----- Original Message ----- From: <portsideMod at netscape.net> To: <portside at egroups.com> Sent: Monday, November 13, 2000 11:55 PM Subject: Movement in Miami: two eyewitness accounts
************************** 'It feels like Birmingham'
>From Mari Castellano by way of Jim Williams and
Mike Klonsky
By Mari Castellanos
Friends, many of you have asked "what's going on in Florida?". This is an attempt to fill you in, from a very exhausted person. I hope it is accurate, albeit biased since I am a diehard Democrat. Get mad. Pass it on. Mari Castellanos
It felt like Birmingham, last night, at a mammoth rally at New Birth Baptist Church, a primarily African American congregation in Miami - 14,000 members led by young and fiery Bishop Victor Curry.
I was privileged to be seated with the "pastors" at the front of the church, fifteen feet away from the pulpit (Please God, just once before I die I want to preach like Jesse!).
The sanctuary was standing room only. So were the overflow rooms and the school hall where people connected via large TV screens. In all rooms people sang, and prayed, and listened. Story after story was told of people being turned away at the polls, of ballots being allegedly destroyed, of NAACP election literature being allegedly discarded at the main post office, of Spanish speaking poll workers being sent to Creole precincts and vice-versa, and on and on.
Union leaders, civil rights activists, Black elected officials, ministers, rabbis, and an incredibly passionate and inspiring Marlene Bastiene - president of the Haitian women's organization - spoke for two or three minutes each, reminding the assembly of the price their communities had paid for the right to vote and vowing not to be disenfranchised ever again. Then the Rev. Jesse Jackson preached it.
You folks need to know what's happening in Florida, a state where some dead people still vote (Miami, 1998), while live registered voters are told they are not in the electoral roster (Miami, 2000). Law suits are being filed in federal court today. Marches are scheduled all over the State. The ballot scandal in Palm Beach is outrageous and I don't think the Jewish condo commandos will accept their votes for Gore becoming votes for Buchanan because of a faulty ballot design. You also need to know that Gov. Jeb Bush sent out letters, bearing the seal of the Governor of Florida, to registered Republican voters encouraging them to request absentee ballots and "vote Republican". Last night the Black leadership spoke of starting a drive to recall Jeb. Yet, none of this made the late evening news I watched.
This is our election, our vote, our constitutional right, our democracy, the reason so many of us left our countries of birth and became Americans. As Madame Bastiene so eloquently put it, this is what all those Haitians -and Cubans - who washed upon our Florida shores were seeking, the right to freely elect our leaders. We can't let the Bush brothers take it away.
Last night we were reminded that it took eleven months of walking to work to win the bus strike. We cannot allow them to call the election today. Demand a challenge. We nay need you to come south once more and help us win this battle.
I am extremely tired but I hope I was able to tell it like it is.
Post message : portside at egroups.com Subscribe : portside-subscribe at egroups.com Unsubscribe : portside-unsubscribe at egroups.com List owner : portside-owner at egroups.com Web address : http://www.egroups.com/group/portside Digest mode : visit Web site