Blogging Blackwater and Support for Southern Progressives

Yesterday, we published Merc Is the New Crack by regular contributor Lindsay Beyerstein on InTheseTimes.com. Lindsay's article reported on Blackwater and America's downward-spiraling addiction to the private marketplace. The Institute for Southern Studies' blog, Facing South, has an excellent link to comprehensive coverage and history of the Blackwater mercenary company. From Facing South: BLOGGING BLACKWATER: If you're interested in following the growing Blackwater scandal in detail, you should add to your reading list Blackwater Current, a new blog by Raleigh News & Observer investigative reporter Joe Neff. He has covered the company extensively since 2004, when his series The Bridge chronicled the death of four of the company's contractors in Fallujah. Facing South is a top-notch blog. In the last few days they've covered the ascendance of solar energy in Florida, Jena 6 developments, the subpar system of criminal justice in Louisiana and how adolescents bear the brunt of the system's failings, and John Edwards' plan to end criminal military outsourcing. In her InTheseTimes.com article on the overt, insidious, and tireless efforts of anti-choice zealots in the south, An Unholy Alliance, Carrie Kilman writes about the lack of allies and support for Southern reproductive rights activists, particularly from the North. "Thinking that anti-choice zealotry is only an issue south of the Mason-Dixon line is a mistake," writes Kilman, "laws restricting women’s access to healthcare have chipped away at abortion rights in almost every state." This goes for all progressive issues, not just reproductive rights. We would do well to follow and support the efforts of Southern progressives. Their issues are not merely Southern issues, but American issues. The battles they fight to protect democracy and equal rights affect and are connected to the same battles we fight in the rest of the country. Let's stop living in denial on this one. Progressives can get mighty lonesome and isolated down there, but it doesn't have to be so. -Jarrett Dapier Assistant Publisher In These Times