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Inside the New Print Edition of CounterPunch: How Go the Democrats? Democrats on the Brink: Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair; Innocent Lads, Depraved Killers and Predatory Priests by JoAnn Wypijewski; Torture Air, Inc.: the Road to Rendition: by Jeffrey St. Clair. Remember these stories are available exclusively in the print edition of CounterPunch. CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! Call Toll Free 1-800-840-3683 or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558

Coming Soon from CounterPunch Books Other Lands Have Dreams: From Baghdad to Pekin Prison by KATHY KELLY Click Here to Order! Today's Stories March 23, 2005 Patrick Cockburn The US Frees Iraqi Kidnappers to Become Spies March 22, 2005 William Blum Anti-Empire Report: Democracy--or is it the US Military--on the March Jim Vallette Cheney's Oil Change at the World Bank Greg Moses A Palm Sunday Chat with Sis Levin John Farley Bush's Culture of Life: Let the Insurance Companies Pull the Plug When the Sick Cost Too Much Ron Jacobs Halt the Anniversary Rallies and Stop the Damn War M. Junaid Alam How the Democratic Party Fosters Conservatism Rep. Cynthia McKinney An Immoral and Illegal War: Destroying Iraq Isn't Enough for Them Dave Lindorff "Saving" Schiavo; Killing the News James Petras Fateful Quadrangle: Cuba and Venezuela Face Off Against the US and Colombia March 21, 2005 John Walsh In the Bars on the Road to Fayettevile: War Support Paper Thin Werther The Legacy of George Kennan, Chief Architect of the Cold War Mike Stark Where is the "Culture of Life" in Maryland? Time is Running Out for Vernon Evans David Swanson Feeding Tubes for the Third World: Put the Hungry into Comas, Then Feed Them! James T. Phillips Happy Meals: Behind the Grill at a Baltimore Diner Mike Ferner Serving, Refusing, Impeaching Robert Jensen The World Waits for an Answer Paul Craig Roberts A Threat Greater Than Terrorism Stew Albert Vegetable Nation Website of the Day American Press Blotter: Jacko, Terry and Steroids vs. the World                     Hot Stories Alexander Cockburn Behold, the Head of a Neo-Con! Subcomandante Marcos The Death Train of the WTO Norman Finkelstein Hitchens as Model Apostate Steve Niva Israel's Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings? Dardagan, Slobodo and Williams CounterPunch Exclusive: 20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians Steve J.B. Prison Bitch Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber True Lies: the Use of Propaganda in the Iraq War Wendell Berry Small Destructions Add Up CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.     Subscribe Online

March 23, 2005 The Fire This Time The Bush Bros. Racist Crackdown in Florida By PAUL A. MOORE A fire is burning hotter every day in the state of Florida. This fire is much like that set by the former slave owners and their terrorist arm, the Ku Klux Klan, against the post-Civil War Reconstruction. Yesterday and today the racist arsonists seek to destroy any semblance of African-American political power. Prior to the 2004 elections, Florida's Gov. Jeb Bush attempted to reprise the so-called felons list which so effectively suppressed the Black vote in the 2000 election. Bush took active measures to keep the 2004 list in the shadows. His motivation in that regard became clear when media outlets petitioned the courts and the list was forced into the light. The names of more than 22,000 African-Americans appeared on the list of 47,763 alleged felons. Meanwhile, 61 Hispanics were listed. For three decades beginning in the 1950's Black Miamians were empowered through Charles R. Hadley's Operation Big Vote. So revered is Hadley, a public park and public elementary school proudly bear his name. But the Charles R. Hadley of the Orlando area, the director of the Orange County Voters League, Ezzie Thomas, today stands accused of a crime in Bush's Florida. Thomas' activism and an unprecedented Black voter turnout was a major factor in the shocking political upset on Feb. 25, 2003 that made Buddy Dyer the first Democratic mayor of Orlando in history. Thomas helped Dyer be reelected on March 9, 2004. Shortly after Dyer's victories, agents of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) descended on the homes of elderly and infirmed Black absentee voters. Several of those interrogated reported later that agents hiked up pants legs or in some other manner displayed firearms. The FDLE message of intimidation hardly less subtle than a burning cross but Ezzie Thomas went back to work and again turned out large numbers of African-Americans on Nov. 2, 2004. Ezzie Thomas was taken into custody on March 11, 2005 and paraded through a phalanx of news camera to the jailhouse. To paraphrase the charge against Thomas, he believed Black people had the right to vote. It harkens back to Election Day in 1920. Then a white mob laid siege to the black town of Ocoee, not far from Orlando, after a Black man, allegedly carrying a weapon, demanded his right to vote. Ocoee was burned to the ground and half-a-dozen residents killed. Back in Miami, the Internal Revenue Service is trying to settle another score with Black voters. The IRS, fresh off its attack on the NAACP, has opened an inquiry into the Friendship Missionary Baptist Church and its pastor, Rev. Gaston Smith. The IRS has the power to effectively burn down this Black church by revoking its tax exempt status. The church's crime? Rev. Smith dared to receive presidential hopeful John Kerry at an October Sunday prior to the 2004 election. The persons who complained to the IRS? Their identities are protected by the IRS in the same manner that hoods once kept racist marauders anonymous. Paul A. Moore lives in Miami Lakes, Florida. He can be reached at: wwwkings@aol.com