De El Salvador-Anastasio y los del Monte

Guatelinda

Okay this video is a little caught up in a colonial moment but nostalgias a bitch so it moved me...

Borders without visas

Let's live up to the promise of NAFTA and allow a free flow of people in North America.
By Tim Cavanaugh, TIM CAVANAUGH is the Web editor of Reason magazine. E-mail tcavanaugh@reason.com.
May 23, 2006

AMONG THE MANY measures and half-measures that are being proposed to solve the crisis of illegal immigration, there have been some real doozies: a 700-mile wall to keep people out (or in?); a temporary guest-worker program that may end up harming both American and Mexican employees; even a scheme for the largest mass deportation in U.S. history.

But here's one good idea you won't hear about. Let's allow the North American Free Trade Agreement to live up to its promise and permit citizens of Canada, the United States and Mexico to move and work freely among the three countries.

If that sounds crazy, it's only because a century's worth of regulatory corrosion and toxic bureaucracy have made us forget that this is how things used to be. For most of American history, immigration was either open or so lightly regulated that the United States was effectively open to everybody. MORE

What are you waiting for?

More info:
www.cirnow.org/
Go here for more detailed info and to find your senators phone numbers:
www.justiceforimmigrants.org/action.html

Please take a little time to call your senators. For real this stuff they are trying to pass it going to affect all of us. Like new ID cards with tracking devices. It doesnt take much to call and call often. Leave a message and just let them know that you support legalization and human rights...or go to one of these websites that support possitive immigration legislation to get more info on the specifics. I called yesterday. You have no idea how important it is to call. This is how our legislators make their decisions by hearing from you in the form of a fax or a phone call they count it as representing a larger voice of dissent. For reals. REAL TALK. It doesnt take much time out of your day. Here's a local number for Feinstein 415-3930-0707
ITS THE VERY LEAST YOU CAN DO and its pretty simple. abrazos, la mayita

Daily Show and Immgration

Immigration Action

Take Action Now!

Please Contact your Senators Today Regarding S. 2611, The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006

This week, the U.S. Senate will be considering S. 2611, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act (CIRA) of 2006. The legislation represents a positive step forward in enacting a comprehensive immigration reform bill before the end of the year. Over the next two weeks, the Senate will consider amendments to the legislation, both amendments which would improve the bill and those which would cause more harm to immigrants and refugees. It is important that the Catholic network weigh in on this important issue at such a critical juncture.

CIRA contains many positive provisions, including a legalization program which includes a path to citizenship for up to 10 million persons in Title VI; family unity provisions in Title V; and a temporary worker program in Title IV. However, it also contains overly punitive enforcement provisions in Title II of the bill. Moreover, it contains provisions which could preclude some of the undocumented population from qualifying for the legalization program. It is important that our elected officials receive the appropriate messages regarding this legislation. They include the following:

Legalization provisions: We support the provisions in Title VI which provide a path to citizenship for up to 10 million persons and the provisions in Titles IV (temporary worker program) and V (family-based immigration). However, we support changes in the bill to allow the maximum number of undocumented persons to qualify for a path to citizenship. These would include:

*

Restoration of protections for those persons who have resided in the country for 2-5 years and who would be required to go home prior to applying for a green card, including restoration of confidentiality in the process; a right to appeal adverse decisions; no waiver of rights, and an extension of the application deadline.
*

Creation of a realistic opportunity for those here 0-2 years to participate in the program, who under the bill must return home and apply through the temporary worker program, which could take years.
*

Removal of provisions which would render ineligible any person who commits document fraud or misrepresents fact on a I-9 application. (Undocumented immigrants without legal status often are compelled to misrepresent their status in order to obtain employment)

Enforcement Provisions: We also support amendments to the bill which would remove or ameliorate harsh enforcement provisions in Title II, including:

*

the expansion of the definition of an aggravated felony;
*

increased use of indiscriminate mandatory and indefinite detention;
*

removal of protections for asylum-seekers, refugees, and other vulnerable populations;
*

the authorization of local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws;
* limits on judicial review.

Please call your Senators regarding S. 2611.

Please write your Senators regarding S. 2611.

Central America and Iraq

Grandin on Rumsfeld's Latin American Wild West Show( click on the link above to read more)

It was in Central America, remember, that President Ronald Reagan first actively faced off against the "Evil Empire." It was through Central American policy that the previously distinct strands of conservatism and neoconservatism first broke foreign bread (and foreign heads) together. It was the anvil upon which the ideas and constituencies that drive Bush's aggressive foreign policy today were first hammered out. It was the place that secular neocons and anti-communist militarists came together with the Christian New Right to oppose Catholicism's Liberation Theology, which, for them, was the radical Islam of its moment -- at a time when Reagan's CIA director was playing footsy in Afghanistan and elsewhere with the Islamic jihadists who would later be melded with the "axis of evil" into the War on Terror.

Central America was also where Republicans first embraced the idealist language of spreading "democracy" abroad as a key justification for an aggressive, violent, preemptive foreign policy. It was in relation to Central America that, through the Office of Public Diplomacy, the executive branch first used a full range of PR "perception management" techniques to sell a war -- again anticipating the media manipulation that led to the invasion of Iraq. Finally, it was in what became the Iran-Contra scandal that Republicans first tried to bypass many of the restrictions on the presidency put into place (however feebly) after Vietnam and Watergate, foreshadowing the vast, half-secret expansion of executive powers in the last five years. Not for nothing did so many of the current administration's officials and hangers on -- John Negroponte, Elliot Abrams, Otto Reich, Donald Kagan, Michael Ledeen, even John Bolton -- come out of Central America. It is a story that must be read, as must Grandin's piece on U.S. war-planning in recalcitrant Latin America.

Immigration Matters

Counterterrorism Targets: Are You One?
By Roberto Lovato

Youth go to ES

Youth want to reconnect with their roots. We all need to do that at some point! Help out if you can or pass it on anyway. M

*Please repost and forward it to everyone you think might help.*

Dear family,
I am writing to inform you of a special project that our organization is developing. As many of may know we started an on campus organization at San Francisco State University called C.A.S.A. (Central American Student Association). The organization was born out of a need for Central and South American representation on our campus. What makes our organization different from other Latino organizations is that we want to get involved in international issues and in specific in Central America. One of our goals and missions is to take delegations of high school and college level students back to their ancestral lands. This July we are taking our 4th delegation in less than 6 months. What makes this delegation so different from the previous 3 is that they are all high school students. This very exciting and important for us because we believe high school students are the future and we must as privileged university and professional Latinos and other ethnicities begin to take and active and leadership role in their lives.

We met some of these students in the week of action for immigrant rights this past March in front of the Federal Building in San Francisco. While some of our members were fasting for immigrant rights, these high school students were there, by our side supporting the cause, marching and making sure that the hunger strikers were ok. They made signs and they organized themselves in a peaceful way to protest the racist anti-immigrant reforms. They are not just high school students, they are young warriors from our communities who have stand up for our rights. We believe in these students and we have high hopes for them. Please help us raise funds for them to experience the culture and history of El Salvador.
I call upon all you out there that care about the future of our youth to support these students in their efforts to reconnect with their roots and reclaim their identities.
We are fundraising $800 per student, which includes the flight, meals and spending funds. Our total budget for 20 students is $16,000. These students are low income students and is almost impossible for their families to afford this much money for an educational trip to El Salvador, therefore your support is of great importance for this project.
Paz,
Gustavo

You can donate funds to our non-profit Avenues Project
and you can claim a tax-donation for your support. Tax Id .. 300035154.
____ Yes, I ____________________________ would like to donate __________ so that students can reconnect with their roots. Please add my name to the list of donors on your website (AvenuesProject.org), your community newsletter, and any materials you send out to the media.

Checks payable to: Avenues Project, re: El Salvador Roots Trip
Contact Info: 510.776.3740, razafilm@yahoo.com, teolol@avenuesproject.org, www.AvenuesProject.org

Below you will find an important letter from high school students and teachers that I am organizing with, we are raising funds to take 20 youth to El Salvador to connect with their roots.
Please read it, spread it like wild fire, and donate even $20. Everything helps......

Gustavo Choto (email: GustavAlexander@yahoo.com)
Organizer/Educator - C.A.S.A - SFSU (Central American Student Association San Francisco State Univerity)

East Oakland Community High School- Raza Film Class
The Avenues Project, an education non-profit organization (501 c.3)
8251 Fontaine Street Oakland, CA 94605
510.776.3740, razafilm@yahoo.com, www.AvenuesProject.org/

Dear Community Members and Supporters,
Twenty East Oakland Community High School students from the Raza Film Class are fundraising to travel to El Salvador this summer, but they need your help to make this dream a reality. Half of the students in the class are Central American and want to learn about their roots. We have family members who live in El Salvador, but we have never met them because traveling out there is very expensive. We want to learn about our country because we only know about El Salvador from pictures and stories. We want to live there for a couple of weeks and experience life in Central America. We are fundraising $800 per student, which includes the flight, meals and spending funds. Our total budget for 20 students is $16,000.

Some of the goals of our trip are helping our larger community. During this trip we will be helping the people there by making a bridge so that they can transport themselves from the countryside to the city. We will also help set up pipes so that they can get clean drinking water to their homes. We want to also visit and help out orphanages.

We need your support to help empower all of us and also allow us to meet/reunite with family members. We are all excited about going to El Salvador, but we cant make our dream come true without your support. We will be making a difference to the people of El Salvador, and it will change our lives, but we need your help. Thank you so much for your support.
Sincerely,
C.A.S.A. (Central American Student Association)

Raza Film Class- East Oakland Community High School
Raza Film Students
On the journey
to connect with our roots
in Central America.

Name of Students:
Yanina Vazquez- El Salvador
Yesenia Vazquez- El Salvador
Adrian Arias- El Salvador
Maite Arias- El Salvador
Adriana Vega- Mexico
Francisco Flores- Guatemala
German Flores- Guatemala
Maria Felix- Mexico
Luis Sanchez- Mexico
Luis Garcia- Mexico
Jose Gutierrez- Mexico
Jose Agredano- Mexico
Omar Escalante- El Salvador
Jocelyn Padilla- Honduras
Francisco Capuchino- Mexico
Gumaro Meza- Mexico
Ricardo Gomez- Mexico
Eric Maldonado- Mexico
Reyna Rodriguez- El Salvador

Organizer & Educator,
Gustavo Choto - El Salvador

'Sanctuary City' for Immigrants Gets Pricey

http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
By KEN MAGUIRE, Associated Press Writer Sun May 7, 2:14 PM ET

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - This famously liberal city is serving notice that illegal immigrants are welcome, even while Congress is considering tough new penalties. Police won't harass you. Education and health care are available.
ADVERTISEMENT

Here's the hitch: You probably can't afford to live here.

Back in 1985, when Cambridge first declared itself a "sanctuary city," rent control kept apartments affordable.

Today, however, Cambridge no longer has rent control; cheap apartments were turned into luxury condominiums and the city — home of Harvard and MIT — is among the most expensive places to live in the United States. The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is around $1,400 a month.

Vos

EL VOSEO

En algunos países hispanoamericanos como Guatemala, Argentina, y algunas partes de Colombia, en vez de "tú" se dice "vos," y no se utilizan las terminaciones normales para la segunda persona del singular en el presente del indicativo, ni en el imperativo. Este es el llamado "voseo." Uds. no tienen obligación de utilizarlo ni de memorizar su conjugación, pero sí es conveniente que lo reconozcan:
PRESENTE tú piensas --> vos pensás, IMPERATIVO ¡piensa! --> ¡pensá!
PRESENTE tú comes --> vos comés, IMPERATIVO ¡come! --> ¡comé!

PRESENTE tú vienes --> vos venís, IMPERATIVO ¡ven! --> ¡vení!

Hay, sin embargo, una manera más facil de recordar todo esto:

PRESENTE
1. Tomen el infinitivo del verbo (pensar, comer, venir)
2. Quiten la "r" y pongan una "s" (pensas, comes, venis)

3. Añadan un acento a la última vocal (pensás, comés, venís)

IMPERATIVO

Igual que el presente pero no añadan la "s" (pensá, comé ...)
Hay muy pocas excepciones: tú eres --> vos sos