Four Farm Workers in Two Weeks Die from Heat Stroke

I had intended to write something about this on Thursday, when the death toll was at three. Now, just a few days later, it's up to four farm workers in California dead from heat stroke. The tragedy in this is there are laws in place to protect the workers, but they are not being enforced.

From a United Farm Workers Action Alert:

Ramiro Carrillo Rodriguez, 48, father of two, died in Selma, CA on Thursday afternoon after working all day for Sun Valley Packing in Reedley thru a farm labor contractor. Ramiro had complained of being sick from the heat. He was taken home by his foreman. He passed out almost as soon as he got in the house. By the time an ambulance got there he was dead on arrival. He leaves behind two children ages 13 and 16.

Ramiro's death makes two farm workers dying of heatstroke last week, four farm worker heat deaths in the last 8 weeks and the 13th farm worker heat death since CA Governor Schwarzenegger took office.

Ramiro Carrillo Rodriguez's death follows the deaths of 42 year-old farm worker Abdon Felix Garcia, father of three, who died on Wednesday after spending the morning and early afternoon working for Sunview Vineyards in Arvin. The coroner says Felix's body core temperature was measured at 108 degrees just 13 minutes before his death. 64 year-old Jose Macarena Hernandez died during a record-breaking heat wave on June 20 while harvesting butternut squash in Santa Maria on land owned by Sunrise Growers. UFW President Arturo Rodriguez attended his funeral yesterday. And then there was the heat death of 17 year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez who died while laboring in the Stockton area grape vines.

Governor Schwarzenegger came to Maria Isabel's funeral and said he would do everything possible to prevent this from happening again. Has he done everything he can? With the recent deaths of Ramiro Carrillo Rodriguez, Abdon Felix Garcia and Jose Hernandez it is clear the state does not have the capacity to protect farm workers.

As California's summer sizzles we must do everything we can to insure that no more farm workers fall victim to the heat because the laws written to protect them are not enforced. Speaker Emeritus Fabian Nunez has introduced legislation which has moved out of the assembly and which is now in the state senate. It will make it easier for farm workers to organize and enforce the laws that the state cannot enforce.

Please take action immediately and click to fax California Gov. Schwarzenegger (if you live in California, a cc of your message will also be e-mailed to your legislators) and tell them something needs to be done NOW. It’s time to put a law in place that will allow farm workers to protect themselves!

Employers are required by the state to provide outdoor workers with access to at least a quart of fresh water per hour and a shaded area where they can take a five-minute rest and recovery breaks when they are having symptoms of heat illness. Employees and supervisors are also supposed to be trained in heat illness prevention, but that doesn't appear to be happening.

The action alert included the following news reports:

07/11/2008 - KCOY: Heat wave victim laid to rest.
07/11/2008 - Bakersfield Californian: Possible heat death prompts questions from local lawmaker
07/11/2008 - KSBY: Santa Maria family searches for answers in death of field worker
07/11/2008 - News10.net: Third, Possible Heat-Related Farmworker Death Investigated
07/11/2008 -Sacramento Bee: State investigating third farmworker fatality in scorching weather
07/10/2008 - KGET: Heat Death Victim Identified
07/10/2008 - Bakersfield Californian: Farm workers union complains about heat-related deaths

Show your support for the United Farm Workers.

.

Stop Taxpayer Funded School Vouchers

The federal government is considering whether or not to reauthorize taxpayer funded school vouchers in the District of Columbia. Vouchers are a bad idea because fundamentally they don't "fix" the underlying problem.

They allow some students the option to attend other schools, usually private religious schools, at taxpayer expense. In evaluating these programs over the years the research indicates the performance of "voucher students" isn't significantly better than that of their peers attending the public school. In other words, instead of actually fixing the problem the federal government would rather offer a "feel good solution" that in reality is no solution at all.

Here is what you can do:

Act NOW to Stop School Vouchers!

Urge Congress to End DC Voucher Program

On Tuesday, June 24, the House Appropriations Committee will mark up the FY2009 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill, which could include $18 million for private and religious school vouchers. This bill could contain a continuation of a federally-funded school voucher program even though the program was supposed to end in September 2008.

In 2003, Congress authorized a pilot, private-school voucher program for the District of Columbia. Now, even though the program's five-year pilot period is ending, President Bush has proposed an increase in funding. Next Tuesday, the House Appropriations Committee will mark-up the bill that funds the D.C. voucher program. If this Congress does not end this, the only nationally funded voucher program, more may come and your state could be next.

The D.C. public schools are in need of improvement, yet this program does nothing to help public schools provide high-quality education. In fact, congressionally mandated federal evaluations released in both 2007 and 2008 found no significant differences in academic achievement between voucher students and their peers in D.C. public schools. This program does not work and should not be funded by our tax dollars.

Furthermore, these vouchers have been funding religious education. Because sectarian schools integrate religion throughout their curricula, school vouchers allow the state to fund religious teaching as well as secular coursework.

In addition, despite receiving public money, the participating private schools are not subject to all federal civil rights laws, and do not face the same accountability standards that all public schools must face.

Please call the Majority Office of the House Appropriations Committee ASAP to urge the defeat of this misguided program! The number is (202) 225-2771.

If you cannot make a phone call, please e-mail your representative NOW to urge him or her to oppose this program. Your representative can help stop vouchers before they go any further.

Take action right now!

Dogs Unite!

stolen from jewgirl at all the way from oy to vey

I never ask ya's to sign petitions. Now, I'm akksin. Here's the dish and the URL:

"In 2007, the 'artist' Guillermo Vargas Habacuc, took a dog from the street, tied him to a rope in an art gallery, and starved him to death. For several days, the 'artist' and the visitors of the exhibition have watched emotionless the shameful 'masterpiece' based on the dog's agony, until eventually he died.

The prestigious Visual Arts Biennial of the Central American decided that the 'installation' was actually art, so that Guillermo Vargas Habacuc has been invited to repeat his cruel action for the biennial of 2008.

PLEASE HELP STOP HIM
http://www.petitiononline.com/ea6gk/petition.html

It's free of charge, there is no need to register, and it will only take 1 minute to save the life of an innocent creature.

Please, please, please sign this petition.

Yeah it's stolen ... so arrest me!

Urge Senate to Promote Real Science in Schools

STOP an Unconstitutional Creationism Earmark

Americans United for Separation of Church and State is urging everyone who cares about academic integrity to contact their Senators immediately and urge them to oppose using tax dollars to promote creationism in public school science classes. The alert reads:

An earmark was recently added to the Senate Fiscal Year 2008 Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriation Bill's Committee Report that would put $100,000 of federal funding directly in the hands of the Louisiana Family Forum, an organization that has a history of aggressively sponsoring the teaching of creationism and other theories that debate evolution in schools. The funding is for a project that would allow this group to "to develop a plan to promote better science education," but this group would surely use these funds to undermine the teaching of real science.

In truth, there is no controversy in the scientific community over the theory of evolution. Thus, attempting to debunk it or single it out for criticism using taxpayer money can serve no valid secular teaching purpose. Every major scientific organization and the overwhelming majority of scientists agree that evolution is the best and only scientific explanation for the diversity of species.

The courts have been consistent in finding that governmental efforts to hinder the teaching of evolution or to promote the teaching of alternate "theories" violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The religious tone of creationism and its proponents, including Louisiana Family Forum, makes such groups completely inappropriate recipients of federal funding for science education.

Now, we need to stop the funding on this dangerous provision. With your help, we can ask that this earmark be extracted from the Senate Appropriations bill. Please call the Senate Appropriations Committee to ask for the removal of this earmark by using the numbers below:

Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies
Majority staff: 202-224-9145
Minority staff: 202-224-7230

CALL TODAY and URGE your Senators to VOTE AGAINST this earmark!

TAKE ACTION: Senate to Vote on Hate Crimes Bill

The Senate is finally going to vote on the Matthew Shepard Act on Thursday (9/27).

Now that Senate action is imminent, anti-LGBT groups are activating their misinformed grassroots base once again.

They've convinced thousands that this bill will muzzle preachers and send pastors to jail for reading certain parts of the Bible. This is simply NOT TRUE. If we don't call right now, critical votes COULD BE LOST to these scare tactics.

TAKE ACTION NOW
Click here to get contact information for you Senators.

For each office, tell the staffer who answers:
"As a constituent, I'd like the Senator to support the Matthew Shepard Act (S. 1105)."

We cannot allow our Senators to be intimidated, misled, or swayed by an extremist minority.

TAKE ACTION: End Abstinence-Only Funding!

Make calling your member of Congress, and urging them to oppose abstinence-only funding, the first thing you do on Monday morning. Don't know who your Representative is? Click here and go to "Elected Officials" to find out. Simply type in your zip code, and the names of your elected officials will come up. To get the phone number, click on the name of your representative. It's as easy as that!

___________________

from Advocates for Youth

Tell the Democratic Leadership to end
Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Funding!

The House Labor-Health and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee is moving forward with a bill that increases funding for the Community-Based Abstinence Education (CBAE) programs even though these programs are ineffective in changing teen behavior, promote scientifically inaccurate information, and withhold critical life-saving information about the effectiveness of condoms in protecting against HIV.

Tell the Democratic Leadership that you stand with the overwhelming majority (82%) of Americans who support giving young people all the facts.

Failure to end abstinence-only funding is a failure of leadership.

TAKE ACTION NOW!