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PACIFICA RADIO CHAIR BLASTED FOR CANCELING NYC BOARD MEETING FOR 2nd TIME

by S Hamanaka Thursday, Aug. 14, 2003 at 1:54 PM

UNITED FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE LEADER'S UNILATERAL ACTION CREATES BLOWBACK IN LEFTIST RADIO NETWORK. RIFT WIDENS OVER AFFIRMATIVE ACTION. TALKS SET FOR CHICAGO.

Pacifica Radio, with its potential audience of 60-70 million listeners across the country, is the most influential left media outlet in the United States. The question is: who will control it? A bitter struggle over affirmative action has split the interim Pacifica National Board (iPNB) along racial lines. Pacifica Radio has stations in five cities: KPFA/Berkeley, KPFK/Los Angeles, KPFT/Houston, WPFW/Washington DC, and WBAI/New York.

Now, in a move that has many crying foul, Leslie Cagan, (who wears two hats as chair of Pacifica and co-chair of the huge United for Peace and Justice), has unilaterally and illegally cancelled the iPNB meeting scheduled for the Big Apple August 15-17. Such cancellations require a board meeting and approval. Instead, Cagan has ordered the iPNB and reps from Pacifica's five Local Advisory Boards (LABs) to be closeted away in a Chicago hotel this weekend to try and resolve the split over Diversity in Pacifica's new bylaws. Cagan, who voted against affirmative action remedies, chose Chicago to get away from local activists. In particular, New York has a diverse, radical local board and is a stronghold of affirmative action supporters.

After a near takeover by centrist Democratic Party forces that sought to mainstream the network's five stations and possibly sell one or two, progressives launched a mass campaign coupled with a series of lawsuits that landed all parties in the courtroom of Judge Sabraw in Oakland, CA. Part of the settlement agreement called for democratic elections of the Local Station Boards.

Ironically, the progressive white leadership now finds itself in the conservative position of opposing affirmative action. They purport to be fearful of a white backlash and a conservative Supreme Court, despite the recent Michigan decisions which civil rights attorneys hailed as a victory for affirmative action.

Announcing the Chicago meeting, Cagan wrote: "It is time for everyone committed to Pacifica to help us develop a compromise that works, one that will allow us to adopt bylaws, move into elections of local boards and a new national board and to begin the next phase of re-building this network."

Cagan's seemingly reasonable announcement was met with shock and outrage. Pacifica Treasurer Jabari Zakiya wrote to Cagan: "Being the Chair of this **INTERIM** Board, per the Settlement Agreement, gives you no special powers to unilaterally void votes of the entire iPNB, as you are trying to do by canceling our vote to have an iPNB meeting in NY Aug 15-17, nor to unilaterally decide to have a meeting in a city of YOUR choice, for purposes of YOUR choosing, with people YOU are designating."

Cagan's move falls on the heels of a June motion put before Judge Sabraw's court (under the terms of the agreement that settled the Pacifica lawsuits) by other white directors. The motion, based on a technicality, discounted the votes, of several African American directors, including Zakiya, who refused to endorse Draft "B" of the bylaws, which purposely omits affirmative action. Even though Draft "B" failed to get the necessary two-thirds majority on the iPNB, Judge Sabraw ruled that it passed.

Supporters of Draft "B" contend that Pacifica is floundering without bylaws and that the African Americans dissidents on the board are banding together with the remaining "hijackers" who supported the former chair Mary Francis Berry.

Again, Jakiya to Cagan: "YOU also just PRESUME to have the authority to spend $20K-$40K? on this meeting, without the Board having any vote on the use of these Foundation monies. In effect, YOU have ordained yourself to have unilateral EXECUTIVE POWER, which was specifically prohibited by the Settlement Agreement. So what is the difference between what you are doing in attempting to exercise dictatorial power versus what you all claimed Mary Francis Barry/Bessie Wash did? "

"B" supporters claim affirmative action favors people based on skin color and not politics and will lead to the return of the "hijackers" like Mary Francis Berry, who is African American.

Affirmative action supporters, a diverse group led by radicals of color, claim Pacifica suffers from "institutional racism" after a decade of purges which saw the dismissal of radical programmers of color at several stations. They point to the lack of representation and programming for Latinos, Asians, persons with disabilities, persons in prison, undocumented and rank and file workers, and other underrepresented groups

The peace movement in the United States has long been criticized for racism by activists of color and seeks to address that problem. Cagan is a leader of United for Peace and Justice, a coalition of 650 groups. Like the National Organization of Women, UFPJ requires diversity on its national board. UFPJ has an affirmative action policy that resembles the affirmative action remedy proposed for Pacifica. "B" supporters maintain affirmative action remedies are "illegal" and "divisive" and that giving preference to people of color denies voters their rights.

The struggle for power within Pacifica has escalated. A Chicano affirmative action supporter in L.A. has received online threats. White-led programmers at WBAI are seeking the ouster of a pro-affirmative action LAB rep, hoping to keep the militant attorney away from the negotiating table in Chicago. Recently "B" supporters have resorted to secretly wiretapping private conference calls of affirmative action supporters and sending the tapes to Cagan. In addition the official website of the WBAI Local Advisory Board has been hacked and racially-tainted slurs posted. As well, "B" supporters posted unauthorized inflammatory headlines on the official WBAI site. Meanwhile, outside the ranks of Pacificans, racism appears to be alive and well: in Los Angeles, the Program Director and the General Manager of KPFK, both people of color, have received death threats after increasing programming for the Chicano/Latino communities.

Cagan has ordered that the Chicago talks be limited to diversity but leaders of the three LABs that voted down Draft "B" are holding out to include negotiations over democracy and transparency, which would allow listeners fo vote for all major amendments and include listener access to Pacifica financial records. Two-thirds of the directors on the iPNB and three out of the five Local Advisory Boards must ratify the bylaws before they can take effect.




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S Hamanaka- Propagandist

by provocateur watch Friday, Aug. 15, 2003 at 8:49 PM

for those of you who are reading this crap, Hamanaka is part of a tiny faction of deceptors who have attempted to take the network down in the interests of their own power. Word.
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Ms. Hamanaka is a brave soul

by Edwin Johnston Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 4:12 AM
edi@hal-pc.org

Pointing out racism at Pacifica is a dangerous proposition. Many people who have done so have been assaulted, had their job threatended, had been libeled as being racists themselves, been falsely accused of being police agents, etc. -- the usual attempts to simply shut up the critics.
When you don't have a decent counter-argument, attack is a likely response.
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Free Pacifican

by Eileen J. Goodman Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 8:34 AM

It goes beyond that.

Free Pacificans who fought together on the streets to save pacifica are fighting each other. Those who support Plan B are doing a "Cooper"(one-sided opinion) - lumping everyone into a side which supports Burt Lee - not true! I am of the opinion that Burt Lee supports Draft B - for he too see the advantage... Plan B supports a new hijacking in the future and takes away local control of stations - for the National Board will have all the power.

What I fear the most if Plan B passes: Elected board members will be targeted for elimination for having different opinions (it's written in the bylaws) for board members who displease other board members can be voted out - until one faction controls it all - bye-bye Pacifica!

Just look at what has happened at KPFK with our new management. Eva was targeted for elimination before she got in the door for "not being in the loop". But she has surprised us all and is hanging in - barely - for the relentless persecution has been non-stop... And this has been acomplished by those - mostly - "Free pacificans who have the time and money to placed themselves everywhere - like on the seach committees and collectives - committees.... websites and listserves. If you look back - the same individuals have tried to place themselves everywhere determining policy..... while slamming Eva....

No to B until we get a guaranty written in the bylaws protecting Pacifica from a hijack and guarantees for a listeners Bill of Rights - for local control of programing and a guaranty for some kind of diversity requirement - someting fair - something just.

Long Live Pacifica

Eileen J. Goodman
Free Pacifican
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I'm new to this board - where's my first post?

by Eileen J Goodman Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 8:48 AM

Am I being censored?
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Learning is Fun

by Wake Up! Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 12:36 PM

Data about the anti-democratic/anti-labor history of KPFK management can be studied here:


http://www.dogsofnow.net/democracy_f/democracyindex.html
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One-Sided Story Only

by Eileen J. Goodman Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 1:08 PM

This website only tells a story from those peoples who support B Bylaws. It's one-sided and tainted - for the real story - still being told - has yet to be heard. It is my hope that people. in Pacifica, will come together, despite their different politics and SAVE PACIFICA for the future generations. If we're lucky - we can learn to be respectful to each other - passing a tradition of real dialogue with many points of view.

So thank you Dogsof Now - you've done a great job telling one point of view!
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I have a chant for you!

by go go Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 1:22 PM

here it is:

"KPFK GO AWAY!"

jesus fucking christ...only a kpfk hack would come onto indymedia and immediately cry censorship. indymedia has editorial rules in place and as long as posts generally follow them, they stay.

KPFK people are so accustomed to living and working under extremely authoritarian systems that you can't imagine people actually cooperating together for political ends. It's tragic, as KPFK is a place where anti-authoritarians have almost no voice, where management rules by an iron fist, and where old commies gather to plot their back room takeovers.

indymedia was created as an alternative to this nightmare scenerio, so if you want to come here and bring the KPFK nightmare, please go away.
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When you don't have a decent counter-argument

by Eileen J. Goodman Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 1:29 PM

Attack is a likely response.

BTW - document is an explanation as to why I was censored here to begin with - an email sent to me. And so they saw the need to stay true to the IMC principles afterall....
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Da, mr. wilson

by Ivan Badanov Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 6:20 PM

after we force you and your familly and friends out into the street
we will live in your home and drive your vehicle while we play with your women and eat your food. It will be glorious.
I will bring old Badfinger records to play on entertainment system.
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poor boy

by Ivan Badanov Saturday, Aug. 16, 2003 at 6:29 PM

"love your neighbor but watch your potato patch"
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Sometimes it takes ahile for a post to post

by Eileen Sunday, Aug. 17, 2003 at 3:47 AM

A comment on my last post made above. I can see it makes little sense. If I reacted too fast wondering where my first post was. Please accept my apologies. I'm perhaps a little bit sensitive. As to the dialogue that follows - well - no comment
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KPFK and LA-IMC

by lynx-13 Sunday, Aug. 17, 2003 at 12:58 PM

first, here's some links for people interested in learning about KPFK/Pacifica:

KPFK LISTENERS
an account of the K-LAB bylaws vote (with useful links)
where do we go from here? (bylaws discussion)
white privilege and other problems at "Independent Media Centers"
links , including a good WBAI thread
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

now.... to address this stuff from 'go go':

- "KPFK GO AWAY!"

the la-imc is potentially a very useful public forum for constructive discussions about kpfk, our local Pacifica station. the la-imc also has the capacity to archive such discussions more effectively than any other existing forum. make your own conclusions about the intentions of people who try to prevent that.

- "...only a kpfk hack would come onto indymedia and immediately cry censorship. indymedia has editorial rules in place and as long as posts generally follow them, they stay."

false. in reality, lots of people cry censorship here, not just Eileen, and often they are right. posts do disappear. here is an attempt at constructive discussion with Steven Starr on this and related matters.... and continued here

- "KPFK people are so accustomed to living and working under extremely authoritarian systems that you can't imagine people actually cooperating together for political ends.... indymedia was created as an alternative to this nightmare scenerio, so if you want to come here and bring the KPFK nightmare, please go away. "

very silly ideas. maybe you should go for a walk around the halls of kpfk and see how many IMC people you see. Steven Starr and Alan Minsky ("ex-interim General Manager" and "Senior Producer" respectively) are only the tip of the iceberg - haha. wake up. stop spouting the simplistic mythology and start putting in some real work.

when it comes to certian aspects of democratic process and structure, LA indymedia compares very poorly to KPFK. LA-IMC doesn't even post meeting notes publicly!!

la-imc should make clear that it understands that lack of transparency is a problem and that la-imc is presently not adequately transparent. la-imc should post minutes or notes or journalistic accounts of regular la-imc meetings in some very visible place on the front page of the site.

in fact, LA-IMC rarely even posts meeting anNOUNCements!! unfortunately, fantasies about the noble anti-authoritarian LA-IMC are mostly laughable.

on top of THAT, LA-IMC has a "CENTER column" that takes up most of the room on the front page, calls itself the "indy media CENTER" and is planning big changes to the funtionality of the site without consulting anybody!! more info on that soon, hopefully.

besides being a good example of white privilege and male privilege, the LA-IMC is a very good example of the "Tyranny of Structurelessness". this important essay from the women's movement should be more widely read and understood by all contemporary activists, i think. a lot more humility is in order, not the simplistic mythologies recommended by 'go go'.

KPFK has plenty of problems and so does the LA-IMC. at the same time they both stand to benefit a lot from constructive connections between them.

"KPFK - DON'T GO AWAY!"

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Let's Go To Detroit!

anticrisis

lynx

latest comments
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Pacifica.

by Sheepdog Sunday, Aug. 17, 2003 at 2:42 PM

KPFK like the rest of Pacifica is way too timid and compromising to the right while sucking up to the worst of the left.
Like Gun control-Sucks.
Labels such as ?President? Bush instead of just 'Bush? as the right did to 'Clinton' although also with good reason, come right out of Amy's mouth without a skipped beat
as well as other right wing newspeak. .
Still used the word 'compound' instead of church at the Davidian community over at Waco.
It does promote safe topics for the frail, or hard stuff like Expert Witness, Guns and Butter as well as Taking Aim. Weaponry is also nice.
It doesn't have commercials (except for itself, like Disney) and in Texas KPFT! They have hot country as well as Gospel. Bush Admirer would like this; the KKK blew the Towers up a while back. Where were you, Bush Admirer?
Sometimes they bore you some times they inform you. One of the reasons they are so one sided is because opposing spokespersons 'declined to return calls' .
I hate commercial radio. It needs to die.
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Sometimes a Weak Notion

by Edwin Johnston Sunday, Aug. 17, 2003 at 3:20 PM
edi@hal-pc.org

They say that everyone talks about the weather but nobody ever does anything about it. Maybe it is the same for democracy.
Many long for the days of heady democratic discussion about the future of Pacifica radio, for it seems so long ago. Andy Warhol's prediction was correct in that even Pacifica became famous for fifteen minutes. This is not to suggest that the effort to save the network was entirely unfruitful. There were many memorable moments in the wake of the settlement agreement, most of them having to do with programming changes. In fact it's somewhat surprising that the stations even remained on the air, given the situation. As a result of this the listeners were not disappointed and increased their donations.
However, new programming merely served as a facade to mask what was going on behind the scenes. The sound of Pacifica presented itself as a smiley face icon erected to increase listener contributions. And as fortune would have it this occurred during the run-up to and the prosecution of the new war against Iraq. Money in the bank. But it would be an exercise in cynicism to suggest that Pacifica executive director Dan Coughlin was unhappy that the war was so short-lived.
Programming changes had little to do with anything related to the concept of democracy. It just took the easy way out and focused on the subject of opposition. WBAI's newest manager, Don Rojas, is a symptom of this since he was foisted upon us as a revolutionary and every good revolutionary is at heart a troublemaker. The same holds for Pacifica's national program, "Peace Watch", which had little to do with peace unless peace translates into reports of war. Maybe we should award the programming aspect of the network a not so insignificant C+. But let's not be too hasty in doing that prior to gaining an overview of the rest of the operation.
The immediate rush from a liberator model to a dominator model in regards to the establishment of an innovative structure for the network proved to be the foil for democracy. The instantaneous creation of so many firsts-among-equals dampened all but the hardiest democratic impulses. The apportioning of positions of power throughout the network went directly to way too many people's heads. These new nodes of authority resulted in both the assumption of rulers and the creation of a subclass of the ruled, with predictable consequences for those who chose not to play a part in this scheme.
The new system of authority at Pacifica was an unaccountable one from the very beginning. Anyone with recognized power could, and more than often did, wield it like a hammer over their opponents' heads. As long as one did not challenge the power of those directly above in this feudalistic setup everyone below was fair game. But since all this was happening within the freest nation on earth, with a 200 year long culture of liberty, the end result was a winnowing of participants. The stated desire for a process of inclusion in decision-making turned into its precise opposite. The only people left in this mad scramble were the acknowledged powerholders themselves and a handful of idealists who felt it worthwhile to continue to struggle against them.
The idealists themselves had for the most part managed to secure meager positions of authority (a few were de facto powerholders without portfolio) which were nonchalantly doled out as so many comp concert tickets. This situation actually served to defeat the idealists at their own game, since by participating it provided the illusion that democratic debate was occurring; that an opposition existed, when in fact democratic debate had long ago been squelched. And the idealistic opposition would have to take an enormous amount of lumps in return for their challenges.
The main problem with the dominator model is its tendency to intoxicate. Once anyone gets a taste of the power they become thirsty for more. The pleasure and pursuit of power becomes what junk is to the heroin addict. The eventual cannibalism by the powerholders at Pacifica of each other was contained within the seed of its creation. And so here we are more than a year and a half later where the defining mode of action is crude corruption, where the level of discourse revolves around burying the obvious and anyone nearby, where the closest thing to camaraderie is a series of temporary and constantly shifting alliances sealed in conspiratorial email whispers.
And still nothing has been accomplished, because entropy has already set in. We have reached the point of diminishing returns. Everyone is now busy searching for an exit strategy. A few are giving it one last great college try to eke out anything that could be considered a victory, no matter how small or however temporary. But nobody wants to stick around long enough after that to be held responsible for the logical collapse of the whole mess.
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Pacifica

by Sheepdog Sunday, Aug. 17, 2003 at 8:26 PM

It just seems to be a podium for get mad, but get over it.
There are, as mentioned back in this thread
some damn good shows.
It still has programs worth listening to.
Commercial air is a hijacking of public domain.
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To Lynx - thank you

by Eileen Monday, Aug. 18, 2003 at 5:11 AM

Sometimes it takes me some time exploring the Internet. Thank you for your articles and words - especially on Pacifica - here in the IMC
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Pacifica's Racial Divide

by Rafael Renteria (repost) Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2003 at 4:32 AM

It's always the same.

Those who are taking a backward position react by making personalistic attacks, and broad, unspecific characterizations about their opposition.

None of the replies to Hamanaka's story reply to the specific content of the story in any depth whatsoever. The facts are not disputed. The analysis remains esentially unrefuted, even unengaged, because it cannot be refuted.
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