Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/author/kathlyn-stone/page/3/)
The Family Tree Clinic in St. Paul’s Merriam Park neighborhood is offering free rapid HIV tests Mon. Dec. 1, in collaboration with World AIDS Day. The screening test looks for the presence of HIV antibodies. Continue Reading
Ruth Ann Plourde suddenly interrupted the workshop as her class was trying to recreate the graceful but agonizingly slow T’ai Chi forms she’d taught moments before. “How’s the monkey chatter now?” she asked, in reference to humans’ normally racing thoughts. “Are you feeling in the present?”
No doubt about that. It took all one’s concentration to put the right foot out in front, lean into it, and simultaneously do the choo-choo move with the arms. No one was thinking about irritations at work, the price of gas, or picking up the kids. At the end of the class participants said they felt focused and relaxed. Continue Reading
The Paul Wellstone-Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 was added to the financial bailout package, passed, and promptly signed into law last week. The mental health parity legislation was added to the $700 billion bailout package to win support after the House rejected the bailout earlier in the week. The law requires health insurers to provide benefits, co-payments and treatments for mental health services and substance abuse disorders equal to traditional medical coverage. “This bill is a major achievement, one I know my dad would be proud of,” said David Wellstone, co-founder of Wellstone Action. Mental health parity was championed by Sen. Paul Wellstone during his years in the Senate. Continue Reading
James Kvaal, a senior fellow at the Washington, DC-based Center for American Progress was in St. Paul yesterday to issue a warning about Sen. John McCain’s “radical” plan for health care. Kvall was one of five Center staff members who are fanned out across the nation to outline the plan, which has received little national attention. The cornerstone of the plan is the elimination of the tax exclusion for employers who provide health coverage as an employee benefit. If employers were to be taxed on health benefits, they’d be less likely to offer them, opponents reason. Continue Reading
Penny Coleman wishes people would stop thinking of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in combat veterans as a mental disorder. “It’s not a disorder, it’s an injury,” says Coleman flatly. Coleman led a workshop on PTSD and suicide prevention at the Veterans For Peace national convention held in Minneapolis the last week of August. About 20 Vietnam veterans, an Iraq war veteran, and two family members who each lost a sibling (one to suicide following her service in Vietnam and one in combat) shared what works and what doesn’t in treating PTSD in soldiers. What’s clear is that from Minnesota to Alabama to Colorado and Maine, VFP members devote time to helping their fellow veterans cope with combat-related trauma. Continue Reading
The week of September 1-5 brought many passionate activists from near and far to St. Paul to speak about the policy issues they care deeply about. Here are some of their messages. Twin-City-area attorneys Marianne and John volunteered with the ACLU as ‘Liberty Guards’ to distribute “Know Your Rights” pamphlets for protesters at the Sept. 1 rally and march and to keep an eye out for civil rights abuses. Continue Reading
On the morning after arrests of more than a dozen journalists, journalists and advocates for freedom of the press delivered a strong rebuke and call for action to city officials in St. Paul. Twin Cities Media Alliance organizer Nancy Doyle delivered a letter with more than 50,000 signatures to St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, St. Paul City Attorney John Choi, and Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner’s offices. Continue Reading
The heavy police presence promised at the RNC in St. Paul this week was like honey to a bee for a few angry troublemakers and thrill seekers. Continue Reading
The subject of profiling, the practice of weighing someone’s guilt or innocence based on the way they look or act, is bandied about a lot these days. Some people think it’s a perfectly acceptable practice when carried out by law enforcement. After walking into two profiling situations today I’m convinced of its dangers, not only to the victims but also the perpetrators. First, at a little before 3 p.m. my teenage daughter and I were heading for the Ripple Effect event at the State Capitol grounds to hear Michael Franti, a musician we both like. After we crossed Constitution Avenue a volunteer with the National Lawyers Guild pointed out to me that a state trooper took our picture as we crossed the street, and that he was taking pictures of every person that entered the venue from the same direction. Continue Reading
Cherie Honkala, national spokesperson for the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign, “Bushville,” a tent city for poor protesters, and former Minneapolis resident, called the police conduct surrounding the RNC, “the worst” she’d seen in 20 years as a demonstrator. She recounted the multiple arrests and acts of intimidation that started a week before yesterday’s official opening of the convention, the use of tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, and dogs, the surrounding of protesters by 200 heavily armed police and the National Guard, the arrest of Democracy Now! Anchor Amy Goodman and asked rhetorically, “What the hell is going on?”Security forces say arrests were appropriate by Mary Turck, TC Daily Planet”We had information about their tactics and they followed the script,” St. Paul police chief John Harrington said at a press conference Tuesday morning, referring to Monday’s clashes between police and various groups of protesters in St. Paul. Continue Reading