This action is happening right now! If you can, please go right now to 180 Bloor Street West to demonstrate your support for their action! Press release below - please forward widely!

Jewish Women Occupy Israeli Consulate in Toronto
Toronto: Wednesday January 8, 2009 Time: 10:25 am

A diverse group of Jewish Canadian women are currently occupying the Israeli consulate at 180 Bloor Street West in Toronto. This action is in protest against the on-going Israeli assault on the people of Gaza.

The group is carrying out this occupation in solidarity with the 1.5 million people of Gaza and to ensure that Jewish voices against the massacre in Gaza are being heard. They are demanding that Israel end its military assault and lift the 18-month siege on the Gaza Strip to allow humanitarian aid into the territory.

Israel has been carrying out a full-scale military assault on the Gaza Strip since December 27, 2008. At least 660 people have been killed and 3000 injured in the air strikes and in the ground invasion that began on January 3, 2009. Israel has ignored international calls for a ceasefire and is refusing to allow food, adequate medical supplies and other necessities of life into the Gaza Strip.

Jewish Women Occupy Israeli Consulate in Toronto
Toronto: Wednesday January 8, 2009 Time: 10:25 am

A diverse group of Jewish Canadian women are currently occupying the Israeli consulate at 180 Bloor Street West in Toronto. This action is in protest against the on-going Israeli assault on the people of Gaza.

The group is carrying out this occupation in solidarity with the 1.5 million people of Gaza and to ensure that Jewish voices against the massacre in Gaza are being heard. They are demanding that Israel end its military assault and lift the 18-month siege on the Gaza Strip to allow humanitarian aid into the territory.

Israel has been carrying out a full-scale military assault on the Gaza Strip since December 27, 2008. At least 660 people have been killed and 3000 injured in the air strikes and in the ground invasion that began on January 3, 2009. Israel has ignored international calls for a ceasefire and is refusing to allow food, adequate medical supplies and other necessities of life into the Gaza Strip.

If you would like to sign on to this letter, send an email to
antizionistjews@gmail.com with your name and city

January 5th, 2009

Like much of the world, we have spent the last week watching in shock and disgust as Israel continues its assault on the Gaza Strip. With the body count rising and a new tragedy in full bloom, we feel that it is important to speak out as Jewish youth in Canada and to denounce what Israel is doing in our name.

The Jewish diaspora is diverse and divided on its positions on the state of Israel’s policies. At this juncture in history, as Israel has committed its worst massacre in Gaza since it began its illegal occupation in 1967, we feel that it is crucial that Jews speak out and denounce Israel’s actions that amount to no more than war crimes committed by an apartheid state.

As Jewish youth, we are diverse, but we are unified in our solidarity with our Palestinian brothers and sisters in Gaza.

Some of us are students. We are outraged by the bombing of the Islamic University in Gaza city, as well as other civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and mosques.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Of sowing and harvests: Subcomandante Marcos' speech on Gaza

Two days ago, the same day we discussed violence, the ineffable Condoleezza Rice, a US official, declared that what was happening in Gaza was the Palestinians' fault, due to their violent nature.

The underground rivers that crisscross the world can change their geography, but they sing the same song.

And the one we hear now is one of war and pain.

Not far from here, in a place called Gaza, in Palestine, in the Middle East, right here next to us, the Israeli government's heavily trained and armed military continues its march of death and destruction.

The steps it has taken are those of a classic military war of conquest: first an intense mass bombing in order to destroy "strategic" military points (that's how the military manuals put it) and to "soften" the resistance's reinforcements; next a fierce control over information: everything that is heard and seen "in the outside world," that is, outside the theater of operations, must be selected with military criteria; now intense artillery fire against the enemy infantry to protect the advance of troop to new positions; then there will be a siege to weaken the enemy garrison; then the assault that conquers the position and annihilates the enemy, then the "cleaning out" of the probable "nests of resistance."

By Dan Freeman-Maloy, the Bullet, Socialist Project.

There is every reason to be outraged. But despite the severity of Israeli atrocities in Gaza, we have little right to act surprised. Whatever else can be said, Israel has made it abundantly clear that until its actions are met with credible international sanctions, it will subject Palestinians (and very likely others in the region) to massive, recurring waves of violence.

This was clear when the Obama-Biden campaign helped to lay the political foundation for this assault. It was clear when, amidst threats of such an operation and ongoing colonization in the West Bank, the European Union voted to upgrade relations with Israel earlier this month. For those of us in Canada, it has been clear as the Harper government has sharpened its alignment with Israel in the absence of any sustained parliamentary opposition.

www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/560982
January 02, 2009, Michelle Shephard, National Security Reporter

The last remaining terrorism suspect who has been held for seven years under
a "national security certificate" has been ordered released from detention.

Federal court Justice Richard Mosley ruled Friday that there is no evidence
that Syrian Hassan Almrei "poses a threat to the safety of any individual"
and should be released under strict conditions.

"I am satisfied that any risk that he might pose to national security or of
absconding can be neutralized by conditions," Mosley wrote in his 100-page
ruling.

Conditions for his release will likely include 24-hour monitoring by agents
with the Canada Border Services Agency, wearing a GPS monitoring bracelet
and a ban on any use of cellphones or computers.

"Hassan was very, very happy - very pleased," said his lawyer Lorne Waldman
after speaking with Almrei by phone. "Personally, I'm delighted. Holding
someone in Canada without charge, without trial, is a very serious matter
and I'm relieved that this detention will end soon."

Critics of Canada's immigration law that allows the government to deport
non-citizens deemed a risk to national security have called the Kingston
holding centre where Almrei is held "Guantanamo North."

by Kolya Abramsky, from Zapagringo

Up there, they intend to repeat their history.

They once again want to impose on us their calendar of death, their geography of destruction.

Down here we are being left with nothing.

Except rage.

And dignity.

There is no ear for our pain, except that of the people like us.

We are no one.

We are alone, and just with our dignity and our rage.

Rage and dignity are our bridges, our languages.

Let us listen to each other then, let us know each other.

Let our rage grow and become hope.

Let our dignity take root again and breed another world.

If this world doesn’t have a place for us, then another world must be made.

With no other tool than our rage, no other material than our dignity

- Communique announcing the World’s First Festival for Dignified Rage, 15th/16th September 2008

Desperately seeking Obama
By Sunera Thobani, from Rabble, January 2, 2009

The New Year has begun with Muslims around the world being taught a lesson in the crudity of racial equations: 400 Palestinian lives equal six Israeli lives.

Reeling from having learnt that over a million Iraqi and Afghan lives equal 3,000 American lives, the logic of this racial mathematics is certainly no new thing. After all, the first U.S. Constitution engaged in just such calculations of human worth, and Katrina demonstrated their ongoing effects. But the lesson has the power to shock every time: the images of Palestinian bodies being pulled out of the rubble in Gaza that flood news reports are unbearable to witness.

Surely the lesson cannot be lost on President-elect Barack Obama. That such violence can be waged on so defenseless a population with the support of the Bush Administration is unconscionable. That Obama chooses to remain silent is nothing short of cowardice.

From New York City:

We have occupied New School University.

We liberate this space for ourselves, and all those who want to join us,
for our general autonomous use. We take the university in explicit
solidarity with those occupying the universities and streets in Greece,
Italy, France and Spain.

This occupation begins as a response to specific conditions at the New
School, the corporatization of the university and the impoverishment of
education in general. However, it is not just this university but also
New York City that is in crisis: in the next several months, thousands
of us will be losing our jobs, while housing remains unaffordable and
unavailable to many and the cost of living skyrockets.

So we stress that the general nature of these intolerable conditions
exists across the spectrum of capitalist existence, in our universities
and our cities, in all of our social relations. For this reason, what
begins tonight at the New School cannot, and should not, be contained here.

Thus: with this occupation, we inaugurate a sequence of revolt in New
York City and the United States, a coming wave of occupations,
blockades, and strikes in this time of crisis.

Be assured, this is only the beginning,

With solidarity and love from New York to Greece,
To Italy, France and Spain,
To the coming insurrection.

- New School Occupation Committee

Common statement of anti-capitalist left organizations
OKDE-Spartakos

We, the organizations of the anticapitalist Left that sign this text, want to condemn the murder, in cold blood, of 16 year old Alexis Grigoropoulos by a police special guard in the evening of December 6th.

Our answer will be to resist and to keep fighting to overthrow the policy of police oppression, austerity and racism

We salute the demonstrations against the government of murderers all over Greece. In our opinion the reason for what happened is not the “extreme zeal”, or the “loss of temper” or the “lack of training” of a police special guard but the whole policy of the New Democracy government.

It is a policy that not only reinforces police oppression and legitimizes the use of lethal weapons against demonstrators, but also privatizes the Ports and Olympic Airlines, attacks social security and the rights of students.

It is the policy of police beatings of students, of the kidnappings of immigrants from Pakistan, of illegal interceptions of phone communications and of racist attacks that lead to the death of refugees that came here looking for asylum and a better future.

It is the policy of special “antiterrorist” legislation, of full compliance to the measures adopted by the EU against democratic liberties and against immigrants.

December 15, 2008 - TORONTO, Ont.

As we write, more than 110 York undergraduate students are joining graduate student members of CUPE 3903 in an occupation of the President’s Office on the 9th floor of the Ross Building at York University. They are demanding that President Mamdouh Shoukri come out, engage them, and address 12 key questions.

They also plan to present him a letter to sign, requesting that he commit to participating in a public forum of undergraduates and CUPE members, to be held in the week of Jan. 5th, 2009.

Since the strike began on November 5th, and the University locked out students by canceling all classes, Shoukri’s actions and those of his representatives have ranged from unresponsive to hostile to the majority of student concerns. Most recently, President Shoukri refused to participate in an undergraduate Town Hall organized by the York Federation of Students on Thursday, Dec. 4th. There, students discussed the YFS economic proposal* urging York to direct funds and fundraising dollars away from non-essential expenses such as luxurious celebrations, and huge raises and bonuses for York Administrators, back to the classroom where it belongs.

Monday, December 15th
The Concord Café (937 Bloor St.)
7pm

A panel discussion on Labour and the University

On November 6, 2008, CUPE 3903 went on strike against their employer,
York University. Fed up with the employer's dismal offers, nearly 3500
teaching assistants, contract faculty, and research and graduate
assistants took action to win decent job security, equity, wages, and
benefits.

December 15 marks the beginning of week six on the picket lines.

Facing anti-union media, an employer that refuses to negotiate, and
self-serving politicians, it is sometimes difficult to find spaces where
we can collectively discuss the historical and political significance of
this struggle.

Nevertheless, we must ask: what are the implications of this strike for
3903 members, the university sector, and the Canadian labour movement?

Upping the Anti welcomes all organizers, activists, and allies committed
to labour union solidarity to attend the forum with questions and
contributions.

Speakers:

*Punam Khosla* is long-time antiracist marxist-feminist activist and
organizer, and a strike coordinator and media spokesperson with CUPE
3903. She is currently doing her PhD in Urban/Environmental studies at
York University and is a course director (Unit 1). Her current work aims
to support women of colour left activism and involves developing a new

Scores of Temporary Foreign Workers deported by Ontario agri-complex
from UFCW Canada, December 6, 2008.

CAMPBELLVILLE, ONTARIO - Dec. 6, 2008 — More than 70 Mexican and Jamaican agriculture workers at a mushroom grow house facility outside of Guelph were fired without notice on December 6, by Rol-Land Farms, a $50 million-a-year, privately owned industrial agricultural corporation that operates a number of mushroom growing operations across Canada. No reason was given for the firings.

The workers were in Canada on the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, championed by the Harper government. They were also evicted from the housing provided to them by Rol-Land and are in the process of being repatriated.

"No company should have the right to treat human beings like disposable farm tools," explained Chris Ramsaroop of Justicia for Migrant Workers, an advocacy group that works with migrant workers across Canada. He added, "these workers have lost everything over night: their jobs, their housing and even their ability to stay and work in Canada. Rol-Land Farms didn't even issue notices to their employees."

By John Clarke

Now that the crisis of the financial markets has become a crisis of the 'real' economy, it is obvious that those who already face poverty (or live on the edge of it) will be hit extraordinarily hard in the days ahead. Over the last three decades, social programs that served to partially redistribute wealth or limit the disciplinary power of unemployment on the working class were massively reduced. With this 'social safety net' seriously compromised, we can expect a rapid and deep process of impoverishment to take effect as the downturn unfolds. The scale and severity of this will pose major challenges but open up huge possibilities in terms of mobilizing poor communities.

Tadzio Mueller and Alexis Passadakis, from Interactivist

1. The current world economic crisis marks the end of the neoliberal phase of capitalism. ‘Business as usual’ (financialisation, deregulation, privatisation…) is thus no longer an option: new spaces of accumulation and types of political regulation will need to be found by governments and corporations to keep capitalism going

2. Alongside the economic and political as well as energy crises, there is another crisis rocking the world: the biocrisis, the result of a suicidal mismatch between the ecological life support system that guarantees our collective human survival and capital’s need for constant growth

3. This biocrisis is an immense danger to our collective survival, but like all crises it also presents us, social movements, with a historic opportunity: to really go for capitalism's exposed jugular, its need for unceasing, destructive, insane growth

4. Of the proposals that have emerged from global elites, the only one that promises to address all these crises is the ‘Green New Deal’. This is not the cuddly green capitalism 1.0 of organic agriculture and D.I.Y. windmills, but a proposal for a new ’green’ phase of capitalism that seeks to generate profits from the piecemeal ecological modernisation of certain key areas of production (cars, energy, etc.)

The Economic Crisis Will Lead To A Social Assistance Crisis

As more plants close and the markets continue to fall, there is consensus on the economic future for the province of Ontario: more job losses and recession. Ontario’s last recession took place in the early 1990s - thousands of people from across the province migrated to Toronto in search of work and services that smaller communities offer little of, such as shelters, drop-in centres, meal programs, and outreach workers. Most people who came to Toronto found shelters well beyond capacity, social services over-taxed, and a stingy, overloaded welfare bureaucracy staggering under a caseload of 100,000.

CANADA:Native Rights Concerns Cloud 2010 Games
Jon Elmer
http://ipsnorthamerica.net/news.php?idnews=1870

VANCOUVER, 1 Dec (IPS) - A coalition of indigenous elders, social justice activists and community organisers is voicing opposition to the upcoming Winter Olympics, promising to continue their protests up to and throughout the 2010 games.

Taking advantage of a three-day media briefing hosted by the official Olympic body in late November, the Vancouver Organising Committee (VANOC), activists and native representatives invited the local and visiting international media to an office in the heart of the what is commonly known as Canada's poorest neighbourhood, the Downtown Eastside, to hear 'the other side of the Olympic story'.

Rallying under the banner of 'No Olympics on stolen native land', speakers representing nine native and community groups outlined connections between native poverty, dislocation and homelessness and the staging of the games in Vancouver and Whistler, 120 kms north of Vancouver.

COMMUNIQUÉ FROM THE INDIGENOUS REVOLUTIONARY CLANDESTINE COMMITTEE—GENERAL COMMAND OF THE ZAPATISTA ARMY FOR NATIONAL LIBERATION MEXICO.
Sixth Commission and Intergalactic Commission of the EZLN
26th of November 2008.

To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from the Lacandona Jungle in Mexico and in the world:
To the guests of the First World Festival of the "Digna Rabia":
To the people of Mexico:
To the peoples of the world:

COMPAÑERAS AND COMPAÑEROS:
BROTHERS AND SISTERS:

ON THIS OCASSION WE TELL YOU OUR WORD ON THE ADVANCES FOR THE CELEBRATION OF THE FIRST WORLD FESTIVAL OF THE DIGNA RABIA.

FIRST. - UP UNTIL TODAY, WE HAVE THE CONFIRMATION OF ATTENDANCE FROM PEOPLE, GROUPS, COLLECTIVES AND ORGANIZATIONS, ASIDE FROM MEXICO, FROM THE FOLLOWING COUNTRIES:

IRAN.
ARGENTINA.
ITALY.
FRANCE.
UNITED STATES.
BRAZIL.
SWEDEN.
COSTA RICA.
SPANISH STATE.
SWITZERLAND.
BASQUE COUNTRY.
CUBA.
CHILE.
ENGLAND.
AUSTRIA.
VENEZUELA.
BELGIUM.
GERMANY.
NORWAY.
GREECE.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 3903 which represents 3400 Teaching Assistants, Graduate Assistants, Research Assistants, and contract faculty at York University has been forced out on strike by the York University administration since Nov. 6th. They are fighting for a wage increase above inflation, job security for contract faculty, and improved working conditions and employee resources. Hear CUPE 3903 members Clare O'Conner, Kelly Fritsch, and AK Thompson report on the progress of their struggle and speak on the importance of Graduate Teaching Assistants and Teaching Assistants unionizing.

Thursday Dec. 11th, 3 pm, Room L-239 (just past the Student Centre on the way to the Parker Tower at Laurentian University). This is a wheelchair accessible location.

Preliminary sponsors are the Graduate Student’s Union (GSA), Students’ General Association (SGA), CUPE 3903, and Upping the Anti.

For more information contact Gary Kinsman at 523-2205 or at 675-1151 ext. 4221

Afghans to Obama: End the Occupation -- An interview with an Afghan women's rights activist
By Sonali Kolhatkar, from Z-Net, November 30, 2008.

President Elect Barack Obama wants to increase the number of US troops in Afghanistan. But the US/NATO occupation is less popular than ever. Eman, an Afghan woman's rights activist with RAWA tells Uprising host, Sonali Kolhatkar, that Obama must end the occupation. RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, is the oldest women's political organization in Afghanistan, struggling non-violently against foreign occupations and religious fundamentalism for more than 30 years.

Sonali Kolhatkar: Many on the American left are celebrating the election of Barack Obama to the presidency of the US. But while he has pledged to end the Iraq war, he has also promised to increase troops in Afghanistan. What is your opinion of Barack Obama and his stated policy on Afghanistan?

Dan Crow

Precarious employment is one of the hallmarks of what is euphemistically called “the new economy.” It has deep roots in the university sector. Recent decades have seen a move away from full-time secure jobs for academic workers, toward reliance on part-time, contingent, relatively low wage jobs. As a cost-savings measure, and as a way to provide flexibility in operations, universities rely on part-time teaching staff to increasing degrees. In some instances, more than half of all undergraduate teaching in Canada (but also in university systems across Europe) is done by part-timers.

Contingent academic workers, numbering in the tens of thousands in Ontario alone, find themselves in a situation where they have to apply for their jobs as often as every four months, with no guarantee that the work they rely on will be offered. Many have found themselves in this situation for more than 20 years, with an increasingly large cohort joining them each year, proving that there is indeed company in misery. Furthermore, despite the fact that many contingent academic workers have nominally high hourly wages, many live in poverty because of limits on the ability to work. For example, academic work is primarily seasonal work, with very little offered in the spring and summer months.

From Zapagringo-- http://zapagringo.blogspot.com/2008/11/revolution-evolution-in-21st-century.html

I really hope that you find some way to to read the piece below, Grace Lee Boggs' new introduction to "Revolution and Evolution in the Twentieth Century" penned by her and the late James Boggs in the late 1970s. Sit here and read it, or cut and paste and print it out... whichever you choose, please consider ordering the 2008 re-print, which has been re-titled "Revolution and Evolution in the Twenty First Century", at the Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership's on-line bookstore here. That might be the most convenient way to read this intro - and certainly the one that most supports those whose labor has created this powerful work :-)

Podcast To The Working Class: Scott McWhinnie and The Labour Show
By Derek Blackadder, from Our Times, October-November 2008.

Most days Scott McWhinnie can be found doing his electrician's job at the University of Guelph, roaming the southern Ontario campus doing urgent repairs and general maintenance. Sometimes, if you're a trade unionist in the strip along Ontario's 401 highway west of Toronto, you may hear McWhinnie's bass lines in the music of Rebel Girl, the band he's part of. It specializes in Wobblie tunes at union gigs.

McWhinnie, a member of Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 1334, also has other, more conventional, pastimes, though he puts them to unconventional use. "I also play golf to annoy elitist corporate types. My people invented it so it's in the blood," he says with a chuckle, referring to his father, who grew up in Scotland.

"My father grew up in a mining village but became an auto mechanic, which was his ticket out," says McWhinnie. "My mother was the youngest of 10 in a family of tenant farmers. These origins imbued me with a working-class sensibility that is a part of me at a genetic level. It gets passed on."

Celebrate People's History and Build Popular Power on January 20, 2009

We call on all anarchists, horizontalists, autonomists, anti-capitalists, anti-authoritarians, and others organizing a world from below to bring our best creative spirits to the project of a "Celebrate People's History and Build Popular Power" bloc on January 20, 2009, in Washington, DC -- or in your hometown, if you can't make it.

As people striving toward a nonhierarchical society, yes, we can -- and should -- be rigorously critical of Barack Obama. It goes without saying that we want a world without presidents; we want worlds of our own constituting via directly democratic structures, not states. But not all heads of state are alike, and if we fail to recognize both the historical meaning and power of this particular moment, we will ensure our own irrelevance.

We can -- and should -- also be in critical solidarity with people who have been violently marginalized, who see in the Obama campaign the possibility of their own agency. The inauguration affords a unique space for us to stand with a diverse group of activists inspired by Obama, many new to political organizing, even as we maintain our views on the limits of change from above.

Adam Hanieh

The current global economic crisis has all the earmarks of an epoch-defining event. Mainstream economists – not usually known for their exaggerated language – now openly employ phrases like 'systemic meltdown' and 'peering into the abyss.' On October 29, for example, Martin Wolf, one of the top financial commentators of the Financial Times, warned that the crisis portends "mass bankruptcy," "soaring unemployment" and a "catastrophe" that threatens "the legitimacy of the open market economy itself... the danger remains huge and time is short."

There is little doubt that this crisis is already having a devastating impact on heavily-indebted American households. But one of the striking characteristics of analysis to date – by both the left and the mainstream media – is the almost exclusive focus on the wealthy countries of North America, Europe and East Asia. From foreclosures in California to the bankruptcy of Iceland, the impact of financial collapse is rarely examined beyond the advanced capitalist core.

Speakers include:

* Kelly Fritsch on Upping the Anti. Kelly is on the editorial collective of Upping the Anti. She is also a PhD student and an active member of CUPE 3903 at York University.

* Clare O'Conner on “An ‘unshakable’ bond?: Canada's support for Israel." Clare is a student at York University and an editor of Upping the Anti.

* Dave Bleakney on "Smashing the Wall: Labour and Palestine. How the labour movement is overcoming years of silence and where we go from here." Dave is the national union representative for education (anglophone) for the Canadian Union of Postal Workers. He was at the founding convergence of Peoples Global Action and has been active in many Latin American solidarity struggles. He is a recipient of the Commemorative Medal of Che Guevara from Cuba.

Music by Dave Bleakney. Dave will also be performing songs of social justice. Dave started out as a New Brunswick folk punker and now is as comfortable with a string quartet as with high decibel ear splitting feedback...

Thursday Dec. 11th, 7pm, 4th Floor Resource Centre of St. Andrew's Place, 111 Larch Street. This is a wheelchair accessible location.

Copies of UTA #7 will be available for $5 each. For more information or for childcare or travel subsidization contact Gary at 523-2205 or at gkinsman@laurentian.ca
On Upping the Anti also go to: www.uppingtheanti.org

Starting Nov 6, 2008, CUPE 3903, the union representing contract faculty, teaching and research assistants at York University in Toronto, Canada, went on an all-out legal strike. Significant issues include wage increase corresponding with cost of living increase, funding guarantees for graduate students (who also form significant number of workers at York U), improved working conditions (which mean improved learning conditions for students), and job security for contract faculty (some of whom have been teaching for several years on a sessional basis, carrying 1.5-2 times the load of the permanent faculty at 50-75% of the cost for YorkU). Find a summary of all outstanding issues at http://cupe3903.tao.ca.

The issues are obviously significant for the workers at York University to strike over. Their significance goes beyond York U however. These are issues facing non-permanent teaching and research workers in all universities, who are estimated to carry 40-60% of the workload at low exploitative wages and benefits, in poor working conditions and without any job security. This is the reality of labour in higher education institutions functioning as for-profit corporations (as is York U) governed by BoDs composed of representatives of other corporations.

by Sherry Wolf

In the wake of Barack Obama's historic victory, a false and reactionary narrative has emerged that blames Black voters for the gay marriage ban that passed by a 52 to 48 percent margin in California.

While Florida and Arizona also passed same-sex marriage bans, the vote for Prop 8 in the politically progressive state of California is widely attributed to the enormous surge of Black voters, 70 percent of whom approved the ban reversing the state's May 2008 Supreme Court decision allowing lesbians and gays to marry. The exit polls showed that 53 percent of Latinos voted for the ban, as well as around 49 percent of white voters.

The state's Black population, however, is 6.2 percent, and it accounted for 10 percent of the overall vote. In other words, blaming African Americans for the referendum's passage ignores 90 percent of the vote.

It also ignores recent history. To judge from social research, had there been an unapologetically pro-civil rights campaign, there was the prospect of a different outcome.

The most comprehensive study of Black attitudes toward homosexuality, which combines 31 national surveys from 1973 to 2000, came to a fascinating conclusion. Georgia State University researchers found that "Blacks appear to be more likely than whites both to see homosexuality as wrong and to favor gay-rights laws."