They did him in, Tookie; it is my first capital punishment in
California. They say, however, that Texas held the first place in
executions while Bush was the governor.

Now Bush has the whole world to sample, to decree who deserves
to live and who to die, who is a terrorist and who is a patriot, who
can have scissors and who can have guns. Good and bad guys, it all
looks like Hollywood and cowboy films. It not only looks like it, it
is really is like it.

This Tookie, this black Californian, I don't care if he is guilty or
not, I say when interviewed by a TV, as if my opinion mattered: the
death penalty is barbarism and a crime against humanity, like torture.

How do you feel? the reporter asks me with tender feelings. What
does that matter, I scream, it is not about feelings, it is about
human rights. In point of fact I feel awful. We are standing in front
of a federal building where we try to squeeze in, as if we were
employees, in order to use their toilets during a protest lasting
longer than two hours. I am bleeding, and it is not my heart. I am
hungry, and it is not my soul. Six TV reportage cars are parked
around us, only a few cops and a lot of free lance photographers.

People, not that many yet, but not as small as these crowds can be.

Faces I know: pacifists, hippies, mostly middle aged people, just like
those few I saw in New York City, dancing in the wind against global
warming issues and Bush's response to Kyoto. I feel awful because I
come from a country where ethnic cleansing was done legally and in my
name; I feel America is my country too by now, and I feel the worst
side of my new patriotism. The guy was black, the guy was a writer,
the guy seems to be a redeemed soul dedicating his book to radicals
and pacifists. Angela Davis is speaking in front of the San Quentin prison in
San Francisco. Thousands of people are rallying there. Harold Pinter
speaks on video at his Nobel Prize event, but where are those voices
in the USA? What are my favorite American writers doing these days,
Philip Roth, John Updike... If only one of them said half of the
things Pinter said, American writers would be winning Nobels. Only a
dying man from Old Europe, in a wheelchair, dares to name the facts
with their proper names. Literature is dead, buried by corporate
nuclear wars, depleted uranium and bombings. Oil is blood and writers
are selling their souls, not their books.

What next? Democracy is not enough, free information is not
enough, Internet is not enough.

A rally is scheduled in front of Gov. Schwarzenegger's house up the
hill. We drive slowly. The view is beautiful and misty, the fancy
Sunset Boulevard houses decorated with toys and Christmas lights. At
the top a sparkling gate opens as sesame, we drive in; the two blondes
from Code Pink. On our sides are black limos and SUVs, men in dark
suits smoking and talking busily on the cell phones; we pass them and
reach the top of the hill; a dead end street.

The Governor's house is not lighted; nobody is to be seen. On our
way back, the cars and people have vanished, only a few spooky man in
black are seen here and there; we stop in front of the gate. One car
approaches us. Do you need something? they ask us, no thank you we
answer. They scrutinize us and leave.

The next security SUV is more insistent: my friend here is not
feeling well, Jo lies. You can take her to the restroom, the guy
offers with concern. I realize it may be that we have innocently
entered a gated community, surrounding the Governor's house. I am
thrilled, but not happy to be dragged by the security and
interrogated.

We have a friend on the other side of the street, Jo says. As it
happens, this is true. You don't live here? they ask, startled. They
escort us hurriedly to the security gates, and make sure that we go up
the other side of the hill. The friend is luckily at home. She opens
the door, lets us in and gives us a drink and a phone. All the fuss
with scissors and security and yet, we trespassed.

Not only that, but we managed to get in with sticker on our car saying
CODE PINK and STOP THE NEXT WAR NOW, but we also managed to get out
without being harassed.

It is sad evening to wait for a person to be publicly and legally
executed, and then go to bed thinking that we have done all we could.
Life stinks. How do executioners feel? The decision makers, how do
they feel? Why don't TV reporters demand to know their feelings? In
any case, whatever we said and did will not be broadcast. Some of our
photos with candles will be published, with captions saying stuff we
didn't say and didn't mea.. I don't believe in God or pure
spirituality, I held a candle to make a difference in the dark. It
didn't make much difference, that candle. It barely warmed my hands.