No Christmas in the Incarceration Nation

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday December 17, 2009 · 9:42 AM PST

2009/12/17 · 09:42

Each year our volunteer-run community radio station , WMMT-FM -- "Mountain Community Radio"-- produces a holiday call-in show for those inside our Nation's prisons. I live in Whitesburg, KY a small town in the Appalachian Coalfields that has quite a few prisons built up around it.

We started "Calls from Home" in hopes of reconnecting prisoners with their relatives at a time of year in which family is celebrated, and also as a response to human rights abuses in our local prisons.

I'm a regular lurker here and wanted to share the audio from the show as a form of a holiday greeting to the KOS community. Listen to some heart warming calls below the fold.

appalachia

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday May 05, 2009 · 5:21 AM PDT

2009/05/05 · 05:21

I received an email this morning informing me that Claudine Brown in under consideration for chair of the NEA. As an artist dedicated to human rights and working in low-income communities someone like Claudine being the chair of the NEA would simply be a victory for humanity. You might not know Claudine, but she has been an voice and supporter of artists in low-income communities across the country and fearless in her support for art that works to address pressing social issues for decades.

I know hundreds of artists around the country who will step up and support her, but I need the KOS community advice on make sure our voices our heard. What is the best way to rally for a person under consideration? Who should we ‘target’ our communication to? Can we get a progressive and social justice activist elected to Chair of the NEA? More about Claudine below the fold.

appalachia

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday February 23, 2009 · 6:52 AM PST

2009/02/23 · 06:52

According to the National Center for Chartiable Statistics, there are currently over 1.5 million nonprofit organizations in the United States.

Non-profits are both weathering the economic storm and at the same time trying to aid those most vulnerable in our communities with food, shelter, cultural programming, medicine, and job training. I thought I would share some 'slang' from my daily life in the non-profit arts world.

Thin envelope - a rejection letter from a foundation or funding source. "We got another thin envelope today, we might have to cut some programs."

Pimping Poverty- when non-profits sell poverty to a funder. "Did you hear them pimping that poverty to the Ford Foundation, and all of their staff graduated from the Ivy League."

Founders Syndrome - when the founder of a non-profit continues to control the organization long after they should have let go. "That is one bad case of Founders Syndrome."

Read more below the fold. Add your own my fellow non-profit workers..

appalachia

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday December 05, 2008 · 1:37 PM PST

2008/12/05 · 13:37

There are over 2.4 million people in America’s prisons and rural America is home to the majority of them--a way to prop up the economy. Where I live, in the central Appalachian coalfields, the result has been nothing short of a archipelago gulag, with almost every county having a state, federal or private prison.

Back in 1999, our funky regional community radio station (WMMT-FM "The Voice of the Hillbilly Nation) responded to reports of human rights violations in two newly opened SuperMax prisons with a holiday call-in show for prisoner families. Ten years later the program has grown to a national radio program that brings hundreds of prisoner family voices to the airwaves each holiday season. Sometimes heartbreaking the calls give instant insight into a system the targets our poorest citizens.

The volunteer djs are putting "Calls from Home" right now, live on the Internet. I've posted some of the calls below the fold.

(Brief update for those interested. I've added the final radio program, which was pretty powerful)

appalachia

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday October 21, 2008 · 5:29 AM PDT

2008/10/21 · 05:29

Coalminers standing up to the NRA. Appalachia is more complex that the national media gives it credit for. Of course getting the coal vote and the environmental vote, often the two are found in the same family, is the trick to winning Appalachia.

Story below the fold.

appalachia

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday October 06, 2008 · 9:42 PM PDT

2008/10/06 · 21:42

Rural and white working class communities have not been immune to the sting of the burgeoning U.S, criminal justice system.

Newer
Older

RSS

No Christmas in the Incarceration Nation

Help select a progressive NEA chair

Non-Profit Slang

Holiday Call-in Show for Prisoners: (Updated) With Embedded Audio

COAL MINERS DEFEND OBAMA

The way to the rural voter's heart leads through prison.