January 19 - Washington DC. About 300 demonstrators took to the streets outside Lafayette Park to protest the impending war in Iraq. Three Baltimore demonstrators were arrested in peaceful acts of civil disobedience. Demonstrators were manhandled by the police and an 80-year old woman received head injuries when tackled by a policeman. (photos by Laura Goren)

On January 7, 2003 Jonathan Neale spoke to a small group of activists at the Progressive Action Center. Neale’s talk, sponsored by Left Turn, focused on how the drive for war is linked with the drive for globalization and how the anti-capitalist and anti-war movements are coming together in Europe and around the world. Jonathan Neale is the author of "You Are G8, We Are 6 Billion: The Truth Behind the Genoa Protests" and steering committee member of Globalise Resistance and member of the Socialist Workers Party in Britain. Jonathan Neale was born in New York and lives in Britain. He has a PhD in Social History from Warwick University. Since January2001 he has been a spokesman and organizer for Globalise Resistance, an anti-capitalist group in Britain. He was one of three delegates from Britain to the Genoa Social Forum, the body that organized the protests. The following is the text of his speech (transcribed by Kristie Kozenewski).

The chants of over 75 anti-death penalty protesters filtered into Ehrlich's inauguration, drawing attention to Maryland's racist death row.

Jan. 7, 2003 -- In 1906, the Bronx Zoo put a tribesman from the Congo on display in a cage with an orangutan and a parrot. Though the African-American clergy in the city vehemently protested, Zoo officials and even the mayor of New York refused to stop the spectacle. Crowds filed by to see this man not as who he was, but as who he was advertised to be, a pygmy cannibal from the African jungle. Is CBS engaging in the same spectacular exploitation with "The Real Beverly Hillbillies?"

In his new book No Greater Threat: America after September 11 and the Rise of a National Security State, local attorney and author C. William Michaels explains what the USA PATRIOT act really means for the United States.

Protesting the Bush administration's drive to war on Iraq, activists challenged the fences the State sets up to restrict the public sphere. At Baltimore's Inner Harbor and the Towson Town Center, authorities responded with police officers, dogs, and "eviction." [Updated article originally posted 12/22/02]

Almost half-way through the funding cycle, the Baltimore Empowerment Zone appears to be floundering. This article argues that it is the widespread crisis of participation in the inner city that is significantly responsible for undermining the Empowerment Zone's grand intentions. [photos by Erin Hall]

Baltimore resident Ellen Barfield, Voices in the Wilderness volunteer, traveled to Baghdad on December 6, to stand in solidarity with Iraqi citizens under the threat of US war.