goodfellowsmansfield.com

Thursday, October 12, 2006

The Blunkett diaries, being serialised in the Guardian, claim that Gordon Brown opposed the war against Iraq. Only at the last minute did he give in, according to the diaries, when he realised that Blair would sack him otherwise.

Gordon Brown, interviewed by the Guardian, said he did not think Blunkett had ever said such a thing and that, if he was reported as having done so, he was being misquoted.

The diary entries are contemporary with the events and were recorded shortly after the Cabinet meeting on Iraq.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

It can be difficult to be John Reed.

Christopher Hitchens called him a “Bin Ladenist” and Cathy Young editorialized in The Boston Globe that he “blames the victims of terrorism” when he puts out a novel like Snowball’s Chance, a biting send-up of George Orwell‘s Animal Farm which he was inspired to write after the terrorist attacks on September 11. “The clear references to 9/11 in the apocalyptic ending can only bring Orwell’s name into disrepute in the U.S.,” wrote William Hamilton, the British literary executor of the Orwell estate. That process had already begun: it was revealed Orwell gave the British Foreign Office a list of people he suspected of being “crypto-Communists and fellow travelers,” labeling some of them as Jews and homosexuals. “I really wanted to explode that book,” Reed told The New York Times. “I wanted to completely undermine it.”

Is this man who wants to blow up the classic literary canon taught to children in schools a menace, or a messiah? David Shankbone went to interview him for Wikinews and found that, as often is the case, the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

Reed is electrified by the changes that surround him that channel through a lens of inspiration wrought by his children. “The kids have made me a better writer,” Reed said. In his new untitled work, which he calls a “new play by William Shakespeare,” he takes lines from The Bard‘s classics to form an original tragedy. He began it in 2003, but only with the birth of his children could he finish it. “I didn’t understand the characters who had children. I didn’t really understand them. And once I had had kids, I could approach them differently.”

Taking the old to make it new is a theme in his work and in his world view. Reed foresees new narrative forms being born, Biblical epics that will be played out across print and electronic mediums. He is pulled forward by revolutions of the past, a search for a spiritual sensibility, and a desire to locate himself in the process.

Below is David Shankbone’s conversation with novelist John Reed.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

A memorial service was held Friday for Javon Thompson, a toddler that died in Baltimore, Maryland, while under the care of a religious group called “1 Mind Ministries”. Thompson died in late 2006 or early 2007 in an apartment in West Baltimore. According to police statements, members of 1 Mind Ministries refused the boy food and water because he did not say “amen” after group meals. Police say the boy would have been about 19 months old when members of the group stopped feeding him in December 2006.

The Baltimore Sun spoke with Seeta Khadan-Newton, Javon Thompson’s grandmother, at the funeral service which took place at March Funeral Homes in Northwest Baltimore. “I loved this baby more than anything in my life,” she said.

The Baltimore Sun reported that Khadan–Newton told them she had contacted Baltimore’s Division of Social Services at least four times between April and December of 2006 out of worries for Thompson’s wellbeing and location. DSS officials stated that they received only two phone calls, and the complaints about Thompson’s treatment were not enough to look into further.

WJZ-TV reported that “Queen Antoinette”, the 40-year-old leader of 1 Mind Ministries, allegedly concealed Javon Thompson’s body in a blanket and sprayed it with fabric softener to mask the odor before having a member of the group leave the body in a friend’s backyard shed in Philadelphia. According to police, members of 1 Mind Ministries placed Thompson’s remains in a suitcase and took it to Philadelphia in February 2007, where they left it with an elderly friend. Subsequently members of the group moved to Brooklyn, New York. Law enforcement authorities found the suitcase with Thompson’s remains in April 2008.

Ria Ramkissoon, 21, Thompson’s mother, and four others, have been charged with first-degree murder by Baltimore homicide detectives in connection with the boy’s death. The Associated Press reported that police charging documents state that Queen Antoinette instructed her followers to pray for Javon Thompson to be resurrected while he lay dead in the back room of the Baltimore apartment. An informant told police Queen Antoinette left Javon Thompson’s body in the back room of the apartment for over a week, and told her followers: “God was going to raise Javon from the dead”.

Ramkissoon’s mother and her attorney assert that she was brainwashed by the 1 Mind Ministries group and acted under the control of Queen Antoinette. “The members of this cult, who were more than twice her age, were calling the shots,” said Ramkissoon’s attorney Steven Silverman at a court hearing for his client. Inside the group, Ria Ramkissoon referred to herself as “Princess Marie”.

Court documents revealed that 1 Mind Ministries conducted operations in secret, did not believe in medical care and dressed in all-white clothing. Members of the group were referred to as “princes” and “princesses” by Queen Antoinette, also known as Toni Sloan or Toni Ellsberry. Documents also state that they viewed Javon Thompson as a “demon” for not saying “amen” after meals, that they stopped feeding him in December 2006, and did not seek out medical attention when the boy stopped breathing and died.

Rick A. Ross of The Ross Institute Internet Archives for the Study of Destructive Cults, Controversial Groups and Movements spoke with the Associated Press about the nature of the 1 Mind Ministries group, and asserted that it meets the definition of a “cult“. Ross has given expert testimony in cases related to controversial groups and has studied them for 26 years. Law enforcement officials also used the term to describe the 1 Mind Ministries group, specifically characterizing it as a “Christian fundamentalist cult”.

“It fits the profile of a classic cult in the sense that it’s a personality-driven group and that Queen Antoinette is that animating personality and central defining element of the group,” said Ross. He compared the group to others where children were killed because they did not follow the instructions of the group. The Ross Institute Internet Archives maintains a page about 1 Mind Ministries, which contains archived news articles, a photo of Queen Antoinette, and links to other resources.

Prosecutors in the murder case have also referred to the 1 Mind Ministries group as a “cult”, and said that members of the group would likely follow Queen Antoinette’s instructions during the trial. In a hearing August 13 where Queen Antoinette and group member Trevia Williams, 21, were denied bail, they both also refused legal representation from Baltimore public defenders, and both declined a preliminary hearing. “Chances are, the cult members are going to do what she tells them to do,” said Baltimore Assistant State’s Attorney David C. Chiu at the court proceeding. Ria Ramkissoon is being held in the psychiatric unit of a city jail in Baltimore, Queen Antoinette, Trevia Williams and group member Marcus Cobbs are also being held in jail in Baltimore, and federal officials in New York from the United States Marshals Service are searching for another member of the group.

Rev. Anna V. Nelson spoke to the family at the memorial service in Baltimore, saying: “I would like to think that this boy died for us. This baby has left a message here for the whole world. This baby died so that they [1 Mind Ministries] could be exposed.”

The memorial service ended with a presentation of video clips of Javon Thompson playing, being held by his mother, and finally watching the camera as a female voice says goodbye to him.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

A suspect whom police believe to be connected with the alleged plot by Hmong Americans to overthrow the government of Laos has been captured and detained in Thailand, police said yesterday.

The man was identified as Sha Wang Lee, 53. He was arrested on Monday while trying to cross the border into Laos in northern Thailand‘s Nan Province. Police said he was carrying an expired United States passport that showed his hometown as Fresno, California. He also had a military-training certificate signed by Vang Pao.

Royal Thai Police Captain Sitthinan Sithkamjorn told the Associated Press that the man was taken to the U.S. embassy in Bangkok.

Kathleen Boyle, an embassy spokeswoman, said she could not comment on the case because of privacy concerns.

Sittihinan said the man would be detained in Thailand for overstaying his visa if he was not deported to the U.S.

Also on Monday, Vang Pao and nine others accused in the plot pleaded not guilty to conspiracy charges in U.S. district court in Sacramento, California. They are charged with violating the Neutrality Act, which makes it a crime to conspire to overthrow a foreign government that is on friendly terms with the United States, as well as conspiracy to kill, kidnap and maim, and conspiracy to export munitions without a license. They could face life in prison if convicted.

Vang Pao, 77, is a former general in the Royal Lao Army who led U.S.-backed Hmong forces against the communists in the Laotian Civil War, or “Secret War” that paralleled the Vietnam War. After the war, Vang Pao immigrated to the U.S.

Among the suspects is Harrison Jack, 60, a former California National Guard colonel and U.S. Army Ranger who ran covert operations during the Vietnam War. The others charged are all Hmong-American men, many of them prominent members of Hmong community in California’s Central Valley. They were Lo Cha Thao, 34; Youa True Vang, 60; Hue Vang, 39; Chong Yang Thao, 53; Seng Vue, 68; Chue Lo, 59; and Nhia Kao Vang, 48. An 11th suspect, Dang Vang, 48, was arrested last week and had already pleaded not guilty.

U.S. authorities arrested Vang Pao and nine others in a sting operation set up by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), in which the defendants met at a Thai restaurant in Sacramento with a man they believed was an arms dealer but was in fact an undercover ATF agent.

After leaving the restaurant, they examined a truckload of weapons that contained AK-47s, M-16 rifles, C-4 explosives, anti-tank rockets, rocket-propelled grenades and Claymore mines, according to the federal indictment.

Their plan was, authorities say, to ship the weapons to Thailand, where they would then be smuggled into Laos and used to blow up government buildings in the Laotian capital, Vientiane.

The court has refused to grant bail to any of the defendants, saying those pose too great a danger and flight risk.

About 1,000 Hmong people rallied on the Sacramento district courthouse steps, calling for the release of Vang Pao. Waving American flags, signs and posters of Vang Pao, among their chants was “Free Vang Pao! Freedom Now!”

Another rally by around 1,500 Hmong people was held on the steps the state capital in Sacramento, where demonstrators demanded that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger speak about the case.

“We want Arnold to come out and say something!” protest leader Vanmong Xiong of Sacramento was quoted as saying by the Sacramento Bee. “Arnold has the power to talk to President Bush, and Bush should dismiss it [the case]!”

According to Xiong, about 8,500 Hmong refugees from the Secret War are still in Laos, on the run in the mountain jungles, fleeing from the persecution of the communist government that has ruled the country since 1975.

“Who paid for this?” he thundered. “The taxpayers of the U.S.! We pay Laos to murder our men, women and children in the jungle!”

Laotian Ambassador to the United States Phiane Philakone, was interviewed by the Sacramento Bee, saying there are no human rights violations against the Hmong in Laos, and he invited reporters to go see for themselves.

Simply referred to as The General by admirers in the Hmong community, Vang Pao is viewed as a folk hero by Hmong-Americans of his generation.

In Wisconsin, home to many Hmong war refugees, an elementary school was to be named after Vang Pao. On Monday in Madison, Wisconsin, the school board voted 7-0 to remove Vang Pao’s name from the school, which is under construction.

Board members apologized to the Hmong community, but said the move was needed to defuse dissension in the community, and that the time was not right to name a school after Vang Pao.

“We have to make sure that there’s not a lot of controversy surrounding a school that children will attend,” board president Arlene Silveira was quoted as saying by WISC-TV.

The board had approved the name unanimously earlier this year, but the name had sparked controversy even before Vang Pao’s arrest, with opponents cited allegations of Vang Pao’s involvement in drug trafficking and war crimes during the Secret War.

Now there is uncertainty about what to name the new school.

“I think it is painful, but there’s hope that the school board members are thinking about changing its policy and with that discussion we hope that the intention is to work with us again,” Hmong community leader Koua Vang, executive director of United Refugee Services, was quoted as saying by WISC-TV.