Dear Judges, Lawyers, Policemen, Guards, Counselors, Taxpayers, et. al.,

We are here. Like it or not, for good or bad, we are here. Who are we? We are the
downtrodden and dispossesed, the self-torturing, the disenfranchised convicts,
drug and alcohol addicts, the unemployed and unemployable. We are the children of
poverty, financial and spiritual. We have and will have children of our own,
grandchildren too. We are ex-cons, uninsured, homeless, of many colors and speaking
many tongues. We are the enemy in what has become a domestic war against ourselves.

And who are you? You who like the tough talk of Tough on Crime? You who watch as
budgets are cut in education and health care while you militarize a police force?
Bullet-proof vests, automatic weapons, helicopters, tanks, robots ... the
testosterone is oozing through the streets, more prisons, longer sentences, tighten
the belt, spartan conditions, task forces, gang units, gun courts. And what is there
to show for it? Unemployent stays low because half the population oversees those
"out of the workforce", the dregs, the rabble, the enemy? Please tell me there is a
deeper reason. Do you feel safer? More humane? More like a cohesive society with a
shared sense of purpose, who can identify Us and Them? Do you live in a gated
community or gentrified neighborhood? By the way, have you read the Declaration of
Independence and US Constitution - or do you only know the first phrases?

It's about time we got together. Please know that I have yet to meet a convict who
wants their child to be a thief, an addict, a dealer, a prostitute, or a violent
individual. Most of us still have hope for ourselves even when stuck in the darkest
dilemmas, ruts and catch-22s. Most of us believe in crafting laws and instilling
order. Many of us have burrowed beneath the surface to find a spiritual sense of
being, an understanding force at least as powerful as those we succumbed to, and many
of use wouldn't escape if you opened the front door. Did you know that approximately
10 million Americans are either incarcerated, on probation, on parole or once were in
those categories? Each of those 10 million have families, friends, neighbors ... and
so closer and closer does the We interface with the You. Don't you think it's time we
talked?

Are you ready? Can you accept that the road we are travelling points toward a grim
and painful future? Do you have the heart to face monumental failures while bravely
struggling beyond where we are now? I know that some of you are, and that some of us
are, and this is what gives me hope. You need our insights just as we need your
structure. It is never over, especially when a real solution, a real treatment for
our sickness, is yet to begin.

In Solidarity,

Bruce Reilly (a.k.a Bruha)
P.O.Box 8274
Cranston, RI 02920 USA

P.S. - I am trying to conceptualize an effective guerilla media campaign to promote
this cause. Ideas are welcome. Collaboration is prayed.
























is
officially over.

4) ONLY votes MAILED to the vote-taker will count. Votes posted to the
net for any reason (including inability to get mail to the
vote-taker) and proxy votes (such as having a mailing list
maintainer claim a vote for each member of the list) will not be
counted.

5) Votes may not be transferred to other, similar proposals. A vote
shall count only for the EXACT proposal that it is a response
to. In particular, a vote for or against a newsgroup under one name
shall NOT be counted as a vote for or against a newsgroup with a
different name or charter, a different moderated/unmoderated status
or (if moderated) a different moderator or set of moderators.

6) Votes MUST be explicit; they should be of the form "I vote for the
group foo.bar as proposed" or "I vote against the group foo.bar as
proposed". The wording doesn't have to be exact, it just needs to
be unambiguous. In particular, statements of the form "I would vote
for this group if..." should be considered comments only and not
counted as votes.

7) A vote should be run only for a single group proposal. Attempts to
create multiple groups should be handled by running multiple
parallel votes rather than one vote to create all of the groups.

The Result

1) At the completion of the voting period, the vote taker must post
the vote tally and the E-mail addresses and (if available) names of
the voters received to news.announce.newgroups and any other groups
or mailing lists to which the original call for votes was
posted. The tally should include a statement of which way each
voter voted so that the results can be veri