained international media attention for attempting to ask President George W. Bush at his ranchette for what “noble cause” her 24-year-old soldier-son, Casey, died in Iraq. As a consequence of backlash and personal frustration, Sheehan “retired” from the anti-war movement, deciding to sell the five acres of land intended for use as a staging area for future vigils during the president’s summer vacations. The most aggressive potential buyer at the time was Move America Forward, a conservative pro-military group that planned to erect a monument there in honor of the fallen soldiers of the Iraq War. However, both Walker and Sheehan refused to allow the property commonly known as Camp Casey to be sold to the “wrong hands.” Walker bought the land for $87,000 which also covered the cost of property improvements. “I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t do something,” Walker said. “[The land is] too important. It’s a piece of the anti-war movement because it represents one woman’s grief turned into a grassroots movement which hardly ever happens anymore because we live in such a slick, polished media spun environment.” Walker admitted during an interview with the Lone Star Iconoclast that Sheehan’s initial means of selling her land through an online auction was flippant yet at the same time true to the nature of the “Peace Mom.” “We live in an age of spin. Cindy has no spin,” said Walker, a veteran of broadcast journalism and television/film acting. “Putting it on eBay is about as non-spin as you can get. I mean, how unsophisticated is that, right? That’s both the beauty and the downfall of Cindy Sheehan’s message. She simply said what she believed, and it didn’t always come out nice.” Walker said that Sheehan’s behavior was “a throwback to the 1960s” when far fewer public relations firms influenced political discourse. Walker added that her purchase was in the spirit of her own activism which she began as a Vietnam War protester. Her actions divided her family then, but now they have reached an understanding, she said “It’s the old hippie in me coming back to the streets once again,” she said. “I’m not in it to make any money. I expect to lose every penny I put into it, but I’m feeling better these days about at least I’m doing something physically as opposed to just signing online petitions.” When asked if she intends to cash in on the historical value of Sheehan’s property, Walker replied, laughing: “I’ve always bought high and sold low. I assume that’s my destiny. I live in California, so it’s almost
