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Who are the speakers & panealists
for the 4th Annual Peace Convention?
Neal Katyal
Neal Katyal, a Professor at Georgetown University Law School, recently won Hamdan v. Rumsfeld in the United States Supreme Court, a case that challenged the policy of military trials at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, Cuba. The Supreme Court sided with him by a 5-3 vote, finding that President Bush's tribunals violated the constitutional separation of powers, domestic military law, and international law. As former Solicitor General and Duke law professor Walter Dellinger put it "Hamdan is simply the most important decision on presidential power and the rule of law ever. Ever."  An expert in matters of constitutional law, particularly the role of the President and Congress in time of war and theories of constitutional interpretation, Katyal has embraced his theoretical work as the platform for practical consequences in the federal courts.
Katyal previously served as National Security Adviser in the U.S. Justice Department and was commissioned by President Clinton to write a report on the need for more legal pro bono work. He also served as Vice President Al Gore's co-counsel in the Supreme Court election dispute of 2000, and represented the Deans of most major private law schools in the landmark University of Michigan affirmative-action case Grutter v. Bollinger (2003). Katyal clerked for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer as well as Judge Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court of Appeals. He attended Dartmouth College and Yale Law School. His Articles have appeared in virtually every major law review and newspaper in America.
Katyal was named Lawyer of the Year in 2006 by Lawyers USA, Runner-Up for Lawyer of the Year 2006 by National Law Journal, one of the top 50 litigators nationwide 45 years old or younger by American Lawyer (2007), named one of the top 500 lawyers in the country by LawDragon Magazine (in 2006 and again in 2007) and one of 10 Non-Resident Indian Achievers Worldwide by Hindustan Times. He has also been awarded the Town of Salem, Massachusetts Prize (2007); the ACLU Foundation’s Roger Baldwin Award (2007), the National Asian Pacific Bar Association Trailblazer Award (2007), and the 2004 National Law Journal pro bono award for his work.
His primary academic interests are Constitutional Law (primarily war powers, separation of powers, constitutional legitimacy, presidential power, slavery and affirmative action), Criminal Law (particularly cybercrime, conspiracy, architectural solutions to crime and the role of deterrence), and Education Law.
Katyal has appeared on every major American nightly news program, as well as in other venues, such as the Colbert Report.
Ron Takaki
Ron Takaki is one of the most preeminent scholars of our nation’s diversity. He is a professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has taught over 10,000 students during 34 years of teaching.
Born aHin 1939, Takaki is the grandson of immigrant Japanese plantation workers in Hawaii. He graduated from the College of Wooster, Ohio, in 1961. Six years later, after receiving his Ph.D. in American history from UC Berkeley, Takaki went to UCLA to teach its first Black history course. While there, he helped to found its centers for African American, Asian American, Mexican American, and Native American studies.
In 1972, Takaki returned to Berkeley to teach in the newly instituted Department of Ethnic Studies. He served as department chair from 1975-77. His course, Ethnic Studies 130, “The Making of Multicultural America: A Comparative Historical Perspective,” provided the conceptual framework for the B.A. program and the Ph.D. program in Comparative Ethnic Studies as well as for the university’s multicultural requirement for graduation, known as the American Cultures Requirement.
The Berkeley faculty has honored Takaki with a Distinguished Teaching Award. In 1988, Takaki was awarded the Goldwin Smith University Lectureship at Cornell University, and in 1993, Cornell’s Distinguished Messenger Lectureship, the university’s most prestigious lecturer appointment.
Professor Takaki is the author of 11 books. They include significant titles: Iron Cages: Race and Culture in 19th Century America (Knopf, 1979) has been critically acclaimed. Now in its third edition (Oxford, 2000), this book is still widely read in college courses across the country.
Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans (Little, Brown, 1989) was selected by the New York Times as a Notable Book of the Year and by the San Francisco Chronicle as one of the best 100 non-fiction books of the 20th century. Over 100,000 copies are in print.
A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America (Little, Brown, 1993) is the winner of numerous prizes, including the American Book Award. Publishers Weekly hailed the book as a “brilliant revisionist history of America that is likely to become a classic of multicultural studies.” Over 400,000 copies are in print.
Hiroshima: Why America Dropped the Atomic Bomb (Little, Brown, 1995) offers the first study to examine the significance of race in Harry Truman’s fateful decision. In his welcome of the book, Studs Terkel wrote: “Ronald Takaki, a probing and perceptive historian, offers us the until now unwritten story of the bombing of Hiroshima. He explodes the myth of its ‘military necessity.’”
Double Victory: A Multicultural History of America in World War II (Little, Brown, 2000) is the only study of the “Greatest Generation” from the perspectives of our nation’s diverse racial and ethnic minorities. This book challenges the memory of the war as a war fought only by white Americans, as reflected in the movie, “Saving Private Ryan.”
Takaki has been on national television to discuss issues of race, U.S.-Japan relations, multiculturalism, affirmative action, etc. The programs include the NBC “Today Show,” ABC “This Week with David Brinkley,” CNN “International Hour,” “Cross Fire,” “Jim Lehrer Newshour.”
In 1980, the University of Wisconsin invited Takaki and Nathan Glazer to debate the issue of affirmative action. Since then, the two of them have had debates at Michigan State University in 1994, Berkeley in 1995, the University of Pudget Sound in 1996, and Ohio University in 2004. In We Are All Multiculturalists Now (1997), Glazer stated that he had changed his mind on affirmative action.
In 1997, the Council on Foreign Relations hosted a debate between Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., and Takaki at the opening plenary session of its conference on America’s diversity and America’s foreign policy. They were presented respectively as the authors of The Disuniting of America and A Different Mirror.
Takaki has lectured in Japan, Russia, Armenia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Austria, and South Africa.
He has been awarded honorary doctorates from Wheelock College, the College of Wooster, Macalester College, Northeastern University, the University of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts College of Art, and Whitman College.
In 1995, Takaki attended two seminars on race at Vice President Al Gore’s home to advise him; in 1997, he attended a White House meeting with President Bill Clinton to help brainstorm ideas for his major speech, “One America in the 21st Century: The President’s Initiative on Race.” Significantly, Clinton took the dialogue on race beyond the black-white binary, and presented an inclusive definition of Americans as a diverse people belonging to one nation.
Takaki was elected to be a fellow of the prestigious Society of American Historians, whose membership is limited to 250 scholars including David Brion Davis and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. Its executive secretary, Mark Carnes, stated: “Takaki has reshaped American History.”
The Los Angeles Times has described Takaki as a “minority Everyman. He is a rare hybrid, a multicultural scholar.”
Cindy Sheehan
Cindy Lee Miller Sheehan is an American anti-war activist, whose son, Casey Sheehan, was killed during his service in the Iraq War on April 4, 2004, aged 24. She attracted international attention in August 2005 for her extended demonstration at a camp outside President George W. Bush's Texas ranch garnering her both support and criticism. In May 2007, Sheehan officially ended her involvement as an anti-war activist, saying "I am going to go home and be a mother to my surviving children and try to regain some of what I have lost." On July 8, 2007, in the wake of President Bush's reduction of the sentence of Scooter Libby, Sheehan announced that she plans to challenge Speaker Nancy Pelosi should Pelosi fail to introduce articles of impeachment against President Bush.
Khalil Bendib
Award-winning Berkeley-basededitorial cartoonist Khalil Bendib is known both as an editorial cartoonist and fine artist. Born under colonial rule in Algeria during the war of independence against France,  Khalil is the only widely read political cartoonist in North America who brings a Muslim and progressive perspective to our media. His cartoons are featured in over 1,700 small and mid-size newspapers across the country, including many Muslim, African-American and progressive publications, and can be viewed at www.bendib.com. His books of cartoons include It Became Necessary to Destroy the Planet in Order to Save it (PlanNine,2003,) Mieux Vaut Empire qu’en Pleurer (E-dite, Paris 2005) and Mission Accomplished (Interlink, 2007.) His cartoons have been featured in USA Today, the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle and numerous other mainstream newspapers.
Khalil's work as a sculptor and ceramic artist can be seen in various public and private locations in the USA, and it is collected internationally. Among Khalil's public monuments are the "Alex Odeh Memorial Statue," an over-life size bronze statue in Santa Ana honoring martyred Palestinian-American ADC leader Alex Odeh, the "Deir Yassin Remembered" memorial sculpture at the Hobart and William Smith colleges in Geneva, New York, the Edwin H. Lennette Memorial Monument in Richmond, CA and the GAIA bronzes in downtown Berkeley. Some of this work can viewed at: www.studiobendib.com
Mr. Bendib is also co-host of the KPFA weekly radio show “Voices of the Middle East and North Africa” (www.kpfa.org) and is frequently on the road giving talks and presentations on matters of Islamophobia, stereotypes, political cartooning and censorship in the media.
Brandon Mayfield
Brandon Mayfield, Oregon lawyer and converted Muslim falsely accused in 2004 Madrid bombings will speak about his quest for justice, not only for himself, but for all of us through his lawsuit against the government, demanding that the PATRIOT Act be declared unconstitutional.
The U.S. government abused at least three powers during its investigation and arrest of Mayfield: 1) the expansion of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the PATRIOT Act, 2) National Security Letters and 3) the material witness statute. To read about the recent court case Mayfield won, in which two parts of the PATRIOT Act were recently declared unconstitutional,
Born in Oregon raised in the Midwest. Father of three. Graduated PSU 1992. Former Patriot Missile Platoon Leader, US Army. Law Degree from Washburn University School of Law 1999. Member of Oregon State Bar since 2000. Currently practicing in the area of personal injury, and contracts. Also an advisory Board Member to the Islamic Society of Greater Portland.
Elden Rosenthal
Elden Rosenthal, Oregonian civil rights attorney who represented Brandon Mayfield  and won their case against the Patriot Act. Rosenthal successfully overturned parts of the Patriot Act’s provisions on the grounds that they were unconstitutional. He won a $2 million settlement and public apology from the federal government for his client Brandon Mayfield, who was wrongfully jailed for two weeks as a presumed terrorist in connection with the Madrid bombings. The settlement preserved Mayfield's right to sue over the constitutionality of the PATRIOT Act which authorized his detention, and Rosenthal continues to litigate those issues. Bad fingerprint analysis, lying FBI agents, religious discrimination, wrongful detention -- Mayfield v. USA remains the most prominent test case of the PATRIOT Act in the courts today.
Since graduating from Stanford Law School, Palo Alto, CA, in 1972, Elden Rosenthal has become one of the west coast's preeminent civil rights attorneys. He is listed in the Best Lawyers in America for Civil Rights and Employment Law. He is also a member of the American College of Trial Lawyers and has received numerous awards in Oregon for his civil rights work, including an Award of Merit from Oregon State Bar, a Public Justice Award from Oregon Trial Lawyer Assn., and a Civil Liberties Award from Oregon ACLU.
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She came back to attend college in 1964 where she got her degree in Pharmacy from Temple University in Philadelphia and also met her husband of 38 years. She married and chose to become a full-time mother upon the birth of her twins. 
a national civil liberties group that works to amplify local voices in defending Bill of Rights protections for all. 412 community resolutions opposing laws and orders like the PATRIOT Act have been passed locally since 2002, including 65 in California, and a resolution passed by the California General Assembly in 2006. The BORDC provides tools and support for the local organizers who work to convince city and state officials to pass these Bill of Rights resolutions.
Also worked as a supervisor for about five years. 
youth organizer for the Gene McCarthy for President campaign in 1968. For the past 17 years, he has served as Executive Director of Peninsula Peace and Justice Center, the San Francisco Peninsula's leading grassroots activist organization. 
He is an immigration and human rights attorney holding two Master’s Degrees from the University of Mexico and San Jose State University as well as a law degree from Golden Gate University. 