Ever wonder why so many people are experiencing homelessness in Portland, or why the panhandling debate never seems to die? It most certainly has something to do with the economy, but it also has something to do with the lack of ongoing revenue and affordable housing units available to low-income working people.

Our sister city to the north, Seattle, just overwhelmingly passed (63 percent) a housing levy for $145 million over a seven year period. Most of the levy, $104 million, will go toward producing and preserving 1,670 apartments for low-income individuals, while another $4 million will go to more than 3,000 individuals and families in need of rent assistance.

It doesn’t stop there. More than $6 million will go towards purchasing land for affordable housing, with $14 million going toward operations and maintenance for affordable rental units and another $9 million going for homebuyer’s assistance.

The levy not only provides homes for people experiencing homelessness and poverty, it also goes to create an ongoing revenue stream for jobs and construction projects in the region.

All for $17 per $100,000 of assessed property value annually. That means for most Portland homeowners, they would be contributing $34 to $68. That might be the same amount you find yourself donating to a local non-profit to help feed, cloth or house an individual. Why not put that money toward something that will house thousands of people?

Street Roots realizes there are barriers both locally and at a state level concerning the tax structures and how money will be allocated. We also realize there are many competing interests, ranging from the schools to human services and the arts. At the end of the day, all of these things – schools, human services and the arts would benefit from a revenue stream dedicated to improving the quality of life by providing a warm and safe place for individuals and families to call home.

The region has excellent leadership at a government level when it comes to helping secure funding for people experiencing homelessness and poverty. In the past year, both city and county government have been engaged at one level or another in helping maintain our fragile safety net for the area’s poor. They’ve done more with less and should be commended for their efforts.

In a time when unemployment rates, hunger and homelessness are at an all-time high both locally and throughout Oregon – we have a responsibility to help maintain the basic needs of our citizens – not just this year, but for many years to come.

The recent passing of the housing levy in Seattle gives us hope. Hope that even in hard times people can pull together and find a way to do the right thing – even if that means paying $17 to $100 a year for the areas most vulnerable citizens.

Street Roots believes the political will exists to pass a levy or a tax locally for affordable housing. We’re hoping that together as a community, we can make that happen in 2010.

If you are already a regular customer of Melissa Walsh, one of Street Roots great vendors, you’ll especially enjoy this edition of Street Roots. It features a story in pictures of Melissa and her husband Sean’s lives, including the obstacles they face and the love between them that carries them through.

And if you’ve never met Melissa or Sean, come and discover this incredible couple that are among so many finding their own path to survival in this city. It’s a compelling piece of photojournalism by Leah Nash that you won’t want to miss.

Street Roots hits the pavement first thing Friday morning, and your vendor will be ready and waiting with this and many other stories to share!

Also in this issue:

“We want to live in peace.” The words of Isdud Al Najjar, who was recently honored for her work with Mercy Corps in Palestine. Joanne Zuhl interviewed Mrs. Al Najjar during her visit to receive the humanitarian award.

The last Republican: Investigative journalist Max Blumenthal looked deep into the heart of the Republican Party. What he found should make the GOP blush. Rosette Royale reports.

Plus, columns by Sally Martin and Ruth Kovacs, an interview on the Street News Service, a biting editorial on what really needs to be done on the housing front, and much more. Thanks, as always, for your tremendous support, and for proving time and time again that Street Roots readers are the finest in town!

Almost from the moment the state Legislature voted to create $733 million in additional revenue by raising the corporate minimum tax and personal income taxes of wealthy people, drama ensued — predictable in a state known for its hatred of taxes.

A group calling itself Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes quickly created a campaign and raised $1.2 million to collect enough signatures to refer the taxes — now known as Measures 66 and 67 — to a special election scheduled for January in the hopes that Oregonians would vote the taxes down.

But, according to a variety of sources, there is even more money at stake —  up to an additional $1 billion — if the taxes are voted down, because of their connection to money Oregon has received from the federal stimulus package and other matching dollars.

The explanatory statement for Measure 66 published by the Secretary of State’s office in October acknowledges that Oregon stands to lose federal funds.

“Because some state money brings in federal matching funds, the state is likely to receive more federal money if the measure passes than if the measure fails,” it states.
If Measures 66 and 67 were voted down, and Oregon lost the tax revenue, federal stimulus money and federal matching money, it could total as much as $1.5 billion.
“Definitely, it’s a possibility,” says Linda Ames, deputy administrator at the state Budget and Management Office.

The corporate minimum tax the Legislature raised in last year’s session is a flat fee paid yearly by corporations and businesses in Oregon. Before the Legislature raised the fee to $150 this year, it had not changed the fee of $10 since 1931. The personal income tax raises taxes for individuals and families making more than $250,000.
In the next two years, the taxes are expected to raise $733 million in revenue. The majority of that money will go to Oregon’s general fund. Nearly all of the general fund is dedicated to public education, health care services and public safety.

“Those are the services at stake,” says Steve Novick, who is doing research on the effects of rejecting the tax measures for Defend Oregon, the political organization advocating for the passage of the taxes. (Novick ran unsuccessfully against U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley in 2008’s Democratic primary.)

Oregon receives matching funds from the federal government for two programs: Medicaid and public education.

Getting matching funds for Medicaid is nothing new. Providing health care services to people living at low incomes and people with disabilities through the Oregon Health Plan, Medicaid is jointly funded by Oregon and the federal government. For every dollar that is spent on Medicaid in Oregon, the federal government provides 63 cents.

According to the state Department of Human Services, Oregon provides health care services to 486,500 Oregonians, which includes 272,500 children and 116,500 seniors and people with disabilities.

The federal stimulus package passed in February increased the federal match rate to about 70 cents per dollar.

If Measures 66 and 67 are voted down, the general fund will lack the money to fund Medicaid at its current budget. The amount of money the Department of Human Services estimates it will lose in general fund money is $182.5 million. That is the equivalent of providing health care and related services to 50,000 people.
The Department of Human Services also estimates that it could lose a minimum of $225 million in federal matching funds.

“Anytime we cut state funding out of Medicaid, we lose federal money,” Ames says.

Public education funding—including K-12 education, public universities and community colleges — could be affected like Medicaid depending upon whether Measures 66 or 67 pass or fail.

The federal stimulus package passed by the Obama administration included a fund called the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund. That fund provides money for basic human services and education to states facing large budget deficits.

Oregon received $466.5 million from the Stabilization Fund, $341 million of which already has been spent on the 2009-10 and 2010-11 school years.

To qualify for the funding, Oregon made an agreement with the federal government — called a “maintenance of effort” requirement — that Oregon would fund education at the same level it was funded during 2006, which was $5.6 billion. The current budget for public education is $200 million above that, at $5.8 billion. Ames says it also is expected that education will get an additional $200 million from reserve funds this summer.

Saying that the public education budget is fairly well “propped up,” Ames says that, depending on how the Legislature decides to balance the budget if Measures 66 and 67 fail, the education budget could fall below 2006 funding levels.

“If you cut K-12 too much … you would have the risk of losing all the federal money, even though some of that has been spent,” Ames says.

If Oregon lost the federal stimulus money for education, Ames says there is the possibility that Oregon could apply for a waiver allowing the state to keep the money.
“We don’t know if that would be allowed or not,” Ames says. “The waiver is an unknown.”

Whether Oregon will lose federal matching money, and how much, depends on the actions of the Legislature. In February, the Legislature will meet in a previously scheduled special session. If it has to re-balance the budget because Measures 66 and 67 fail, many people predict that it will be making tough choices.

For example, does the Legislature maintain Medicaid’s budget and cut other programs, or cut Medicaid and lose federal money?

“Preserving the federal match (for Medicaid) would result in substantial harm to the budgets of education and public safety,” says Janet Bauer, a policy analyst for the Oregon Center for Public Policy. “It is technically possible that the Legislature could, for instance, make the entire hit to education and preserve public safety or the reverse.”

“They could cut really deeply in some other programs and avoid cutting Medicaid,” Ames says.

Pat McCormick, the media spokesperson for Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes, calls the argument that Oregon would lose federal matching funds “ridiculous.”
“(The Legislature) has the full range of choices so they have don’t have to cut,” McCormick says, suggesting the Legislature could look to increase revenues elsewhere, such as a surcharge, or an increase in state income taxes for all incomes.
“He knows perfectly well that there’s not a magic pot of money lying around,” Novick says. “He just doesn’t care.”

Novick says “there’s no easy answer” to how the Legislature will be able to preserve funding for health care and public education if the ballot measures fail. “These are terrible choices,” he says, saying that the state would turn into the “kind of sad state that we were” in 2003, when Oregon experienced a recession, rejected an income tax increase, and had to make cuts in the Oregon Health Plan and public education.

“It is very likely that some of the ($733 million) will have to come out of some of the things we get federal matching funds from,” says Oregon Rep. Phil Barnhart, chairman of the House Revenue Committee. “It will affect every area of the budget.”
Barnhart says that to make up for the money that would be lost if Measures 66 and 67 do not pass, education and Medicaid would be two programs likely to see deep cuts, simply because the budgets are large enough to cut enough to balance the budget.
“There really is nowhere else to get money,” Barnhart says.

By Amanda Waldroupe, Staff Writer

Money is the root of all evil, so the saying goes.

It’s not just a tired platitude, says Thomas Greco, who has spent the past 30 years studying that notion, reaching one conclusion. “The money problem” as he calls it, has to go.

Greco is an economist, author and consultant on alternative economic systems that wrest control from multinational corporations and return it to the common man. The titles of his books, “The End of Money” and the “Future of Civilization,” echo his mantra that it’s not just about the little guy getting more money. It’s about the future of our planet, our health and our democracy.

And it’s not just the wishful thinking of a disgruntled academic. The systems Greco supports are in operation around the world, including in the United States. They include the LETS movement — Local Exchange Trading Systems. And the Swiss WIR Bank, a credit-clearing system that has more than 70,000 members, not to mention all the national and international barter exchanges that involve hundreds of thousands of businesses trading in billions of dollars of goods and services.

Joanne Zuhl: At what point in your life did you realize that the current monetary system had to be replaced?

Thomas Greco: That goes back 30 years. I was teaching in the college of business in upstate New York, and essentially money and banking was being taught pretty much to accept the system as it is, with the Federal Reserve and the International Monetary Fund and the money creation process, but I really didn’t understand any of that.

It wasn’t until I had left my academic career behind and got involved in the peace and justice movement that I began to see information that was calling into question the dominant paradigm and the structures of banking and money that we had inherited in the past.

I was trying to get to the basic causes of the world’s problems, like starving amidst plenty, the gaps in income and wealth around the world, why some countries were very affluent while other were economic basket cases, and why we had recurrent wars. And in the process of doing my research, I quickly realized that there were a number of causes at different levels. We have the personal values added to beliefs, cultural factors that dispose us in certain direction, but those all result in some fundamental structures: political, economic and social structures, and institutions that channel those ideas and channel human energy.

J.Z.: With the recent economic crisis, is the time ripe for a new understanding of alternative monetary systems?

T.G.: It is a ripe time because we’re starting to feel the pain right here at home. Before, we were able to export the problem to other countries, Third World countries, I called them economic colonies of the Western economies — Europe, the U.S. and Japan. By dominating markets, both the market and the politics, the Banana Republics have been under the thumbs of the United States for well over a century. The U.S. military has been the enforcement arm of the imperial ambitions of American companies, not just American, these are multinational companies with no allegiance to any one country.

J.Z.: It reminds me of “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.” The author’s name escapes me, but it was very simply laid out how the banks and the military operated in vulnerable countries.

T.G.: John Perkins … he makes it very clear how that works. But before the United States, the empire was headed by Great Britain, and other European powers. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, you had many countries dominating other countries as political colonies and later as economic colonies.

We’ve seen a shift from political colonialism to economic colonialism, just as on the micro level we’ve seen a shift from overt slavery to wage slavery, but it sill reflects a shift in balances of power.

J.Z.: You say that your search for social justice led you to conclude that the economic model was the root of the problem. How, then, will a different system correct environmental and social injustice?

T.G.: I quickly came to realize that the fundamental linchpin, the keystone of this structure of power is the money and banking system. Money is the medium of exchange, and whoever controls the allocation of the medium of exchange controls the economy, and whoever controls the economy controls the politics.

The key to understanding all of this is to realize what the substance of money is. It’s just credit. It’s no longer gold or silver. It’s not even any longer bank notes redeemable for gold or silver. What’s behind the money today is a debt obligation. When a bank makes a loan, they create the money in the process of making the loan.

But banks, when they make a loan, they only create the principal and not the interest, the system has a debt imperative, which is a growth imperative. That’s why economists constantly talk about growth. Because we have ever-increasing debt. And this compound-interest formula, it forces growth to accelerate over time.

We’re seeing basically an explosion of the financial system with an explosion of debt. And as debtors try to service what they owe, they have to continually expand their profits, and so we continue to tear up more of our planet, to make more stuff, and we continue to consume more stuff and that’s what’s driving the consumer economy.

Once we realize that money is only credit, then we can take control and allocate it to whomever we want.

J.Z.: How would the alternative economy work?

T.G.: You create a credit-clearing organization, associated with a group of others, who are both producers and consumers. When you sell something into the system, your account is credited and when you buy something, it’s debited.

We’re reinventing money and banking from the bottom up. The banks have been perverse in their actions, and it’s gotten worse and worse over time. We used to have community banks that used to provide credit. Most community banks have been gobbled up by large bank holding companies. And the credit is allocated to big corporations.J.Z.: It’s like “It’s a Wonderful Life,” only in reality the small Bailey Savings and Loan was taken over by Mr. Potter.

T.G.: There have been a lot of sound principles of sound banking that have been pushed aside and left behind, and so banks do more and more things that are not only dysfunctional but harmful to local economies.

When we realize that money is nothing but credit, and it’s our credit, we don’t have to give our credit to the banks and beg them to lend some of it back to us. By organizing a global exchange system, we can directly allocate credit to those we want to support.

J.Z.: Describe some alternative systems you would favor. You’ve praised the “LETS” movement — Local Exchange Trading Systems, and the Swiss WIR Bank, which has 70,000 members and is the longest-running credit clearing system in the world. How do these systems operate?

T.G.: There’s actually hundreds of direct exchange systems. What we’re talking about is reciprocal exchange. And that means it’s an exchange among producers. Almost all of us are producers as well as consumers, we have a way of earning money, as well as spending money, even if it’s only by selling our services to an employer. It’s not exactly charity, it doesn’t take care of those who are not able to produce anything. But indirectly it benefits them because it creates more wealth at the bottom of the pyramid. They’re able to support those nonfinancial transactions that support charities in the gift economy. Right now, more of the value is going to the stop of the pyramid. We have CEOs giving themselves obscene bonuses even as the middle class is being destroyed.

by Joanne Zuhl, Staff Writer

The offices are moving, in part, due to the merger of the Bureau of Housing and Community Development and aspects of the Portland Development Commission; the combined agency will now be known as the Portland Housing Bureau. The staff of the former BHCD will be located in the same building, just moving six floors down, while the Portland Development Commission housing staff will be relocating from their Old Town Chinatown headquarters.

For inquiries about the new bureau, call 503.823.2375. There may be brief interruptions in services while the bureau moves offices during the next week.

In this week’s Street Roots we published a Letter to the Editor, in which an avid reader, and elder from the Watoska Band of Ramanichal took offense to the liberal use of the word gypsy in Street Roots, specifically referring to the column, “The Urban Gypsy’s.”

The column has stirred many emotions over the past year, including a sobering piece about what it’s like to be a woman and become homeless.

The column is written by Julie McCurdy, a woman who is still experiencing homelessness with her dog in the Rose City. She has written a regular column with the newspaper and help break the news story about the police inviting themselves into St. Francis Dining Hall back in October.

When we showed the letter to Julie she immediately took ownership of the liberal use of the word, and said, “Absolutely, let’s change that now.” After thinking on it for a night or two, Julie has come up with the idea of asking SR readers to help name the column.

So, readers, what should Julie call her column? Julie is hoping for your suggestions and would love to introduce the next column under the name readers come up with.

And lastly, both Street Roots, Julie and Soup Can Sam, all give thanks for the letter and apologize for any misgivings.

The Letter to the Editor is below.

I have been an avid reader of your paper for quite some time and like what it stands for.  However, there are quite a few of us in the Romani community that find one thing distressing. One of your columnists calls herself “The Urban Gypsy.” Well according to The World Romani Congress established in 1971, the term Gypsy is racist. So used in improper context, saying Gypsy is similar to the N-word. If you want to know what our culture is about go to the Patrin Web site.

I do not know if your contributor has Romani heritage, but I would appreciate it if she would please stop it.  We have a very rich culture and have endured a lot of discrimination. They used to brush my teeth with hospital soap in school for speaking Romani. I know a Roma who was placed in aboarding school by the government, in a brutal forced assimilation program (similar to what the Native Americans endured).

I’m sure you can reply with some such comeback that so called ‘Urban Gypsies’ are living in the spirit of the Gypsies of old.  Well we are not so easy to understand, as we live by our own laws and understandings; and we are driven by a different force.  So respectfully I request… please do not debase our culture by calling yourselves Gypsies.

Thank You!

Casimire Watoska
Elder, Watoska Band of Ramanichal
Life member Romani against Racism
Portland

Posted by Israel Bayer

The  Nov.-Dec. Rose City Resource hits the streets today. Why just today we delivered more than 9,000 guides to homeless services, law enforcement, and hospitals.

Don’t forget to check out the Rose City Resource online.

One of two pallets that came in today.

Wanting to improve your quality of life and help out Street Roots? Look no further. Street Roots online auction is now live until Sunday Nov. 8 at noon.

Trying to figure out what exactly to get your family and friends this holiday season? You’ve come to the right place. Street Roots has partnered with more than 60 individuals and businesses to put together some fantastic Pacific Northwest tidbits just for you in this auction, both large and small. (And if you’re poor, like us, we have lots of gifts for under $50-$25)

Plus, with your support you’ll be helping empower social justice media and economic development for people experiencing homelessness and poverty throughout the Portland region.

Looking for something affordable? We have it. Want an audio history of a loved one, annual museum passes, technology or a health and wellness package? We have that too. From a satirical front page of Street Roots to a fun weekend getaway, there’s something for you to get while giving to the organization.

We hope you like to eat, because Street Roots has partnered with some great restaurants for the perfect date or night out with the family.

From a new bike and a team autographed 2009-2010 Trail Blazers ball to lunch with County Chair Ted Wheeler at his favorite lunch location to fishing with a vendor and so much more, there’s something unique for everyone.

What do vampires, basketball players and fine food have in common? You guessed it! They’re all part of Street Roots inaugural Online Auction! Peruse the pages of the Oct. 30 edition for the gifts that are sure to please — you or anyone else, for that matter. But first, pass a buck to your hardworking neighborhood vendor, who will have the newest paper — along with a smile — early Friday morning. Here’s what you’ll find inside:

Money to burn? If Measures 66 and 67 go down in flames, Oregon stands to lose more than a few local tax dollars. Amanda Waldroupe reports on what’s at stake.

Lose the banks and get back to the barter. Joanne Zuhl interviews economist Thomas Greco on how we need to trash our monetary system and get back to local trade, old-timey like.

Soldiers accuse Fort Lewis of abuse. A report from Seattle on two soldiers with a laundry list of alleged violations against the military.

And did we mention the online auction? Four pages of goodies, big stuff, little stuff, far away places and familiar faces. It’s all for fun, for Street Roots and your neighborhood vendor. Thank you! And let us know your thoughts. We like to hear from you!

Street Roots, the Albina Community Bank in the Pearl and some of Portland’s best photographers are teaming up to present a month long exhibit titled “The people behind the paper.”

You are invited to the opening on First Thursday, Nov.5 at 6 p.m. at 430 NW 10^th Ave. in the Pearl. (You are also invited to stop by during normal business hours anytime in November to see the show.

The exhibit features the work of photographers Leah Nash, Ken Hawkins, John Ryan Brubaker, Elizabeth Schwatrz and Mary Edmeades, shot exclusively for Street Roots.

I read every single article and poem in each edition of your paper. I love the harmonious blend of honest, courageous coverage of the raw experiences of people we see every day…some of whom are going through some of the worst times in their lives.

You bring a face and a beating heart to what many people would rather turn away from. I like talking to the vendors and making that human connection. I like shaking their hands. I like shooting the breeze with them. I never thought I’d be homeless, but one day I was: with a newborn baby in my arms. It happens. One day you’re earning $55,000 a year as a professional working in a high rise building downtown, and then one day you’re sleeping without a roof. It happens. The bottom line is, we all deserve respect. We all deserve compassion.

Thank you, Street Roots for helping us make the connection. Thank you for keeping our hearts beating with love and not letting us turn a blind eye! Thank you for your devotion to such a noble cause. Thank you for all you do.

Sincerely,

A.A.W., Portland

I’ve been to paradise,” a line from an ’80s pop song goes, “but I’ve never been to me.” In a strange way, travel guru Rick Steves has been to a paradise, too, but he’s found that the best places to visit, the ones where you learn the most about yourself, are those where you connect with the locals.

Steves should know. For decades, he’s been bopping around the globe — Spain, Italy, France, Turkey — having adventures that have led him outside the bubble of resort hotels and into a deeper understanding of the world we inhabit. And while most people know him through his PBS show, “Rick Steves: Europe through the Back Door,” his globetrotting isn’t merely Euro-centric. He’s not afraid to step foot in non-touristy, non-Western locales, such as El Salvador or Nicaragua. He ventures to these destinations — the ones that travel companies rarely recommend — because he believes that within the travel experience, there exists a chance to become politically engaged with the world. It’s a notion reflected on his blog, “Travel as a Political Act.”

His political side extends past the borders of international travel. An unrepentant social activist, Steves, who was born in Edmonds, Wash., has worked to bring attention to homelessness and is an outspoken proponent of marijuana reform. All of which means he’s a busy man with a lot of opinions, Steves, in between travels, spoke about what travel can offer, his observations of some Iranian girls, the rise of the megalopolis, his very first trip and the first time he got high.

Rosette Royale: First question, really basic: Why do people travel?

Rick Steves: Well, the famous quote is: “Living on this planet and not traveling is like having a great book and never turning the page.” Travel carbonates your life; it challenges truths you were raised thinking were God-given; it lets you empathize better with people’s struggles; and it lets you know there are other ways of thinking, so you’re less self-assured in the way you look at life. And I find that humbling and exciting.

R.R.: Do you think it’s the same to travel across town or across the state, as opposed to going to another country?

R.S.: Well, in a sense, traveling is meeting people. So you can travel around the world and not meet people and you haven’t done much traveling. Or you can travel across town and talk to people you wouldn’t otherwise, and you could argue that that’s valuable travel. I just really like the people aspect of travel.

R.R.: I guess it’s a Western perception that you think, “Well, you need money to travel.” So, do you?

R.S.: Well, you need money to go far away. And you need time. Time is often something that’s underestimated. Americans tend to have more money than time, so I think it’s real important that Americans find a way to get more time and use their time smartly, as well as their money. But yeah, to travel to Europe, to Mexico: Unfortunately it’s quite expensive. You can travel domestically pretty cheaply. You can hitchhike to California and travel for the cost of your hamburgers and fries.

R.R.: There’s your new book and blog of the same name, “Travel as a Political Act.” What does that mean?

R.S.: Travel as a political act means choosing to travel in a way that broadens your perspective. You can travel in a way that’s just relaxing, recreational, hedonistic — and that’s fine. It doesn’t change you. I like to travel in a way that makes me a better citizen of the planet. And that means rather than going to Mazatlán (in Mexico), I’ll go to Managua (in Nicaragua). And when I step out the door in Bosnia, in (the city of) Mostar, I can turn left out of my hotel and go eat at the touristy restaurant, or I can turn right and go to what was the front line of the recent civil war and eat my humble dinner among bombed-out buildings, talking with the owner of this little restaurant that just opened, which is the first business to open up on the former front line.

R.R.: You’ve mentioned sometimes, when you hear that you shouldn’t go to a section of town, you tend to go.

R.S.: Yeah, I do. I want to find the reality, what’s going on with people who are struggling in their lives.

R.R.: Is that why you think we’re not to go to those dangerous places? Because we’ll see the reality of life?

R.S.: Nobody makes money off of you when you see the reality of life. People make money off of you when you are an escapist in your travels, if you want to lay on the beach and pretend the whole world’s a tequila sunrise. I think travelers have to know that all the information that comes at them to help them determine how they’re going to spend their vacation, that information is motored by people who have a business interest in how you choose to travel. They’re not going to turn you on to options that are less consumptive and less profitable. And I find the irony is, in so many cases, the less I spend, the more I experience.

R.R.: You have a special about Iran, which is on hulu.com. What were your impressions? I mean, Iran: It’s the politically hot country. At least from our viewpoint.

R.S.: I’m just very impressed by the impact of propaganda on both sides of an issue. People in Iran are victimized by their government’s propaganda and their media’s propaganda; people in the United States by our government’s propaganda and our media’s propaganda. No company is going to spend money to put a program like mine on the air that humanizes the enemy. That’s just not what they want to do.

I wanted to go there and try to understand what makes those people tick. And what I concluded after several weeks in Iran was the political base of (President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad is motivated by the same things that the political base of a right-wing politician is: fear and love. I had people crossing the street to say, “We just don’t want our children to be like Britney Spears.” They’re scared to death of American influence. And they’d fight to the death to keep their family values. Well, they’re victims of their propaganda, which makes us seem worse than we are. And when I go there in person, I better understand them and they better understand me. That is travel as a political act.

R.R.: How difficult would it be for an ordinary person to go to Iran?

R.S.: Anybody can go to Iran. You’ve just got to have the visa. And in order to get the visa, you need to have your hotels and your surface transportation figured out. Basically, you’ve got to take a tour. But you don’t need to stay with the tour. You just skip out for a while and you walk over to the mall, and you see girls dressed trashy. That’s fun. Girls dress trashy in malls in Bellevue and girls dress trashy in malls in Tehran.

R.R.:Is their trashy dress like American trashy dress? Is it like Britney Spears?

R.S.: Even better, because they’re from a different culture, but they’re just as trashy. It’s trashy with a cultural switch.

R.R.: Could you describe what that looks like?

R.S.: In the Muslim world, a woman cannot show the shape of her body or any hair or any skin below her chin — she’s not supposed to anyway. So, they’ll leave home and after they get to the mall, they tighten the belt on their robe and they’ve pulled the scarf back on their head. And when you’ve been in Iran for a week, looking at women with no hair tumbling over their forehead, you know how naughty it is for hair to be tumbling over the forehead. And then you see a woman with a beautifully made-up face and hair tumbling over her forehead, it’s quite — (pause) — exotic. Almost erotic. You don’t need to look at cleavage, as you would here, if you were girl watching. Then you realize, this girl is dressing trashy. That’s quite exciting.

R.R.: America, of course, has a reputation which precedes it. So, in the years you’ve been traveling — and how many years would you say?

R.S.: Oh, 30 years.

R.R.: — How do you think America’s reputation has changed?

R.S.: Well, the media shapes our image. The media and the administration’s foreign policy. The media always has the California kind-of-fast life going on. And a lot of people, they look at us and they just think Charlie’s Angels or whatever. Or Britney Spears. That has a huge impact. If you go to Iran, people want to know what’s up with our government; you go to Central America and people want to know what’s up with our government.

R.R.: You talk about the media. But you, in a way, are a part of the media. So how do you think you shape how America is perceived?

R.S.: That’s my calling: Not to change what other people think of America, but help Americans better appreciate what it’s like out there, without their perceptions being shaped by media with an agenda. I’m media with an agenda, but I think my agenda is nicer than somebody who’s just trying to sell fear and commercialization. I’m trying to sell understanding and celebrating the diversity on the planet. I’m fighting fear.

R.R.: Do you remember the first trip you took?

R.S.: Yeah. My very first trip. I was in Oslo, I was just a 14-year old, and I didn’t want to be there — my parents were dragging me along — and they took me to this park. My parents were just doting over me, just loving me. And I looked out over the park and it occurred to me that this park is just speckled with parents loving their kids as much as my parents loved me. And it hit me: Wow, this world is home to billions of equally lovable, equally precious children of God. And it’s sort of a burden I’ve borne ever since, this notion that suffering and love and need and happiness far away are just as real as suffering and love and neediness and happiness across the street.

R.R.: It’s like, I took a trip to Uganda 10 years ago

R.S.: It changes you, doesn’t it?

R.R.: It completely altered my life.

R.S.: Yes, it’s powerful. It’s a beautiful thing. It’s truth.

R.R.: Truth to see the similarities in other people.

R.S.: The fundamental oneness.

R.R.: There are more people living in urban areas now in the world than we’ve ever had. What are your feelings about the megalopolis?

R.S.: Oh, I generally think they’re hellish, they’re soulless. They’re just rusty coffee cans and people who moved in from the countryside in hopes of finding a job and scam artists and bulldozers from the government bulldozing shanty towns that pop up overnight like rashes that are stealing electricity from the wires. Those are the third-world megalopolises, where you have a hundred thousand people living, scavenging off a garbage dump like flies. But that’s the reality these days. There’s lots of cities on this planet with 15 to 20 million people. The last megalopolises I went to were Bombay (Mumbai), Shanghai, and Mexico City.

R.R.: What do you think when there’s someone on your show who loves something and you’re, “Ennh?”

R.S.: Well, when I don’t like something I’ve learned it’s usually because I don’t know enough about it. The more you know about a place, the better connected you are, the more enjoyable it is. Any city will have its charms. But no one thinks of Mexico City as a charming place. You think of Mexico City as a cultural powerhouse.

I enjoyed being in Tehran. I don’t like that city, but I enjoyed being there. Fourteen million Iranians being kept down by a really theocratic dictatorship. Fascinating story. But after a few days, I’m ready for something with a little more charm.

R.R.: Here in the United States, well, there’s wealth for some people. Did you ever have any issue reconciling Western privilege in going to places where you come face-to-face with global poverty?

R.S.: Oh, I have no problem with that at all. There’s a reality on this planet: There are people who are filthy rich and there’s some who are desperately poor.

I think if you’re going to travel with good character, you’re going to travel in a way that’s honest. And rather than going golfing in an elite hotel in the middle of a desert — which is sucking up all the water and importing all the food and using local people only as a cheap labor force, with all the profit leaving the country and going back to the international people who own it — I’d rather travel in a way that puts money into the local economy. And I’d like to travel in a way that humanizes that country and I gain empathy for the people and learn what their struggles are. And then, when I go home and I step into a voting booth, I realize that who I vote for impacts those people in a poor country more than my short-term financial best interest. That seems almost perverse in our society. But to me, it’s not: It’s just enlightened. And I gained that kind of enlightenment through my travels.

R.R.:Do you think Obama’s election has had a great impact on the world’s view of America?

R.S.: Oh, yes. People are impressed that he comes to a country and listens. Bush and his people never went to a country to listen: They went to a country to tell.

R.R.: Now, this is kind of a leap from Obama, but: Marijuana. I know what you think about marijuana laws, but let’s say someone didn’t know. How would you sum it up?

R.S.: I think a country’s drug policies should be motivated by harm reduction. I think we need to acknowledge that drugs harm people, that drugs ruin lives and that drugs can be abused.

On the other hand, you can make a case that the mature, adult use of marijuana as a recreational drug is a civil liberty. Personally, I think if you took the crime out of drug abuse, and treated it as a health problem rather than a criminal problem, you could save a lot of money, avoid a lot of heartache and have less people abusing drugs. And that’s why I’m advocating having another look at the legal status of marijuana in the United States, and try to think of a way to get it out of the criminal and court realm and get it into the counseling and medical-help realm. There’s never been a society in history that didn’t have people using and abusing drugs. It’s what people do. There are lots of recreational drugs in our society that are legal and are advertised and taxed, and others are determined to be illegal. I think marijuana should be classified with alcohol rather than with heroin.

What I bring to the discussion is a European perspective on marijuana. In Europe, they don’t lock people up for smoking pot, and they consume less than half the marijuana per capita than we do. They just have a more creative approach to their drug problems. And I think they’re doing a better job with harm reduction.

R.R.: Did you have the European perspective before you started traveling to Europe?

R.S.: No. I never smoked marijuana in the United States. I smoked it first in India, in Afghanistan, where it’s the normal thing, where it’s part of the culture. My first experience with that was in a whole different environment.

R.R.: Last question: What’s your next trip?

R.S.: Tomorrow I’m going to the NORML convention in San Francisco.

R.R.: (Laughs.) Can you tell us what NORML is?

R.S.: (Laughing.) NORML is the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, of which I’m a board member. No, I just got back from four months of traveling, so I’m home for a while now. I don’t know what my next trip is going to be.

by Rosette Royale

Reprinted from Real Change News, Seattle © Street News Service: www.street-papers.org

Photos Courtesy of Rick Steves.

From the Oct. 16 edition of Street Roots

Janet Buckmaster remembers helping a woman who was a victim of domestic violence while Buckmaster was a paralegal in Northern California 30 years ago. The woman was in her 30s, and her husband was in his 60s. She came to Buckmaster on “this horrible cold December day,” and told Buckmaster that when her husband drank, he started to point his gun at her and her kids. Buckmaster helped the woman get a restraining order, and the office Buckmaster worked for at the time helped the woman with her divorce case.

When Buckmaster returned to work after a vacation in August of the next year, she read the local paper and learned that the husband had shot the woman five times, killing her.

Buckmaster says that when she goes to work every day, she thinks to herself that she might read about one of her clients in the paper a few weeks or months down the line.

“I’ve only experienced that once or twice more since I’ve been here, or at least that I’m aware of, which surprises me,” Buckmaster says.

Working as a paralegal for Legal Aid Services of Portland, which provides legal assistance to low-income individuals living in Multnomah County, Buckmaster helps survivors of domestic violence obtain restraining orders, divorces and other legal assistance. On Oct. 9, Buckmaster, along with Rachel Payton, was awarded the Judge Herrell Award for Outstanding Collaborative Efforts to End Family Violence.

Amanda Waldroupe: How have things changed in the 30 years that you have provided assistance to survivors of domestic violence?

Janet Buckmaster: People would come in and want a protection order or a restraining order, and we would basically say, sure. We can help you with that. But it’s a piece of paper, and there’s no enforceability. Even though someone got a restraining order, the abuser could violate it again and again. That’s certainly changed now. Although it’s still a piece of paper and it’s still not magic and largely depends on the abuser’s determination to do something to the survivor…there are legal consequences. The police are a lot more involved now, more responsive. The courts are more aware. Certainly, it’s come a long way. It’s a lot better.

A.W.: What are the legal needs of survivors of domestic violence?

J.B.: Oh my goodness. People need legal protection. They need housing. They need access to governmental benefits. It’s basic survival stuff that you would see of the homeless community … We see families who are essentially on the streets.

A.W.: What are the criteria to accept a case?

J.B.: There’s an initial screening done when someone comes in. They have to meet the federal low-income guidelines. They have to live in Multnomah County or have a court case that is already filed in Multnomah County.

A.W.: What led you to doing the work you do?

J.B.: I’d always worked primarily with family law matters — doing divorces cases and custody cases. To a large extent, our client population in the family law area has an element of domestic violence. But, several years ago … funding was reduced overall and we were kind of forced to prioritize the types of cases that we handle in the family law section. We decided to focus on the cases that involved domestic violence.

A.W.: What was happening at the time that you decided to focus on domestic violence?

J.B.: We were getting a lot of calls (from) lots of people that had this element in their situation. Because we could no longer help anybody we could fit in because we didn’t have the staff any longer, it seemed like we had to focus on the most difficult cases — the most legally complicated cases and those cases that involved the element of domestic violence.

A.W.: Is domestic violence something that makes a case legally complicated?

J.B.: Not in and of itself, but you’re dealing with people who are just in desperate situations.

A.W.: The award ceremony emphasized collaborative partnerships between organizations that work to help, in some way, survivors of domestic violence. Are those collaborative partnerships something that existed when you first began working in this field?

J.B.: No, certainly not, and not to the extent it is now. It was much more difficult for people to get information or find out what they could do and where they could go.

A.W.: How did it affect others?

J.B.: I think we all felt isolated from one another. Before there was a lot of community outreach, and before the collaboration, I think it was difficult for everyone. We didn’t know, for example, what may be available in the community so that we could make referrals.

A.W.: What are your hopes for the One Stop Center’s impact on domestic violence?

J.B.: Well, certainly, I hope that it will eliminate a lot of hurdles, (and) centralize (services) for people. People in those situations don’t have access to phones or the Internet, and it’s difficult to put all of those pieces together. Hopefully, it will ease what they’re going through.

A.W.: Do you think domestic violence is something that can be ended?

J.B.: That’s a tall order, I think. Just given behavior patterns, when you’ve got an abuser who was abused as a child and grew up in that element, and that’s all this person knows. And you layer that with drugs and alcohol. The behavior issues are still there and alcohol and drugs exacerbate that. I don’t know how to stop that type of person. But that’s no reason for us to stop trying. I get on my soap box about what we need is child care and support systems far beyond what we have. In an ideal world, I guess it would end. I don’t know if I’ll see that. I think great strides have been made in that regard.

by Amanda Waldroupe, Staff Writer

From the Oct. 16 edition of Street Roots

Now being dubbed “the Gateway Center” by domestic-violence service workers and advocates, because it will be located near 122nd Avenue and East Burnside, the center will offer an array of services, including shelter, emergency food and clothing, child care and legal resources.

“It’s the realization of a long vision,” says Kris Billhardt, the director of Volunteers of America’s Home Free program, which provides emergency and transitional services for victims of domestic violence.

On Oct. 9, during the awarding of the Judge Herrell Award for Outstanding Collaborative Efforts to End Family Violence, Billhardt looked forward to the opening of the Gateway Center in 2010, while also not forgetting the effect the recession has had on people who try to stop domestic violence, as well as those who suffer from it.

“How many stayed in abusive homes because they lost their jobs? How many experienced an escalation of violence because the abuser lost his job?” Billhardt asked during her keynote speech.

According to figures collected by the Portland Police Bureau, the city received 5,378 incident reports related to domestic violence this year. In 2006, there were a total of 6,000. Domestic violence accounts for 49 percent of all simple assaults in Portland.

The Judge Herrell Award is named in honor of Judge Herrell, who was a family-law judge in Multnomah County in the 1980s and an advocate for victims of domestic violence and their children.

This year, the award was given to Rachel Payton, an advocacy coordinator with Volunteer of America’s Home Free program, and Janet Buckmaster, a paralegal at Legal Aid Services of Portland, and the Safe Start Team, a Gresham-based multidisciplinary group working directly with the Gresham Child Welfare Office.

Street Roots talked to Payton and Buckmaster (See page next blog post) about the work they do for victims of domestic violence, the Gateway Center, and whether domestic violence is something that can be ended.

Rachel Payton

Volunteers of America’s Home Free program, which Payton works for as an advocacy coordinator, provides emergency services to victims of domestic violence, including shelter referrals, motel vouchers, children services, and support groups. The program also offers transitional services and rental assistance in an effort to help survivors find permanent housing.

As a child, Payton witnessed domestic violence firsthand. She says that her stepfather abused her mother, who also was abused by two other boyfriends. Payton says her mother was always physically protective of her, but the abuse trickled down emotionally.Amanda Waldroupe: What led you to do the work you’re doing now?

Rachel Payton: My mom died in 1998. During the process of her passing, I knew it was time for me to do something to honor her memory. I was 22. When I started to do this work, I thought I would do it as a volunteer. But then a position opened, and it just kind of grew from there.

A.W.: How does having experienced domestic violence as you were growing up influence the work that you do?

R.P.: I think it’s always influenced the work I do. When I was young, I didn’t have a lot of power and control over what was happening. I could support my mom, but I always knew that someone would come help. I didn’t know who that somebody would be. But we’re talking about the ’70s and early ’80s, and there weren’t as many resources for domestic violence back then. I always knew that I wanted to help people. And this was close to me.

A.W.: Why do you think there is a big need for both types of services your program provides, the emergency services and more long-term services?

R.P.: Shelters are an important environment for people who have never been on their own. On the flip side of that, there are people who are fine on their own. A program like ours can wrap around their needs. Both sides of the coin get met.

A.W.: The awards ceremony emphasized collaboration and partnerships between agencies providing services to victims and survivors of domestic violence. How does that help end domestic violence in a person’s life?

R.P.: I think that the collaboration is what I feel is really key. We have one type of service. If someone is needing someplace where they can live, then, since we don’t operate a shelter, we’re not going to meet their needs. Since we end up working up with the same people, it’s important to meet their needs. There’s usually an overlap. It’s important for us to know how that system works. It works for them as well.

A.W.: How is the recession affecting domestic violence?

R.P.: I can’t speak how it’s affected domestic violence per se. There is competition in the housing market. There is more competition for jobs that used to be more easily accessible. I’m noticing an impact. I know that the people I work with, a job at McDonald’s used to be easy to get. But those jobs are getting harder to get. There is a financial impact. The cost of everything is getting higher. I’ve been working with folks a little bit longer—they’re needing a little bit extra time, help, and money to get on their feet.

A.W.: What is a success story for you?

R.P.: A success story for me is someone who identifies a goal and they get it done. It can be really small, like going to one support group, or it can be as huge as starting all over.

A.W.: But is that the story you most frequently witness?

R.P.: Usually, everybody I work with is pretty successful. It may not be the outcomes that everybody would like to see. But success is measured in small doses around here. It could be changing their phone number, or moving, or getting a restraining order.

A.W.: Why do you say everyone you work with is usually successful?

R.P.: Because our services aren’t mandated. The people I’m encountering are reaching out to us. Their goals aren’t measured by us, but by them. People who seek out services are self-selecting.

A.W.: Do you think domestic violence is something that can be ended?

R.P.: I hope it can. I think we all just keep showing up every day and put our hearts and souls into this work. I don’t know that I will be the one to see it.

A.W.: What will it take to end domestic violence?

R.P.: A lot more public awareness. People have to feel OK to talk about it. They don’t have to accept it and tolerate it. Lots of stuff to be done.

A.W.: Do you think it’s as much about personal choice as the services that are provided?

R.P.: I don’t think that anybody chooses to be abused. I don’t think that’s a choice at all. There is this accountability piece that needs to be placed on abusers, and there also need to be resources available for people who don’t want to be there. They need to know that there are options. I think it takes both.

By Amanda Waldroupe, Staff Writer

From the Oct. 16 edition of Street Roots

For eight years now, nearly all things bad coming out of the federal government were tainted by the jingoistic Patriot Act, that sweeping piece of patchwork legislation that chewed up the U.S. Constitution and spit out a new era of government spying, imprisonment and corporate impunity.

That may sound a bit harsh, but considering it created warrantless wiretapping and secretive investigations on U.S. citizens, bound and gagged federal watchdogs, and subsequently allowed telecommunication companies to spy on us with impunity, it’s tough to pitch it harshly enough.

But there are efforts underway in Washington, D.C. to correct at least parts of the Patriot Act’s most egregious elements. Oregon’s freshman senator, Democrat Jeff Merkley, has signed on as an original co-sponsor of the Judicious Use of Surveillance Tools in Counterterrorism Efforts, or Justice Act, introduced by Sens. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) and Richard Durbin (D-Ill.). The Justice Act would reform the USA Patriot Act, the Federal Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act, and other surveillance authorities to help restore judicial oversight.

In addition to the Justice Act, Merkley also has co-authored the Retroactive Immunity Repeal Act to amend the FISA Amendments Act, which shielded companies from liability for illegally violating their customers’ privacy during the Bush administration.

Merkley talked with Street Roots about the need for the legislation and the tough road it faces to a signature from the Obama White House.

Joanne Zuhl: There are three expiring provisions to the Patriot Act that the Justice Act addresses: that includes the government searches of people’s personal records, roving wiretaps and greater government oversight on national security letters, which cleared the way for surveillance on broadly defined targets, including U.S. citizens. Give us your views on what significant changes this bill would make.

Jeff Merkley: The Bush administration went way out of bounds in violating the constitutional privacy of Americans, and we are trying to re-establish that right while setting it in reasonable balance to access to information. The National Security Letters, for example, should be used to obtain records of people who have connections with terrorism or espionage, but not to have a broad authority to obtain basic information without a court order on basically anyone for any reason. In each of these areas it’s really significantly establishing more oversight and tightening the oversight of how these powers can be used.

J.Z.: You say the Bush administration went way out of bounds with the Patriot Act. Give us some examples of what you consider some of the most egregious activities under this act.

J.M.: One was granting immunity to the telecom companies. Americans have every right to know exactly what their companies did and they should be accountable under the law. But that immunity provision means we’ll never know what happened and there will be no accountability, which makes it very hard to make sure that in the future, companies thoroughly respect the constitutional safeguards of Americans. So that’s one example: Use of FISA courts to obtain information without warrants when they could have obtained the warrants with very little trouble. But they just basically wanted to establish their authority that they had the right to anything at any time, rather than demonstrating their case and getting a suitable warrant or doing so within the former appropriate time period.

J.Z.: Is this merely a correction to the checks and balances of the government, or are you looking at rescinding the broad powers that were granted under the previous administration?

J.M.: I think this will put us back much closer to where we were before the Bush administration tore big holes in the privacy protections for American citizens.

J.Z.: The Inspector General has documented in a series of reports the repeated misuse of National Security letters, which the FBI and the National Security Agency issue to justify collecting personal records from people. This has included broad notions of relevance and having “contact” with a suspect, sometimes three or four people removed, and even roving wiretaps for John Doe identities. How are those concerns specifically being addressed? Are we talking about not allowing them or simply having a process to oversee how they are being pursued?

J.M.: Let me give you an example on one of the issues that came up. The FISA Amendments Act ensures that essentially if the government is listening in on foreign conversations primarily to obtain information on an American citizen, they’re really listening in on the conversation with the American without appropriate protections and process. That would be basically banned. We can only imagine all that the government did under the Bush years. This is called reverse targeting; Section 305 of the bill, where the government, in order to listen in on an American citizen without going through appropriate protocol to demonstrate that that’s appropriate, would listen in on someone overseas who is having a conversation with that individual. So this basically ends reverse targeting.

J.Z.: We know that these activities did occur; do we know how widespread or how often? How much was the government taking advantage of these broad openings in the law?

J.M.: I don’t know that we have a lot of information on how widespread it has been. The government tends to be very protective of that. As the powers of electronic surveillance collection increase, through the use of computers and the whole electronics revolution, if you will, it becomes very easy to absorb enormous amounts of information that it wouldn’t have been logically possible to get before, so there are new challenges to the privacy of Americans in the face of powerful new tools available to the government.

J.Z.: Much of the FISA activities are inherently secretive. Will the JUSTICE Act open this up to the general public to understand better what the government is doing?

J.M.: There are some provisions in this bill for public disclosure. It’s a very complicated series of provisions. For example, with the FISA court, there are new provisions to require more public recording on the use of FISA. However, the FISA court operates in secret so there wouldn’t be as much oversight as you and I might hope.

J.Z.: The JUSTICE Act includes a provision to repeal the protection granted to telecommunication companies that conspired with the U.S. government in warrantless wiretaps. But you’ve also co-authored the Repeal Retroactive Immunity Provision in FISA Amendments Act as a separate act that would repeal a provision that shields telecommunications companies from legal repercussions if they participated in the National Security Agency’s program of warrantless wiretaps on U.S. citizens. Why is this separate?

J.M.: There are about four of us who cosponsored this bill, we feel very adamantly that you have to take it very seriously when a company abuses the rights of Americans, and that basically sweeping that under the rug or covering it up is unacceptable. Both to understand what’s happened but also to understand how we prevent it from happening again.

J.Z.: What will this mean for the companies that are using that protection now against lawsuits from citizens who say their rights were violated?

J.M.: Right now, the door is slammed shut, so that there is no opportunity for citizens to make their case in court. Citizens need to have the chance to make their case if their rights were violated.

The intent is not only fairness for individuals whose rights may have been trampled on. Right now, that door is slammed shut, so we haven’t had any sort of court process that introduces evidence, so we really know what went on or in what manner or how many times this occurred and to what level of egregiousness. But it would also say to folks that you must respect the laws that were laid out to protect the privacy of Americans. There were reasonable alternatives throughout for the executive branch to go through the appropriate steps in a very timely manner to protect the privacy of Americans. They chose to go right over the top of that and if indeed those rights were trampled, we need to make sure we know what happened and make sure it won’t happen again.

J.Z.: Is there any safeguard against these rights just being reversed under the next administration, if it was so easily done under the Bush administration? Are these laws just blowing in the wind?

J.M.: No, I don’t think so, because the protections have served very well. Administrations have respected them — Democratic and Republican. But then we had the Bush administration, which did not. Hopefully, this is an anomaly, but it’s more likely that it is going to be an anomaly if we have a very strong statement about the privacy of Americans and respect for the constitution.

J.Z.: President Obama said he was open to changes in the legislation. However, as a senator, he voted for the provision that granted immunity to telecom companies. There is speculation that this is not going to fly because of wanting to appear tough on terrorism, tough on defense. What is the political environment for this bill?

J.M.: I want to make absolutely clear that this bill is tough on terrorism and strong on defense. What it does is state the reasonable steps you take to protect privacy in obtaining information. In fact under FISA, prior to the Bush administration, you could gain information as long as you got a warrant within a certain time period. But the administration just ignored all that. While opponents may try to cast this, we have to push back very, very strongly. This, if anything — because it lays out the principles this nation stands for, while giving plenty of opportunity for appropriate access to information in cases related to espionage, counter-espionage, terrorism and so forth — this is the right way to go. You’re correct, we’re going to have to fight very hard in order to succeed.

By Joanne Zuhl, Staff Writer