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On December 17, 2009, President Obama nominated Sharon Browne, a senior attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation (“PLF”), to serve on the Legal Services Corporation (“LSC”) Board of Directors. Browne’s decades-long legal efforts to undo our nation’s progress in preserving social justice and equality are at odds with the mission of the Legal Services Corporation.

Browne has long advocated for the narrow application of civil rights laws geared toward creating a more just and equitable society. She made her name through her work on California’s Proposition 209, a ballot initiative that, upon its approval in 1996, prohibited the state from considering past discrimination “of any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.”

Browne has also alleged that Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, one of our nation’s most cherished civil rights laws protecting minorities against disenfranchisement, is illegal. Moreover, Browne has demonstrated an ingrained hostility to immigrants’ rights, championing California’s Proposition 227, which banned bilingual education in public schools, and Proposition 187, which prohibited undocumented immigrants from accessing California’s social services, health care, and public education systems.

As of February 2nd, President Obama has nominated 39 judges and had only 15 of them confirmed. At a similar point in his presidency, President Bush had nominated 89 judges and had 30 of them confirmed. President Bush doubled President Obama’s nomination and confirmation rate despite facing a Democratic-controlled Senate for most of the time period. This disparity is stark and must be quickly addressed.

UPDATE: Also cross-posted on HuffPo!

After smearing White House special advisor Van Jones for days on his show, Glenn Beck said on August 27, 2009: “I want to point out the silence; no one has challenged these facts — they just attack me personally.”

Well, the White House is wise to stay above the fray but someone has to set the record straight. And as the person who first hired Van Jones, initially as a legal intern and later as a legal fellow, I am in a unique position to know the truth.

And the truth is: Beck is fabricating his facts.

For instance: several times on his show, Beck has said or implied that Van went to prison for taking part in the Rodney King riots.

NO CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS

Van has never served time in any prison. He has never been convicted of any crime. And just to be clear: Van was not even in Los Angeles during those tumultuous days.

I know because he was working for me – in San Francisco – when the four Los Angeles police officers were acquitted in the beating of Rodney King. I was the Executive Director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area when Van was an intern.

The verdicts came down on April 29, 1992. I remember Van (who was then a legal intern working with me from Yale Law School) coming into my office in San Francisco. Many of us, including Van, sat there together, listening to the news and weeping. We were all in a state of shock. That night, TV showed the tragic images of LA burning.

The next day, when an initially peaceful march in downtown San Francisco devolved into chaos, Van left the area in tears. He was not involved in any destructive activity. He even penned an essay despairing of the violence and the state of the country.

So how can Beck make such unsubstantiated claims?

THE TRUE STORY (FROM SOMEONE WHO WAS THERE)

This is what really happened. On May 8, 1992, the week AFTER the Rodney King disturbances, I sent a staff attorney and Van out to be legal monitors at a peaceful march in San Francisco. The local police, perhaps understandably nervous, stopped the march and arrested hundreds of people – including all the legal monitors.

The matter was quickly sorted out; Van and my staff attorney were released within a few hours. All charges against them were dropped. Van was part of a successful class action lawsuit later; the City of San Francisco ultimately compensated him financially for his unjust arrest (a rare outcome).

So the unwarranted arrest at a peaceful march – for which the charges were dropped and for which Van was financially compensated – is the sole basis for the smear that he is some kind of dangerous criminal.

Van has spoken often about that difficult period 17 years ago – and its impact on him, as a young law student. But to imply that he was somehow a rioter who went to prison is absurd. Beck also bizarrely claims that Van was arrested in the Seattle WTO protests. That is just a flat-out falsehood.

You don’t have to take my word for it. Arrests and convictions are all a matter of public record. Beck is at best relying on internet rumors or even inventing claims to boost his ratings.

Beck is no more accurate with present facts than he is with past ones.

NOT A MYSTERIOUS “CZAR”

Beck has said repeatedly that Van is some kind of a mysterious “czar,” accountable to no one but the President. A simple internet search shows that this claim is false. A March 10, 2009, press release announced that Van was hired by the Chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality – to work on her staff as a “special advisor.”

In other words, Van is within the normal White House chain of command, reporting to an office confirmed by the United States Senate, just like most White House staffers. Media outlets sometimes use the “czar” shorthand. But the facts show that Van has no mysterious role or extra-constitutional powers.

Beck has implied on two occasions that Van Jones and other Obama appointees were not vetted by the FBI. False. I was interviewed in my own office by an FBI agent, dutifully vetting Van. Yet another fabrication on the part of Mr. Beck.

Beck also claims that Van has somehow gained control over $500 million in Green Jobs Act funding and can hand out millions of dollars at his whim. Again, that is patently ridiculous.

NO AUTHORITY TO HAND OUT BILLION$

The law is clear that the Department of Labor has authority over the program, with normal rules governing the funds. Anybody who thinks that a lone government official can pass out money, arbitrarily and without oversight, knows nothing about our legal system. A blizzard of lawsuits would stop any such scheme in its tracks, if one were ever put in place.

Perhaps more importantly: final authority at the Department of Labor lies with the Secretary of Labor. Anyone who thinks that a Senate-confirmed, Cabinet-level Secretary would cede control of a $500 million program to some mid-level White House staffer knows nothing about our political system. It is ridiculous.

PROMOTING BUSINESS-BASED SOLUTIONS

But I have to take on the worst one: Beck repeatedly and mistakenly asserts that Van is presently a communist.

Once again, this charge is easily refuted – most obviously by the pro-business, market-based ideas Van has promoted for years, including in his best-selling book, The Green Collar Economy. Van’s book is a veritable song of praise to capitalism, especially the socially responsible and eco-friendly kind.

Yes, for a while, Van and his student-aged friends ran around spouting 1960s rhetoric and romanticizing revolutionary icons. But that was years ago. Way back then, I counseled him to rethink his tactics and to work for change in wiser ways.

In time, he jettisoned his youthful notions and moved on to seek more effective and attainable solutions.

Fortunately for all of us, it looks like he has found some. Over the past several years, Van has emerged as the perhaps the nation’s chief proponent of using business-based solutions to create jobs and clean up the environment. In his book and his speeches, he highlights the key role of entrepreneurship in solving our nation’s problems.

THE ‘GREEN’ JACK KEMP?

Van believes in government clearing the way for private-sector innovation. In a YouTube clip, he said recently that progressives and conservatives should work together to find common ground and create a clean energy economy.

Van said: “We are not promoting welfare. We are promoting work. … We are not expanding entitlements. We are expanding enterprise and investment. … We are not trying to redistribute existing wealth. We are trying to reinvent an existing sector, so that we can create NEW wealth – by unleashing innovation and entrepreneurship. This should be common ground.”

He has been preaching that gospel, in various forms, for years and years. Van Jones is the nation’s “Green” Jack Kemp – using business-based solutions to attack poverty.

I found it interesting that Bill O’Reilly in his interview repeatedly asked Glenn Beck whether Van Jones’ youthful views had changed over time. Beck never answers those inquiries and instead keeps insisting that Van has championed these ideas recently. Again, that is simply not true.

QUOTES TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT

Upon investigation, it turns out that Beck is quoting (out of context) an article that in fact makes the OPPOSITE point.

The 2005 profile that Beck is flogging actually makes it crystal clear – even in the headline – that Jones has “renounced” his earlier views, matured and moved on. Van’s transformation is the entire point of the piece, and it is impossible that Beck does not know this.

Fortunately, O’Reilly seemed to sense the truth. I remember seeing O’Reilly interview Van Jones some time ago and was struck by how much respect O’Reilly showed for Jones. Perhaps O’Reilly’s knowing queries were prompted by that encounter.

When Van worked for me, he did exhibit that “know it all” quality that so many of us – myself included – have when we are young. Over the years, I have enjoyed watching him grow and blossom into a loving father and husband – and a creative, effective leader.

VAN JONES: A TRUE PATRIOT

Mr. Beck’s unfounded attacks are misleading and false. All of us who know Van are so very proud of him and the work he is doing to improve the lives of ALL Americans. He has touched and improved thousands of lives in the course of his career. Now he is in a position to help millions.

He will do well because Van is a true patriot, who loves his country. He has dedicated his life to trying to make it better – especially trying to uplift the poor, the left-out and the left-behind.

In his book, Van draws a distinction between “cheap patriotism” and “deep patriotism.” I highly recommend that chapter to Mr. Beck.

I do hope Van is keeping his head up, walking tall and continuing to fight for green businesses and green jobs. Our country needs more of them – and more people like Van.

Today, with the passing of Senator Edward M. Kennedy, our nation lost an extraordinary champion of equal justice. His leadership on civil rights issues during nearly five decades of service in the United States Senate is unprecedented and incomparable. Beginning his Senate career at the dawn of the civil rights movement, he was at the helm during passage of all of the important federal civil rights laws-laws ensuring full participation in the political process, opportunity in employment, access to public accommodations, fairness in housing and equal opportunity in education. In subsequent years, he worked to strengthen these laws and to pass new laws protecting victims of injustice. Without his unyielding voice, the nation would be a very different place. Indeed, the historic election of our current president would not have been possible without these earlier milestones.

Senator Kennedy possessed a rare combination of qualities that allowed him to carry the torch on civil rights in the U.S. Senate. He had an unwavering commitment to ensuring equal opportunity, the courage to fight the hard battles, the optimism to lead others, and the perseverance and statesmanship that ensured victory after victory. Above all, what we will remember is his fearlessness. When doubt or cynicism or the prospect of defeat was injected into the debate, Senator Kennedy inspired us to continue the struggle for a fairer and more just society. In addition to inspiring us, it was Senator Kennedy who often crafted the legislative plan leading to success in that struggle. Simply put, Senator Kennedy was always on our side, and, on many occasions, this made the difference to the cause for justice.

Founded by Thurgood Marshall in 1940, LDF is the nation’s oldest civil rights legal organization. Throughout our history, only six individuals have led the organization. Remarkably, Senator Kennedy’s service in the Senate has coincided with the tenures of five of our six leaders. Last year, these past and present leaders of LDF joined in a letter to Senator Kennedy expressing gratitude for his many contributions to equal justice. They acknowledged that “[w]hile we have passed the torch to one another, you have held onto the same light-all the while burning bright-as the preeminent civil rights champion in Congress…. No one fights as hard as you do or with more courage and moral conviction that the right thing must be done. We are eternally indebted to you for opening the doors of opportunity to millions of people.” (A copy of that letter and Senator Kennedy’s gracious reply will be available on LDF’s website)

LDF is deeply saddened by the passing of our colleague, friend and hero in the Senate-a voice once thunderous in the cause for justice is now silenced forever. At the same time, we are heartened by reflecting on the grand legacy of his life’s work, and the vision and hope he left us for a more just society.

The Equal Justice Society would like to go on record as supporting the call to start a criminal investigation by a special counsel into harsh interrogations of terrorism suspects. We have been shocked by recent revelations of abuses that were committed in our name as Americans. We were shocked to learn that our government used tactics perfected during the Spanish Inquisition and refined by Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. As a civil rights organization, we denounced the use of torture during the Bush administration to no avail. Now as a country, we have an opportunity to reclaim our honor.

President Obama addressed this issue tonight in his press conference when he said, “I was struck by an article that I was reading the other day talking about the fact that the British during World War II, when London was being bombed to smithereens, had 200 or so detainees. And Churchill said, “We don’t torture,” when the entire British — all of the British people were being subjected to unimaginable risk and threat.
“And the reason was that Churchill understood — you start taking short-cuts, over time, that corrodes what’s best in a people. It corrodes the character of a country. And so I strongly believed that the steps that we’ve taken to prevent these kinds of enhanced interrogation techniques will make us stronger over the long term and make us safer over the long term because it will put us in a — in a position where we can still get information. “In some cases, it may be harder, but part of what makes us, I think, still a beacon to the world is that we are willing to hold true to our ideals even when it’s hard, not just when it’s easy”

You know of the work of the Equal Justice Society and what we stand for. We want to add our voices to those calling for an accounting. We hope that the legislature will make sure that no one is above the law.

“Why am I compelled to write?… Because the world I create in the writing compensates for what the real world does not give me. By writing I put order in the world, give it a handle so I can grasp it.” – Gloria Anzaldua

I have been thinking a lot about the role of artists and writers in this new era of our American democracy. As we emerge from an eight year period where any form of dissent was inherently labeled “un-American,” you can feel our country struggle to regain its footing around how best to move forward. Newspapers are shutting down at a rate previously unseen and everything about how we think and get our information is shifting in ways that requires creative thinking and a visionary ability to see things that have never yet be.

O, let America be America again — The land that never has been yet –

And yet must be — the land where every man is free.

- Langston Hughes

We are the ones we’ve been waiting for after all, or so we have chanted and been told. I remember the night Obama first uttered that line — in his speech on Super Tuesday, as our nation realized that the Democratic primaries would draw on for some time. As soon as he said it, the historian friend I was with turned to me and we both shouted at the same time: June Jordan!

The late great June Jordan is still one of the most published African American authors you’ve likely never heard of, and she originally wrote that line at the close of one of her poems about the role of women in the unrest of an Apartheid controlled South Africa.

And who will join this standing up

and the ones who stood without sweet company
will sing and sing
back into the mountains and
if necessary
even under the sea:

we are the ones we have been waiting for.

It was a poet who gave our nation, and new President, the words that led to our visioning of how this time of potential and possibility could become real. Back when few thought a black man named Barack Hussein Obama would become President, we needed some visionaries out in cold Iowa, door knocking and caucusing, to remind us of what was potential. June’s words later came in to give us a way to speak about what we were doing.

As we deal with a financial crisis, the level of which we have not seen since the Great Depression, and as we emerge from a time of secrecy and torture, the role of artists is becoming more prominent as the nation re-envisions itself.

Elizabeth Alexander became the fourth poet in the history of this nation to read at an Inauguration when she read her Praise Song at Obama’s historic Inauguration. Obama believed a poet was needed in this time.

As an active Obama supporter and poet, I had cause to think about Elizabeth Alexander when Obama chose the anti-gay Rev. Warren to give the invocation at the Inauguration. I, like many of my LGBT peers, was displeased, to say the least. After years of too little sleep and campaigning in all sorts of states in all sorts of weather, always as an out lesbian, I felt betrayed by the decision.

The LGBT community — as is too often the case — was in many ways the first case study of how a community responds when they feel as if a President they supported let them down. Some decided to boycott the Inauguration. Others brushed off the decision and said that it would politically be a poor idea to express any discontent.

I was not happy with either of those options, particularly as I had spent so long convincing my community to actively support Obama, because I believe he would actively support us. And I got my fair share of angry or hurt emails and voicemails from friends and supporters. As a poet, and one trained by the late June Jordan that poetry is often urgent and the most necessary form of protest, I wrote a poem expressing how I felt, and then proceeded to post it everywhere online and send it to everyone I knew. In fact, I also sent it to a few folks I didn’t know, including Elizabeth Alexander, whom I had read also was a poet mentored by June. Elizabeth read my poem and wrote in response in minutes.

Dissent is a tricky art. As is the visualizing of a nation that is better than the one in financial ruin that we have inherited. Taking Obama’s suggestion, I say we call in the artists.

Justin Bond, formerly of the Tony-nominated Kiki and Herb, has been traveling the country, singing original songs about the state of our economic crisis and using his songstress ways to, as he puts it, “cast spells,” for a better America. In between cabaret songs, he banters about how he hopes some of the bailout money serves to get him health coverage, and bemoans some of what he sees as Obama’s missteps, before declaring to his audience that Obama is not some “Post-Modern slave sent to do all the work to save us from our own crisis.” And then he sings Marat/Sade. That’s one way of viewing it.

Or there are the words of punk musician and poet, Patti Smith, posted on her blog on Inauguration Day:

“We pray he will be a good man and we a good people.”

In every community and everywhere you look, artists are leading the way in visualizing how we can emerge from this time and actively engage in pushing a government so many of us support, so that it can be a government we are also proud of. There is the “Change You Want to See” Gallery in Brooklyn, offering a space for this thinking. And the gloriously beautiful and insightful blog meets artwork series In The Pursuit of Happiness, penned by Maira Kalman in the New York Times. All over this country, writers and musicians are pausing in their lives of trying to survive, like we all are, in this harsh economic crisis, to pen ideas of how we can be a better collective people than we’ve most recently been.

There is no simple policy answer for how we get from this point to a better place. There is also no simple answer for how a country relearns to be democratically healthy and engaged in the continual crafting of a government, particularly during the times between elections. But, for what it’s worth, I would suggest we take time to head the words of the artists around us. As the writer Rachel Syme put it as we entered into 2009, “This year is one where we need beauty and innovation and smart people and new ideas more than ever.” Here’s the valuing those things, wherever we are lucky enough to find them.