On this week's show...
* we'll hear from Mumia Abu-Jamal, who marked his 25th year of imprisonment in Pennsylvania over the weekend
* a new film on Cuba's public health system premiered at the University of Pittsburgh, and we spoke to its producer, as well as other members of the panel discussion that followed
* the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has refused the right of transgender people to designate their own genders on birth certificates.
* local updates on the Hill District casino proposal, the Mon-Fayette expressway, and the protest at Colin Powell's recent speech
* and also, an update from Palestine
Welcome to this week's edition of Rustbelt Radio, the Pittsburgh Independent Media Center's weekly review of the news from the grassroots, news overlooked by the corporate media.
On today's show...
we'll hear from Mumia Abu-Jamal, who marked his 25th year of imprisonment in Pennsylvania over the weekend
a new film on Cuba's public health system premiered at the University of Pittsburgh, and we spoke to its producer, as well as other members of the panel discussion that followed
the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has refused the right of transgender people to designate their own genders on birth certificates.
local updates on the Hill District casino proposal, the Mon-Fayette expressway, and the protest at Colin Powell's recent speech
and also, an update from Palestine
Rustbelt Radio airs live every Monday from 6-7 PM on WRCT 88.3 FM in Pittsburgh, PA, and again on Tuesday mornings 9-10 AM. We're also on Pacifica affiliate WVJW Benwood, 94.1 FM in the Wheeling, West Virginia area, on Thursdays from 6-7 PM. And we can be heard on WPTS, 92.1 FM from the campus of the University of Pittsburgh, Saturday mornings from 9-10 AM.
We're also available on the internet, both on WRCT's live webstream at W-R-C-T dot ORG and for download, stream or podcast at radio dot I-N-D-Y-P-G-H dot org.
We turn now to local headlines.
Headlines
Local News
[3:00] Colin Powell Protest
"Where are the weapons of mass destruction" asked the 20 people that had gathered in Downtown Pittsburgh in protest of Colin Powell's speaking engagement at Heinz Hall. At this December 6th appearance Powell recounted his memoirs "My American Journey" and spoke about the Iraq War as part of the Robert Morris University Speaker Series.
The protest was organized by Black Voices for Peace and The Black Radical Congress. Protest organizer Gail Austin said responsibility for the Iraq War lay with Powell and stated why it was important for there to be black voices for peace while Bill Nill spoke about Colin Powell's military record.
In his speech Powell referred to the situation in Iraq as a civil war and said that he thought that troops should start pulling out next year. He also added that the world has become safer since he began his military career. The protesters clearly disagreed and vowed they would continue to fight for an immediate end to the Iraq War.
[2:15] Hill District Ministers
Urging the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to vote against the proposed Isle of Capri casino, a group of Hill District Ministers hand delivered a letter to the Pittsburgh office of the Board. In their letter they asked the board to "search your conscience and consider the collective voice of Hill District residents, churches and businesses" and vote no to the casino on the hill on December 20, 2006.
Reverend Thomas Smith of the Monumental Baptist Church was among the ministers who delivered the letter.
The Anti Casino movement has been gaining momentum over the past month and many are hoping that The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board will decide not to grant a license to the Isle of Capri. This coming Saturday December 16th there will be a "Raise Your Hand! No Casino on the Hill Speak Out Resurrection Rally" at 2PM at the Ebenezer Church in the Hill District.
[1:20] County/City Council meetings
On Tuesday, December 5, both the Pittsburgh City Council and Allegheny County Council discussed proposals for a moratorium on the acquisition of properties in the path of the Mon-Fayette Toll Road. Andrea Boykowycz of Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future explains the City Council's decision.
andrea.ogg 0:40
The City Council passed this resolution at their meeting last Tuesday. The County Council heard public comments on a similar resolution, but has not yet made a decision. Bud Palding was one of fifteen people who spoke in favor of Council President Rich Fitzgerald's resolution.
Bud 0:05
The County Council will vote on the resolution in the coming weeks.
Wrapup
For more on local news, you can visit pittsburgh dot I-N-D-Y-M-E-D-I-A dot org.
Global News
Intro
You are listening to Rustbelt Radio, the Pittsburgh Independent Media Center's weekly review of news overlooked by the corporate media. We turn now to news from other independent media sources around the world.
Palestine News Update [2:40]
For an update on events in Palestine, we now turn to the International Middle East Media Center.
* bilain.mp3: Bilain 1:40
Last week, Israeli bulldozers demolished 17 homes in the village of Twail Abu Jarwal.
* twail_abu_jarwal.mp3: Twail Abu Jarwal 0:55
For more news from Gaza and the West Bank, visit the International Middle East Media Center at www.imemc.org
Birth Certificates for Transgender People in New York [2:30]
In sex-segregated spaces like New York City's homeless shelters, people whose gender identities do not conform to a sex designated at birth, including transgender, transsexual, intersex, and gender variant identified people, face severe harassment, intimidation,violence, and discrimination. On December 5th, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene rejected a proposed health code amendment to allow transgender people to change their birth certificates in order to reflect their gender identities as they wish these identities to be reflected.
An alternate policy approved on December 5th states that applicants would need "reliable documented evidence from a licensed physician and mental health professional that they had completed transition from one gender to the other and intended to permanently remain in their acquired gender," in order to change the gender designation on a birth certificate. This renders birth certificate changes inaccessible to many transgender people who do not choose surgery, for personal or financial reasons. The policy would effectively give medical professionals full authority to determine a person's gender identity.
Groups including the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, the Transgender Law and Policy Institute, and the Callen-Lorde Community Health Center have criticized this policy. In a response to the December 5th decision, the Law Project writes:
"Transgender people are estimated to have a murder rate 7-10 times higher than the national average. Frequently they face violence and discrimination when their identities are discovered. It is for that reason that the Board of Health recognized, in the 1970's, that transgender people should be allowed corrected birth certificates. The promise of that policy change remains unrealized as long as the standard for changing gender is a narrow set of surgeries that do not represent the realities of transgender health care, and transgender people remain severely vulnerable to discrimination and violence."
Activist Kaitlyn Tikkun writes: "Trans healthcare is individualized: current best practices recognize that a 'one size fits all' approach is not in the best interests of transgender people. A policy that requires genital surgery to get a correct birth certificate excludes many people from getting this basic documentation that they need to live and work."
You're listening to Rustbelt Radio, the Pittsburgh Independent Media Center's weekly review of news from the grassroots.
[14:00] Mumia Abu-Jamal : 25 year retrospective
On December 9th, 1981, in Philadelphia, gunshots rang out that would lead to the fatal killing of a Philadelphia Police Officer, and the imprisonment of radical black journalist and Black Panther Party member Mumia Abu-Jamal. At his trial in 1982, a nearly all white jury convicted Mumia of killing Officer Faulkner. Ever since, he has been on Pennsylvania’s death row.
In the 25 years that have passed since this night, the inconsistencies and glaring racism that mark Mumia’s case have drawn world wide attention and mobilized an international movement for his liberation. Mumia's struggle has become an inspiration for activists around the world organizing against racism, poverty, corporate media censorship, mass incarceration, political repression, and the death penalty.
Mumia is respected across the globe as an independent journalist, dissident, and tireless critic of American and international policies. He records weekly radio essays from his prison cell covering topics as diverse as US military aggression, feminism, popular culture, labor organizing, spirituality, police brutality, and the plight of other political prisoners. As a result of his radical journalism, Mumia has been named the “Voice of the Voiceless”.In addition to his radio commentaries, he has written five books while on death row.
In April 2006, the Paris suburb St. Denis named a major street after Abu-Jamal.
Speaking at the inauguration ceremony, the Mayor of St. Denis, Didier Paillard declared that Mumia's struggle “is a symbol for justice, for the abolition of the Death Penalty, and for the respect of the fundamental rights of a human being. It is a symbol of resistance against a system which has the arrogance to reign over the world in the name of those same human rights that it tramples with complete impunity on its own soil.”
Rustbelt Radio will now bring you a segment of POCC Radio’s, presentation of “The Block Report” on Flashpoints. Minister of Information J.R. and Fred Hampton Jr. speak with Mumia as he marks his 25th year of imprisonment:
mumia (11:50)
You have been listening to an interview with political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal who has been imprisoned on Pennsylvania's death row for the last 25 years.
[15-20] Healthcare in Cuba
On November 30th, a new film designed to introduce U.S. audiences to Cuba’s highly successful public health system premiered in Pittsburgh, at an event hosted by the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public Health. The premiere featured a panel discussion with one of the producers of the film, Dr. William Keck; Kathleen Hower, Executive director of Global Links, and Dr. David Barnard of the University of Pittsburgh.
Dr. Barnard has focused his work on the integration of the humanties into the education of health professionals. His focus for the panel was the issue of healthcare as a right.
Rustbelt Radio spoke with film producer Dr. Keck and Kathleen Hower of global links.
Dr. Keck, on why he made the movie:
Intro.ogg [1:00]
Dr. Keck worked for many years with the group Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba. His career has been focused on providing quality public health services, teaching community health sciences, and linking public health practice with its academic bases. He is the current chair of the Council on Linkages between Academia and Public Health Practice.
Kathleen Hower joined with two colleagues to create Global Links, an organization dedicated to finding innovative ways to recover medical surplus in US hospitals and match it to the needs of hospitals in less developed countries. Global Links is licensed to ship medical aid materials to Cuba, where over $80 million worth of materials have been sent since the program began in 1994.
Dr Keck, on the principles of the Cuban healthcare system:
principles.ogg [:45]
Some of the characteristics of Cuba's health care system:
characteristics.ogg [:50]
Dr Keck, on public health in Cuba:
public health [1:20]
The Cuban health care system is much more doctor-intensive than the US system:
doctor-intensive [1:45]
Kathleen Hower, on Global Links
globallinks.ogg [2:05]
Dr Keck and Ms Hower have both done work in Cuba for over a decade. They discussed challenges posed by the US embargo.
embargo.ogg [2:45]
Cuba sends doctors all over the world to respond to disasters and to help develop public health in other countries. Their offer to send doctors to Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina was typical of a long-standing pattern of sending teams to respond to almost every major natural disaster globally in the last 30 years. The film "Salud" showed doctors working in Gambia, a country making its first effort to develop a public health system. Gambia has looked to Cuba as a model for success.
The film also highlights Cuban doctors’ work in Venezuela and Honduras. In both countries, as in the U.S., the medical profession is populated mainly by educated middle and upper-class people, and seen as a ticket to a financially comfortable lifestyle.
The country, which is about the size of Ohio, now has twenty three medical schools. In many other countries, doctors are generally unwilling to live in the communities that need health care the most- remote rural areas and urban slums. When Cuban doctors go abroad, they focus their efforts on those who need healthcare the most, and go to live and practice medicine in those communities. However, in both Venezuela and Honduras their work was perceived as a threat by medical associations there. Doctors' associations led movements to ban the Cuban doctors, which were unsuccessful because of massive popular protests.
Dr. Keck describes the U.S. response:
defect.ogg [:45]
Dr. Keck and Kathleen Hower contrast how Cuba and the U.S. are perceived internationally:
foreign-policy.ogg [2:15]
Dr. Keck had a few words of hope for those who want to see a change in the US medical system:
helpless.ogg [0:39]
The new film "Salud!" will be available for purchase at www.saludthefilm.net. The website also has more information on how Cuba's health system works, and news about Cuban health efforts around the world.
Ending
Calendar of Events
And now we present the Indymedia Calendar of Events:
On Tuesday the 12th there will be a discussion on torture, war crimes and Guantanamo Bay. Plans will be made for a mass action to take place on January 11th in DC. This meeting will be held 7pm at the Friends Meeting House, 4836 Ellsworth Avenue. For more information contact pittsburgh.witnesstorture.org or call 412-371-3607.
On Wednesday the 13th, at 6:30 pm, Pittsburgh Friends of Immigrants will hold a meeting. It will take place at the Lutheran University Center, 4515 Forbes Avenue in Oakland.
On Thursday the 14th, at 8pm, Pittsburgh Playback Theatre and the American Friends Service Committee will present: Visions of Peace: Healing violence in our World. Admission will go to benefit Hashim Mersal, a refugee from Darfur who recently relocated to Pittsburgh. The event will be held at the Frick Fine Arts building at the University of Pittsburgh, located across from the Carnegie Library in Oakland.For more information, go to www.afsc.org/pittsburgh
On Saturday the "Raise Your Hand! No Casino on the Hill" Speak Out Resurrection Rally will be at 2:00pm at Ebenezer Church in the Hill District, at 2001 Wylie Avenue. For more information go to drgoddess.com
[1:00] Outro
Thanks for tuning in to Rustbelt Radio here on WRCT Pittsburgh, WVJW Benwood and WPTS Pittsburgh.
Our hosts and contributors this week are Lizzie Anderson, Andalusia Knoll, and Diane Amdor with additional contributions from Jessica McPherson, Vani Natarajan, and Carlin Christy. This week's show was produced by Donald Deeley and Matt Toups. Special thanks to all of our hosts, producers, and contributors.
You can get involved with Rustbelt Radio! To contact us, or to send us your comments, email RADIO at I-N-D-Y-P-G-H dot ORG. All of our shows are available for download or podcast on our website at RADIO dot INDY-P-G-H dot ORG and this show can be heard again Tuesday morning on WRCT at 9 AM after Democracy Now!
Tune in next week at this time for another edition of Rustbelt Radio, the Pittsburgh Independent Media Center's weekly review of news from the grassroots.
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