Having survived a year of (successful but grueling) treatment for breast cancer, I'm now in the bittersweet position of assisting others with cancer diagnoses. This includes organizing a fundraiser for Curtis Chapel, a Green Party activist & ETS! volunteer, who wrote about his cancer ordeal last month in ETS! He has no health insurance, no disability pay, and Social Security Disability has (so far) turned down his application for assistance--they need the money more than he does, apparently. Our "compassionate" country's social support system is more diseased than many who desperately need financial assistance, health care, housing, etc!

Curtis needs support for basic things like food, transportation, utilities--and he is trying to raise money to buy a computer-generated speech synthesizer, having lost his speaking voice to the tumor. Join us for a benefit for Curtis on Friday May 31, 7 PM, at Take Another Look Books on Rainier Ave. in beautiful Columbia City (see details in the Activist Calendar.) Several ETS! volunteers will share their writing, including co-editor Geov Parrish and production ace Lance Scott; the Underwires will sing a cappella harmonies; plus many Surprize Guests! If you can't be there, please send donations or your tax deductible check, made out to "The Turning Institute." Send it c/o ETS!, PO Box 85541, Seattle, WA 98145.

Supporting activism also means supporting activists--see you Friday the 31st. -- Valerie Jean Rose

Another good reason to attend the "Lifeline!" benefit May 31 for Curtis Chappel--the indy bookstore that's generously providing the space, Take Another Look Books, will close its doors this summer. Damn, I hate it when the small local businesses I support can't survive an economic recession, while Boeing and corporate ranchers leech off of my tax dollars. Too bad AJ Bastarache, owner of TALB, didn't make huge campaign contributions to Patty and Maria...of course, if he changed the name to Take Another Look Books & STADIUM the WA state legislature would be called back into special session to raise $$ to keep the place open--or keep AJ from moving his business to San Diego.-VJR

Trevor Baumgartner is home safe and sound! Our stalwart ETS! reporter and volunteer, who at the time of his writing last issue was on the West Bank, has had an extraordinary two weeks since--being detained by the Israeli Army during a (successful) attempt by international activists to deliver much-needed food to then-besieged Palestinians at Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity; going on a nearly two-week hunger strike, including refusing water for six days, that left him and three other American activists near death; and finally being deported (after lengthy negotiations with Israeli authorities, the U.S. embassy, and countless other interested parties) and arriving back in Seattle, very weak but essentially safe and sound, over the weekend.

Rather than going into the deserved detail here, we'll let Trevor himself write about his experience for us (hopefully next issue)--but in the meantime, should you see this in time, Trevor, ETS! co-founder John Reese, and Palestinian activist and Bethlehem resident George Rashmawi, all freshly arrived from the West Bank, will be presenting a joint eyewitness report on the West Bank: Weds., May 22, 7 PM at the Independent Media Center. (See Calendar for details of this event and two other presentations on May 26 and May 31.) And if you have a class, church, community group, or other forum where Trevor, John, ETS!er Jake Mundy, or other soon-returning Seattleites can talk about their Palestine experiences, any of them will be happy to come and talk--it's the best way to both personalize and break through US media distortions of how this one-sided "war" is being waged.--Geov Parrish

Hey, did anyone notice that when locked-out Kaiser workers won their long-overdue NLRB victory over Charles Hurwitz & Co. (see article elsewhere -- not that it helped save their jobs or anything), it was front-page news in the P- I and News-Tribune, but the region's largest newspaper didn't run the story at all? Seems like owner Frank Blethen's legendary bitterness toward labor unions and strikers is impacting the Seattle Times' news coverage. Not that that's any surprise, but still, seeing as how editorial bias is supposed to be kept on the editorial page and away from the assignment desk, it's rare that you see bias that severe on that major a story. To invoke another famous episode from Blethen's checkered past, that dog won't hunt.--G.P.

I don't know which is more sickening -- Democrats' transparent use of revelations that Dubya ignored a fairly routine August 2001 terrorism warning about Al-Qaeda for political purposes, or the Bushites' vicious responses that any criticism of the Prez is somehow un-American. Both demonstrate the fundamental rottenness at the core of the two parties, and US politics. For nearly nine months, the Democrats have been sitting on their hands, or using them to clap, as the Bushites subvert the Constitution, plunge all Arabs and Muslims and people who look like them into a Kafkaesque "anti-terrorist" witchhunt, opened the vault for Pentagon contractors, blown apart the budget surplus, and, essentially, declared war on the world. Bush et al. have wrapped themselves in such a Nixonesque air of secrecy, contempt, and paranoia that even if their policies were sound and effective -- they're not -- criticism would be inevitable. And both have entirely missed the main point. Not once since September 11 has any major part of either party demanded, let alone undertaken, a comprehensive review of why the US military and intelligence establishment so completely failed to protect the lives of US citizens (and others) on our own soil.

In theory, of course, that's what they're all sworn to do. But instead of asking why our entire trillion-dollar military complex was unable to stop a few guys with boxcutters, we've decided to do even more of the same -- create more enemies around the world, blow up more people and countries, shovel even more money out for boondoggle space weapons to blast those boxcutters from the sky. It's fairly transparent, of course, as to why nobody's asking this obvious question; it's the same reason the "Office of Homeland Security" had to be established when that's supposed to be a military's job in the first place. Instead, the US military juggernaut is all about global conquest, and making money off of global conquest for the folks who hire the politicians who fund the military that doesn't protect us from a damn thing. It makes us less safe than ever. Want real security? Abolish the armed forces. But so long as we're gonna pretend that our military or political leaders care about us, instead of the hackneyed "what did he know and when did he know it" routine and the usual maneuvering for electoral advantage, shouldn't at least someone should be asking questions about the country's most catastrophic military failure since 1812? --GP

You've been screwed by the local phone company and want to complain, so you write to the FCC. And you wonder: how many other folks have had trouble with the same company? The Federal Communications Commission released a report in early May that ranks the major telecom companies by the number of complaints received. AT&T, the largest phone company in the nation, is No. 1, with 9,900 complaints since July of last year. No. 2 is Worldcom/MCI with 5,231 complaints. No. 3 and 4 respectively are Qwest with 3,927 and Sprint with 2,311. Notably, AT&T, MCI, and Sprint are all long-distance companies. Qwest, on the other hand, is a local phone service provider. Its complaints far outstrip any other local service provider in the FCC survey. And here's another fun fact for you: complaints about the rates and billing practices of phone service companies make up about 30% of all complaints to the FCC--more than any other type or category. The rationale for breaking up Ma Bell and privatizing phone service was that it would provide better, cheaper service. Yet complaints continue, while all four of the carriers mentioned above have either raised their rates recently or will raise them in June. Where's a little regulation when you need it?--Maria Tomchick

When the cashier said "you could save $2.49 if you get one of our Advantage cards," my jaw dropped. "What did you say?" I asked him, gesturing around me. "This is QFC, right?" He flushed. "You get the sale prices if you have an Advantage card," he replied. I could feel the anger gesturing around me. "This is QFC, right?" He flushed. "You get the sale prices if you have an Advantage card," he replied. I could feel the anger rising in me; I think I must grow from 5'4" tall to about 6' when I'm mad. "You mean to tell me I have to have a card to buy things at prices that I used to pay before? What's the point in that?" He stammered. "Well, well, it's our new program. That's how it works." I bit down on my tongue and switched to matter-of-fact mode: "Then I guess this is the last time I shop here." He grinned smugly: "You don't have any choice; it's either us or Safeway across the street, and they have a card, too." I was getting angry again. Never tell me that I have no choice. Never. "I'm going up over the damn hill to Central Coop from now on. And Rainbow Grocery is on 15th. And Larry's Fucking Market is in several locations around town. I have lots of choices! Gimme a complaint card!"

My first urge is to boycott. My second urge is to go into QFC and ask for a new card every time I shop there. After card #45, maybe they'll catch on. But I think taking my money elsewhere is the best option. It's positive, because it gives my business to somebody I like better. And every time they ring up my groceries, I can tell them: "I come here because you don't have an Advantage card. Don't ever, ever try to foist another card on me!"--MT