by Tim Wise

For those who still can't grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are constantly looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.

* White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because "every family has challenges," even as black and Latino families with similar "challenges" are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

by WIP

Port of Olympia Prosecution Announcement

Several people have been the subject of prosecution for their participation in demonstrations at the Port of Olympia in November, 2007. Three of the cases, Olympia v. Hutchison, Olympia v. Kohjima and Olympia v. Sloane have been dismissed with prejuduce. Olympia City Prosecutor Kalo Wilcox reported to defense attorney Larry Hildes that “Judge Ahlf's order to dismiss issued on Friday was based on the same facts, evidence, and law that are of dispute in City of Olympia v. Kohjima & City of Olympia v. Sloane. Therefore, the order to dismiss applies . . .

by Amy Goodman

A little-noticed story surfaced a couple of weeks ago in the Army Times newspaper about the 3rd Infantry Division's 1st Brigade Combat Team. "Beginning Oct. 1 for 12 months," reported Army Times staff writer Gina Cavallaro, "the 1st BCT will be under the day-to-day control of U.S. Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command, as an on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks." Disturbingly, she writes that "they may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control" as well.

by Mike Coday

In the aftermath and investigation of the civil disturbance at the Dead Prez concert at The Evergreen State College (TESC) in Feb. 2008, TESC Registrar Andrea Coker-Anderson was served with a subpoena to turn over student records to law enforcement (as previously reported in Works in Progress). The subpoena included a non-disclosure clause that ordered the college not to disclose the subpoena and information request for 90 days. TESC complied with the subpoena and released information on 13 students that included photo identification.

by Moshe Adler

Wall Street must be saved for the sake of Main Street, Secretary Paulson and Chairman Bernanke tell us. First, everyone has toxic financial instruments in their 401k's; and second, these instruments are clogging the credit system. But in fact neither claim is true.

The first claim is not true simply because the majority of Americans don't have any retirement accounts at all. And the claim that the credit system is clogged is not true because there is no object that can be removed in order to clear it. What is true is that the securities that Wall Street invented are toxic. But . . .

by Marco Rosaire Rossi

One of the unacknowledged tragedies of terrorist attacks on September 11 was that the attacks passed so quickly into from the realm of occurrence to the realm of legend in the collective psyches of Americans that it has become impossible to truly understand those events. Even years after the attacks, September 11 is drenched in an almost religious and often ritualized sentimentality, often involving reflexive flag-waving or slogan-chanting. The problem with such sentimentality is that it stifles critical thinking. It is quite unusual to have an open discussion on the . . .

By Mike Coday

Are you a member of one of the faith communities who would like to see the City of Olympia commit to be a sanctuary city? Bad news, this is not your City Council.

Are you part of the large group of folks in Olympia who would like to remember Rachel Corrie, a favorite daughter of our community, through a Sister City relationship with Rafah? Bad news, this is not your City Council.

Are you a member of any of the groups who were pleased to have an ordinance declaring the City of Olympia to be a nuclear-free zone? Bad news, this is not your City Council.