US African Americans suffer more in drug war

By Jim Lobe

Washington, DC, June 8 (IPS)— The US war against drugs has been waged overwhelmingly against African Americans, according to a new report released here Thursday by the largest US human-rights organization.

Blacks comprise 62.7 percent and whites only 36.7 percent of all drug offenders admitted to state prison, despite the fact that there are five times more white drug users, according to the report by New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW). In some states, blacks constitute as much as 90 percent of all people sent to prison on drug charges.

Relative to population, black men’s chances of being sentenced to prison on drug charges are more than 14 times greater than that of white men, concludes the 28-page report, ‘Punishment and Prejudice: Racial Disparities in the War on Drugs.’

“These disparities are a national scandal,” said Kenneth Roth, HRW’s executive director. “Black and white drug offenders get radically different treatment in the American justice system.

“This is not only profoundly unfair to blacks, it also corrodes the American ideal of equal justice for all.”

The report, which is based on the records of 37 of the 50 US states, found that widest racial disparities were concentrated in Midwestern and Northeastern states, including Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Maine, Iowa, Maryland, Ohio, New Jersey, and West Virginia. In these states, black men are sent to prison on drug charges at 27 to 57 times the rate of white men.

The study underlines the degree to which race remains a major factor in the US criminal justice system which, in any event, suffers a “larger crisis of over-incarceration,” according to the report.

One in every 20 black men over the age of 18 in the United States is in state or federal prison, compared to one in every 180 white men. In five states, that ratio is closer to one in 13.

Since 1980, when US anti-drug laws became much tougher, some 1.5 million people have been sent to prison on non-violent drug charges, resulting in the quadrupling of the national prison population. Throughout the 1990s, more than 100,000 drug offenders were committed to prison each year.

Even the White House drug czar, Gen. Barry McCaffrey, has complained that the US war on drugs has created a vast “drug gulag.”

“Although prison should be used as a last resort to protect society from violent or dangerous individuals, more people are sent to prison in the United States for non-violent drug offenses than for crimes of violence,” according to the report.

Moreover, many drug offenders receive “egregiously long prison sentences,” particularly because of the prevalence of laws which require judges to impose specific sentences regardless of the specific circumstances of each defendant.

Many US judges have complained bitterly about these “mandatory sentencing” laws which, however, appear to be popular with politicians and prosecutors who campaign on “tough-on-crime” platforms.

The actual impact of these laws in reducing the consumption and availability of drugs has been questionable, according to most criminal-justice experts. In general, few drug offenders who end up in prison turn out to be high-level dealers or traffickers; the vast majority of convicted drug offenders consist of street-level dealers who are readily replaced. Meanwhile, adult drug use has not changed appreciably over the last decade, according to recent government and independent surveys.

While these laws appear to have had little if any effect on reducing drugs’ availability or price, their impact on African- American communities has been far-reaching and destructive, according to the report.

“Poor minority urban neighborhoods have been the principal ‘fronts’ of the war on drugs,” according to the report, which cited massive street sweeps, “buy-and-bust” operations, and other police activities which have heavily targeted poor neighborhoods.

Racial profiling —the increasingly controversial police practice of stopping, questioning, and searching minorities in automobiles or on the street based solely on their appearance— has also contributed to disproportionate black drug arrests, the report says. In addition, drug-law enforcement tends to be concentrated in large urban areas where there are a higher proportion of African Americans.

But the imprisonment of so many young men and women in poor communities effectively deprives those communities of human and social capital.

Most analysts believe that harsh penal sanctions for non-violent drug offenses would have been scrapped a long time ago if whites were incarcerated at the same rate as African Americans, who vote in much fewer numbers. Moreover, felony convictions often result in the loss of voting rights, which further disenfranchises a large number of black citizens.

“Politicians have been able more easily to reap the electoral advantages of endorsing tough policies because the group that suffered most from those policies —black Americans— lacked the numbers to prevail in the political arena,” the report says.

Racial attitudes also play a critical role. In one survey in which respondents were asked to form a picture in their mind about typical drug users, 95 percent said their image was of a black person.

The new study is the latest to show racial bias in the US criminal-justice system —a bias that also applies to violent crimes and death-penalty cases. African-Americans currently make up 43 percent of the death-row population in US prisons, almost four times higher than their presence in the general population.

The Justice Department last year launched an investigation into the relationship between race and the imposition of the death penalty amid evidence that the race of both the perpetrator and the victim are decisive in such cases.

Out of a total of 155 interracial murders for which the defendant was executed since 1976, only 11 involved a white defendant and a black victim. In the remaining 144 cases, a black defendant convicted of murdering a white victim was executed, according to statistics compiled last year by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Argentines stage general union strike against IMF

Buenos Aires, Argentina, June 10— On June 9, Argentina was virtually shut down by a general strike called by union federations to protest the latest measures in the government’s austerity program, imposed to meet conditions on an IMF loan. Unions are also angered by a decree that will deregulate the health insurance industry, allowing workers to choose private health insurance instead of union-based policies.

The strike was called by the three main segments of Argentine unionism: the mainstream sector of the General Workers Confederation (CGT), headed by Rodolfo Daer; the more combative section of the CGT headed by truckers union leader Hugo Moyano (this section previously split off and became the Movement of Argentine Workers (MTA), but later rejoined the CGT); and the Confederation of Argentine Workers (CTA), made up primarily of teachers and state workers. While the strike was stronger in some provinces than in others, transportation was virtually nonexistent in most major cities and much of the countryside as thousands of railroad, subway, bus, truck and airline workers struck. Courts closed, and hospital emergency rooms had skeletal staffs. Many people, knowing they would not be able to get to work, decided to take a long weekend, so many stores and private businesses were closed.

In Buenos Aires, the few buses and cabs that ventured out were attacked by angry protesters or had their tires punctured by miguelitos, sharp three-pointed nails scattered on the roads. Mass transit service in the capital was reduced to a minimum, and demonstrators basically controlled the streets. Bank employees noisily marched through the downtown area, chanting slogans and launching fireworks. There was no trash collection, and those determined to get to work had to negotiate garbage-strewn streets on bicycle or on foot. About half of the 120 daily flights to or from Buenos Aires’ airport were canceled or delayed, and several planes left with only 10% of seats filled.

In Neuquén, capital of Neuquén province, demonstrators with signs reading “IMF or homeland” trashed and burned an office of the formerly state-owned oil company YPF-Repsol (now owned by Repsol, a Spanish company) and threw rocks at several other buildings, including the Provincial Education Council and the home of provincial education minister Graciela Carrión de Chrestía. The demonstrators blame Carrión for the recent death of a teacher at a school under construction. Protesters also blocked the entrance to a YPF-Repsol facility in La Plata, capital of Buenos Aires province.

The windows of Citibank branches were broken by protesters in the industrial city of Rosario, Santa Fe province, and in San Juan, capital of the central western province of the same name. In Misiones province, some 300 demonstrators blocked traffic over the international bridge that links the towns of Puerto Iguazú in Argentina and Foz de Iguazú in Brazil. Protesters also shut down highways in Chubut, Jujuy and several other provinces.

In Córdoba department, some 3,000 people blocked Route 38 at Cruz del Eje, a day after police shot at a crowd of some 300 unemployed people with their families — including children — who were protesting at the site. Several people were wounded. The blockade was lifted late on June 9 after the provincial government freed four demonstrators arrested the previous night and promised to immediately create 360 new jobs.

Overall, the strike was peaceful, but the government said at least 53 people were arrested around the country. “Violence is not the way, and we are not going to alter our direction,” President Fernando de la Rúa told reporters as he met in Buenos Aires with economy ministers from the Southern Cone Common Market (Mercosur) regional trade bloc.

Union leader Moyano insisted that “it’s not our intention to strike for the sake of striking, we want to say to the government that this economic model has to change.”

“What the government needs to understand is that the people are demanding a change in direction,” said Daer.

Source: www.americas.org

Co-op union wins

By Brendan Conley

Asheville, June 12— A settlement was reached today between French Broad Food Co-op and Teamsters Local 61, confirming a union victory in the contested March election. The central issue in the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) case is now resolved: the union will be recognized as the representative of the workers at the downtown natural foods store. Attorneys for the co-op and the union reached a settlement at the federal building, just before the case was to be heard by a federal judge.

“The union has been recognized by a vote of 14-13,” said Seth Cohen, attorney for Teamsters Local 61, as jubilant union members congratulated each other. “I’m happy the co-op is finally recognizing the union,” said Catherine Shane, a union organizer who was fired by management.

Shane’s vote in the union election was contested by co-op management, and Teamsters Local 61 filed an unfair labor practice charge claiming she was unjustly fired. Shane said that the settlement resolved the issue to her satisfaction.

Though the French Broad is cooperatively owned and controlled by an elected board of directors, Jon Yarborough, attorney for the co-op, said that the legal action and the settlement were directed by co-op management. “The Board was not involved,” he said. “It was a decision by management.”

Laura Gordon, of the Western North Carolina Central Labor Council, described the co-op’s legal action as an attempt to delay union recognition. “This is a common tactic,” she said. “The workers vote a union in and management refuses to negotiate a contract.” Now, she said, “justice has been served.”

Co-op workers who oppose the union are concerned about how much influence the Teamsters will have in the affairs of their workplace. Lauren O’Leary, a clerical worker not represented by the union, said she sees the union victory as “intervention by another hierarchical, money-making organization.”

The union organizers say that the next step in their campaign is negotiating a fair contract for the workers at the French Broad. “We want to approach a contract in a way that will be empowering, healing, and peacemaking,” said Beth Trigg, a worker at the co-op. The organizers say they want to include all the non-management staff in the contract process. “We’re going to work hard to be inclusive of all the workers,” said Trigg.

The organizers claim that the union has already helped the co-op staff, citing Shane’s ability to dispute her termination by management. Trigg cited a recent cut in health benefits for the staff, and said that the union would ensure that the benefits were restored.