Democracy for New Mexico

Next DFA-DFNM Meetup to Feature Community Organizer Santiago Juarez

Our regular monthly Albuquerque DFA-Democracy for New Mexico Meetup is set for Thursday, June 7th, at 7:00 PM at the Social Hall of the First Unitarian Church at Carlisle and Comanche. To join the group, get on our mailing list or RSVP for the Meetup, click here. Our special guest will be long-time community organizer SANTIAGO JUAREZ (photo), who'll address the topic, "Electing to Resist: Vote Suppression and Community Empowerment."

"You take away people's health insurance and you take their right to union pay scales and you take away their pensions--taking away their vote's just one more on the list."--(Santiago Juarez, "Armed Madhouse")

Prominently featured in investigative reporter Greg Palast's recent bestseller, "Armed Madhouse," veteran New Mexico community organizer and attorney Santiago Juarez returns to Democracy for New Mexico, after a nearly two-year interlude. Santiago will recount his exploits in the 2004 Presidential campaign and election, and bring with him the spirit of citizen fightback in a time of both uncertainty and renewed hope.

Based in Espanola, NM, Mr. Juarez's community development work and his influence touch Albuquerque and span New Mexico and beyond. Counting among his early influences the late Chicano labor and civil rights leader Cesar Chavez, Santiago continues and extends the tradition of working-class, community-based political activism.

Santiago Juarez has held organizing positions in Mexicano/Chicano communities in the western United States since the 1970's. A founding organizer of Seattle's ground-breaking community center, El Centro De La Raza, Mr. Juarez also worked in the 1980's with Rev. Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition.

Since 1995, Mr. Juarez has worked with communities in New Mexico as an organizer and facilitator for Re-Visioning New Mexico. He maintains a private law practice, is on the Board of Directors for the International Relations Center, and is currently the Executive Director of New Mexico Progressive Alliance for Community Empowerment (NM PACE).

Mr. Juarez holds a B.S. from Eastern New Mexico University and a J.D. from the University of Washington.

Richard Becker to Speak on Iraq, Iran in Santa Fe & ABQ

From Stop the War Machine: Richard Becker will speak on "What Does It Take to Get Out of Iraq (and Not Go Into Iran)," on Sunday, June 3, from 7 to 10 PM at Smith Brasher Hall, on the campus of Central New Mexico Community College. The hall is in the big building to the SW at the corner of University Blvd and Coal SE in Albuquerque. Click for flyer (pdf).

Becker will also speak on the topic on Saturday, June 2, at 6 PM at the Unitarian Church, 107 West Barcelona Road, just off Galisteo near Cordova, in Santa Fe. This free event is sponsored by Mother Media (www.mothermedia.org or 982-3609).

Richard Becker is the Western Regional Coordinator of the International ANSWER-Act Now to Stop War and End Racism-Coalition. ANSWER. has organized numerous mass protests of hundreds of thousands of people against the war in Iraq, from mid-2002 to the present. Becker has been a central organizer of, and featured speaker at, many of the West Coast mass mobilizations in San Francisco and Los Angeles.  In December 2005, Becker traveled to Damascus, Syria to participate in a conference on Palestinian Refugees and the Right of Return. One of the few US activists to visit Syria in recent years, Becker has spoken out in opposition to the US-led campaign for regime change in that country at numerous public forums and media events. (Email contact: rbecker17@yahoo.com)

Quote of the Day: Bush Pounds His Chest

From 'A Spreading Terror' by Dallas Morning News columnist Georgie Anne Geyer:

. . . by all reports, President Bush is more convinced than ever of his righteousness.

Friends of his from Texas were shocked recently to find him nearly wild-eyed, thumping himself on the chest three times while he repeated "I am the president!" He also made it clear he was setting Iraq up so his successor could not get out of "our country's destiny."

His judgment and demeanor haven't improved
since this video.