A-Infos (en) Press Release: Karla Faye Tucker

[Lara Johnson <ljanklip@concentric.net>]

 ________________________________________________ A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E http://www.ainfos.ca/ ________________________________________________
OPEN LETTER TO GOVERNOR GEORGE BUSH.

FAXED TO: Governor George Bush
1-800-252-9600 (Texas only)
1-512-463-2000
1-512-463-1849 FAX

BCC:	Members of Congress and Senate
Media
Email discussion lists.

RE: The Execution of Karla Faye Tucker and America!!

Dear Governor Bush

I am writing this letter to voice my horror at a country that not 
only calls itself a 'world leader', but also often is found throwing 
its weight around the United Nations Council (even though it owes 
millions to the UN)  criticising other countries on their HUMAN RIGHTS RECORDS!!!	

Not for one minute do I condone what Ms. Karla Faye Tucker did, it 
was surely a henious crime. However, is it for the government to now 
do the same to another human being? Is Texas and certain states in 
America not hypocritical when they  say it is 'wrong to murder' and 
then they go and do exactly the same thing? 

This like so many other phenonmena in America, seems to me the typical hypocritical 'quick fix' solution? American government officials say they 
are  'tough on crime' and yet when it comes to addressing the causes of 
crime, such as poverty, racism, inequity in the justice system for the 
poor,  drug problems, and easy access to guns, then these same 'tough 
on crime' politicians are nowhere to be  found, have nothing to say, or 
look the other way!! 

The Republican Party are so quick to jump to 'personal responsibility' 
and quite rightly they should. Personal responsibility is what it is all 
about!! However, they seem to think that personal responsibility only 
extends to being responsible for yourself, and not that it extends to 
being responsible for your family, or your community, or country. It is 
common knowledge that the CIA and other 'affiliates' were very much 
involved with drug running into poor neighbourhoods in this country!! 
So Governor Bush, why are those people not being prosecuted? Why 
are they not being brought to trial? Why are they not being executed? 
They only managed to kill whole entire neighbourhoods and destroy 
the lives of millions of young inner city children!! Well, Governor Bush 
- is it not your responsibility to expose such injustices? Is it not your 
responsibility to speak up against Cigarette companies who deliberately 
targetted young children as future smokers? Or are you another one of 
those who can be 'bought'? You only give Justice to those who have 
enough money? 

America should think long and hard about the type of leadership it is 
showing to the rest of the world, and should not be surprised that 
many other countries shun America's leadership? 
After - all lets see what America leads with?

1. A country that calls itself civilized and yet still executes people.
2. Besides Russia, America has the highest rate of incarceration in 
the world! A country where justice is for sale. There is no equal 
justice - if you want justice you better go out and buy it!!
3. A country that has approx 5% of the world's population and 
consumes approx 60% of the worlds drugs!
4. A country where many states spend more on prison construction 
than on education.
5. A country where the top 10 percent of US households own 98 
percent of all corporate stock, and fully 60 percent of all business 
assets, while 90 percent have little or no net assets. The greatest 
source of individual wealth is inheritance. If you are not rich, it is 
probably because you lacked the initiative to pick the right parents 
at birth. (1)
6. A country where the top 1 percent saw their average incomes soar 
by 85.4 percent after taxes in the decade up to 1990, whil the incomes 
of the bottom fifth declined by 10 percent. Income and wealth 
disparaties are greater today than at any time since such information 
was first collected in 1947. (2)
7. A country where some 'family enterprises' are of colossal size. Indeed, 
a small number of wealthy families, such as the Mellons, Morgans, Du 
Ponts, and Rockefellers, dominate the American economy. The Du Ponts 
control ten corporations, each worth billions of dollars, including General 
Motors, Coca-Cola, and United Brands, along with many smaller firms. 
The Du Ponts serve as trustees of scores of colleges. The family is 
frequently the largest contributor to Republican presidential campaigns 
and has financed right-wing and anti-labor causes. (3)
8. A country where corporate heads prove to be anything but 'Public 
Minded" (Read "RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR COMMUNITIES), showing 
far less interest in developing new technologies and creating jobs than in 
feathering their own nests. During the 1990-93 recession, while corporate 
profits fell and workers were being laid off or were taking pay cuts, 
compensation for CEO's rose sharply. In 1990, the CEO of Time Warner, 
a company facing harrowing debt payments, took home $78.2 million in 
salary and bonuses, making more in one day than most of his employees 
made in five years.
9. A country where the ten highest paid Wall Street executives, investment 
bankers, and money managers were paid between $30 million to $125 
million a year. CEO's vote themselves such high raises.(4)
10. A country where JUSTICE = $$$$. As Supreme Court Justice Hugo 
Black once noted that there "can be no justice where the kind of trial a 
man gets depends on the amount of money he has." Legal service in 
America best serves those who can buy it. Note the equally heinous 
cases of: Nicole Brown Simpson, the Menendez brothers - are they on 
Death Row? Was their crime not heinous? Is Mr. Kazcynski on Death 
Row? How many people did he kill?  Is Terry Nichols on Death Row? 
If Justice is to be equal, and if you wish to execute people, then it 
should be meted out equally, not just to those who are considered 
of lower social class status. If Karla Faye Tucker had the Menendez 
Millions - she could have hired 20 expert witnesses, a Dream Team. 
Not only has she changed her life, she is using it to help others!
Does Texas want to kill her, because she is settiing a good example
and helping other prisoners to see the wrong that they have done?
Is Texas upset that she will actually prove that rehabilitation works,
and is possible, because then Texas would have to address these
issues, and quite simply it could not be bothered to, because most
of the people in prison and on death row, are poor?

If America is the leader for the world - God Help Us All!!!!  We are 
all on the way back to slavery, where the the new plantation is the 
prison, where the poor are incarcerated in prisons which are run by 
huge multinational corporations who make millions on the stock 
exchange. Prison companies such as Corrections Corporation 
Association (CCA) who makes millions of dollars on keeping people 
in prison, and making sure that they do not get out, or come back as 
soon as possible!!!  

We are all on our way to a world where there is no room for forgiveness 
and compassion, rather a world where aggression, hate, denigration of 
the poor and minorities, revenge etc, are exemplified by the LEADER OF 
THE WORLD!! 

I thank the Good Lord, for a President such as Nelson Mandela, a true 
leader, a man of compassion, kindness, strength, fortitude, vision - and 
who has the integrity to call America what it is: A land of hypocrisy!!

Karla - my prayers are with you. Forgive these people who call themselves a Christian nation, and yet who cannot forgive.  Governor Bush - you, more 
than anyone else need Karla's prayers!! Your father was President when 
drugs flooded into this country and its poor communities!! And now you 
are going to stand by and allow one of those kids whow succumbed to 
those drugs your father's administration flooded into this country!!  
WHERE IS THE RESPONSIBILITY?? Who should be on trial? 

Surely 'personal responsibility' means standing up for something when 
it is wrong, no matter what the odds? What Karla Faye Tucker did was 
wrong, but what TEXAS is doing is also wrong! Two wrongs do not 
make a right. 

Amandla Awethu

Lara Johnson
P O Box 42
Volksrust
2470.
South Africa
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(1) IRS: Statistics of Income bulletin, 1990.
(2) The Chairmans Report, Economic Comm. of the Congress, Wash, DC  1989.
(3) Du Pont Dynasty: Behind the Nylon curtain - Gerald Colby.
(4) New York Times (03/31/93), Wall Street Journal (04/17/91) Washington Post (09/01/91)
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