Results tagged “armedforces”

It's a new semester at City College and it'll be a new round of fighting over a campus center's "Guillermo Morales/Assata Shakur" sign. The Daily News reports that City Councilman Charles Barron re-placed the controversial sign for the City College NY community center and vows to re-place it if it's taken down again:

"We are here to say to the City University that we have a right to self-determination, that we have a right to free speech, that we have a right to freedom of expression," Barron said. "We are saying that you can't determine who our heroines and heroes are going to be."

Morales and Shakur, both CCNY alums one-time students, are both living abroad after escaping custody/prison and are wanted by the authorities. Morales was a bomb maker (one bomb at the Fraunces Tavern killed four) for the Armed Forces of National Liberation and Shakur was convicted of killing a NJ State trooper in 1973; much has been made about whether Shakur actually fired a gun.

In the wake of President Bush's Wednesday night address to the country, when he announced that he will send thousands of more soldiers to Iraq, hundreds of people protested the plan. They convened at the tiny island in the middle of Times Square in front of the U.S. Armed Forces recruiting station, with signs like "Stop the funding, stop the war" and "When government lies, Democracy dies" with drivers passing by honking their horns. Some protesters were dressed as Guantanamo prisoners. Of course, there were counter-protesters; one sign said, "Warning: Leftist protesters trying to demoralize our troops." No arrests were reported.

The city is always a hotbed for activism. Metro has a story about two gay men and a lesbian staging a sit-in in front of the U.S. Armed Forces Recruiting Station in Times Square yesterday. Only thing is the USAFRS was closed! The three protesters, who were trying to "enlist in defiance of the military’s ban on homosexuals" believe the USAF knew they were staging the purpose and decided to close up. Jake Retain, a Soulforce coordinator, told Metro, "Why else would they be closed at 10 a.m. Wednesday?"