From the Green Party US:
Check out Election Central from the national Green Party all day on election day and into the evening. You can:
From Mother Jones:
On May 20, 2015, the Nebraska state Legislature voted to repeal the state’s death penalty. When the Republican governor, Pete Ricketts, vetoed the legislation six days later, the Legislature overrode his veto. It was an extraordinary move, making Nebraska the first solidly conservative state in more than 40 years to end the death penalty.
But the victory for death penalty opponents was short-lived. Having failed in his role as governor to protect the death penalty, Ricketts worked to reinstate it in a different capacity: As a man of deep pockets. Ricketts and his billionaire father, Republican megadonor Joe Ricketts, spent $300,000 on an effort to collect enough signatures to put the death penalty question to voters, in the form of a referendum on November 8. The governor donated another $100,000 this fall to fund a campaign to sway voters to reinstate the death penalty.
From the Lincoln Journal Star:
Flashing signs that read “We Stand with Standing Rock, #NoDAPL” and “Can’t Drink Oil,” about 200 Nebraskans rallied Saturday afternoon at the state Capitol to oppose a controversial pipeline being constructed more than 400 miles away.
Should it be completed, the Dakota Access oil pipeline will run underground in close proximity to the Missouri River, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s main water source. It also would require tearing apart land the tribe considers sacred burial grounds.
Protests escalated last weekend when demonstrators set up camp on private land along the pipeline’s path, and more than 140 people were arrested Thursday.
Quieter protests continued Friday and Saturday.
Lincoln’s rally and march were organized by a 17-year-old high school student.
Yard signs for Stein/Baraka are available:
From Retain A Just Nebraska:
Please join us on Tuesday, November 1, from 5 to 6:45 p.m. for a reception with death row exoneree, Kirk Bloodsworth. A screening of the documentary Bloodsworth: An Innocent Man about his life will follow the reception.
An honorably discharged former Marine, Mr. Bloodsworth is the first person in the United States exonerated from death row by DNA testing. In 1984, he was arrested for the rape and murder of nine-year-old Dawn Hamilton. He was sentenced to death in Baltimore County, Maryland, in 1985. Kirk was released from death row in 1993 after DNA tests incontrovertibly established his innocence.
Mr. Bloodsworth will join us at the reception. Following that, there will be a screening of the film about his experience on death row at Film Streams, which is just around the corner from The Session Room, followed by a Q &A with him.
From Jill2016.com:
Over 75% of Americans want open debates.
However, the Commission on Presidential Debates, run by former Republican and Democratic party officials, has chosen to exclude Jill Stein from the presidential debates. As we have demonstrated with the previous two debates, this does not stop the Stein/Baraka campaign from speaking truth to power. We have been inserting Jill’s responses in each debate and livestreaming it to #BreakTheBlackout. We’ll do it again during the third, and final, presidential debate on October 19th. We’ll also follow the debate with a live Q&A session, open to all. Join us!
From Nebraskans for Peace:
Plan to attend Nebraskans for Peace’s Annual Peace Conference. Senator Ernie Chambers, Dr. Richard Miller, and Professor John Hibbing will be keynote speakers:
The 2016 Annual Peace Conference promises to be one of the best in our storied 46-year history. You can attend this all-day event (lunch included) for just $20. You can register for the conference by contacting the NFP State Office directly at nfpstate (at) nebraskansforpeace.org or (402) 475-4620.
The eight workshops are about Combating Climate Change, Stopping the Nuclear Arms Race, Our Criminal Justice System, The Latest on Whiteclay, Public Policy & Black Lives Matter, Getting To Know Our Muslim Neighbors, Crisis in Syria and Iraq, and The Political & Economic Prowess of the 1%.
Check out the full details, including the schedule and registration form.
The next People’s Film Festival event is this coming Monday, Oct. 17, held as always at 7 p.m. at First Unitarian Church, 31st and Harney streets. The theme will be the death penalty, and two short films will be shown. The first is the award-winning documentary Stones, which explores the death penalty in Nebraska. The second is a film clip from Democracy Now! that deals with two people, one from Ireland and one from the United States. “It is a story you will marvel at and also be uplifted by,” says Steve Horn. “It ought to put a stake through the heart of those who insist on blind retribution.”
From Democracy Now!:
With the presidential election just over four weeks away, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced off Sunday night at Washington University in St. Louis in what Politico described as “the ugliest debate in American history.” We play excerpts and expand the debate by giving Green Party nominee Jill Stein a chance to respond to the same questions posed to Trump and Clinton. Stein and Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson were excluded from the debate under stringent rules set by the Commission on Presidential Debates, which is controlled by the Democratic and Republican parties. We invited both Stein and Johnson to join us on the program; only Stein took us up on the offer.
From the Lincoln Journal Star:
There was a time during early efforts to undo the Legislature’s repeal of capital punishment in 2015 that longtime death penalty opponent Sen. Ernie Chambers was confident.
He said he had no doubt Nebraska voters would uphold the decision of the Legislature to stop executions.
Now, because of the way the ballot referendum will appear to voters, he just doesn’t know.
“It’s so confusing to people,” he said.
He even gets confused trying to explain it to those who call him and ask.
The simplest way to think of it is to focus on what the Legislature did, and then to decide if you want to retain the law senators passed to eliminate the death penalty for first-degree murder and substitute it with a life sentence, or if you want to repeal that bill (LB268), keeping the death sentence intact.