Attending: Norman G. Kurland, Dawn K. Brohawn, Kemp Harshman, Michael D. Greaney.

Materials Distributed: Core Values, Code of Ethics, Minutes of 08/18/04 Executive Committee Meeting, Joe Lunch Buckett Press Release, JLB Website, Greenspan acknowledgement to Norman Bailey, Bailey letter to Greenspan, Carbondale CIC Network diagram.

Meeting was called to order at 10:20 AM by Kemp Harshman, rotating chairman.

The Opening Prayer was offered by Kemp Harshman. The Core Values and Code of Ethics were read.

Approval of Board and Executive Committee Minutes. Approval of the August Executive Committee minutes was tabled pending final formatting and correction of the draft.

News/Information Items

Oglebay Norton Employee Buyout (Update).Brad Spencer called Mike Lundine, CEO of Oglebay Norton. Lundine indicated that about a month following any bankruptcy court decision on their reorganization plan, they could begin discussions in late October or early November for an employee buyout. Andrew Kho, the lead investment banker of the National Cooperative Bank for the ONEEEA buyout offer, has indicated that the lenders are still in place. The United Steelworkers have not shown any positive interest in partnering with ONEEEA or in opening up an opportunity for Norman Kurland to meet with USW President Leo Gerard. There has been an exchange of letters between Dave McCall (regional head of the USW) and ONEEEA President Rob Woodman to clarify our position. Brad, on behalf of ONEEEA, has been talking with the company about a process for providing the confidential data to the USW, as the union has been requesting. Norman Kurland remains “cautiously optimistic” that the deal can be completed before year end.

Brazil. Norman Kurland spoke with Bishop Hermes two days ago. The bishop said that he will try to reach Michael Clasby, who is now in Brazil. Bishop Hermes will be going to Brazilia, to speak with Minister Marina Silva and Gilney Vianna to seek government support for the worker buyout initiative.

Joe Lunch Buckett site (Endorsements of CESJ, Louis Kelso and expanded capital ownership). Michael D. Greaney found the Joe Lunch Buckett website (www.joelunchbuckett.com) run by his “press secretary” Rick Osbourne. (Joe Lunch Buckett is described as “the world’s first virtual presidential candidate.”) JLB/R. Osbourne is headquartered in Lombard, Illinois. The site especially focuses on Kelso’s Second Income Plan and gave favorable mention to Norman Kurland and CESJ. Norm has been in touch with Rick by e-mail and phone. Rick will be coming to CESJ’s 21^st anniversary celebration. We highly recommend that all CESJ members visit JLB’s website. It is now linked with the websites of Global Justice Movement.org, and Community of World Citizens (Josep Lluís Ortega). Joe Lunch Buckett sent out a press release advocating the Capital Homesteading solution for Iraq. (This can be viewed on the press release section of his website.) Michael D. Greaney will recommend to Rick Osbourne that he register the JLB campaign with the Federal Election Commission.

Norm Kurland Presentation to Just Faith group (Bob Scanlon). At the invitation of Bob Scanlon, Norm will be speaking on 9/27/04 to the “Beyond Just Faith” study group at St. Peter’s Church in Olney, Maryland. He will discuss economic and social justice and on the relevance of Catholic Social Teaching to the Just Third Way. Bob has purchased and distributed copies of Capital Homesteading for Every Citizen to prepare participants for Norm’s talk.

Bob Crane Presentation at George Mason. Bob Crane will be speaking on 9/26/04 at the George Mason University Law Center on “New Frontiers in Conflict Management: A ‘Grand Strategy’ to Wage Jihad Against Terrorist Muslims Who Would Hijack Islam.” His talk will mention the Abraham Federation strategy for Iraq, getting shares of a reorganized national oil company to every Iraqi citizen.

Upcoming presentations to Muslim Organizations; Iraq Oil Negotiation Simulation. Norman Kurland will be speaking at the Darul Salam Center (representing Sunni Muslim scholars) on 9/28 in Annandale, Virginia on “The Abraham Federation: A New Model of Democratic Nation Building Based on Religious Pluralism and Economic Justice for Iraq.”

Thanks to the recommendation of Dr. Radwan Masmoudi, on Friday, 10/01/04, Norman Kurland will be participating in an “Iraq Oil Negotiation Simulation” to be held at the College of Law, American University. Bob Crane will also be participating. The CESJ representatives will be promoting the Iraq oil proposal, in which direct ownership of the shares of the national oil company will be distributed to all Iraqi citizens on an equitable basis.

Global Justice Institute. On 9/21 Norman Kurland and Bob Crane met at the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy with Dr. Radwan Masmoudi and Aly Abuzaakuk (who headed a revolutionary movement against Muammar Quadafi in Libya). They discussed the formation of a Global Justice Institute to be headed by Bob Crane. CSID could help open up funding through private and public donors. One project of the new Institute would be the conference in Amman. Bob would be located in Florida, but would seek funding to travel to DC three days a month. Norm wants Bob’s proposal to provide seed money for Bakir al Hassani to form an Iraq/CESJ. Norm urged Bob to adopt the CESJ Core Values and Code of Ethics for the new Institute, and Bob didn’t see anything inconsistent with Islam. Kemp commented that we need a common language among all the faiths to build a new culture based on universal values.

Proposal for Middle East Conference on “Building Security through Economic Justice in Iraq.” Ali suggested Amman, Jordan as the site for the conference instead of Alexandria, Egypt, since Jordan would be easier for people in Iraq to travel to. The new Institute for Global Justice should be the motive force behind the conference, and sponsored jointly by CESJ and CSID, which should give a greater sales appeal to go after government funding. The conference will be one project. Bob Crane is seeking funding to come into DC three days a month. He might provide some seed money to form an Iraqi CESJ.

Fr. William Christensen. On 9/22, Norm spoke with Fr. Bill on the phone; he is pushing the formation of a CESJ in Bangladesh. The papers to form a non-profit and the JBM Garment Factory should be in final draft form by the end of the month. The formation process may not be completed until 2005 or 2006. Right now Fr. Bill is in the process of gathering support as he travels across the U.S. His meetings with John Pimenta and at Notre Dame University went well.

Meeting with Pat Clawson (Meetings on Capitol Hill/Flint CIC Model). A former reporter with CBS, CNN, and Radio America, Pat Clawson is now a private investigator and businessman (in the public relations and Internet technology areas) who had recently moved back to Flint, Michigan. He came across CESJ’s website about nine months ago and contacted CESJ. Norman Kurland and Dawn K. Brohawn have met with him. He was particularly interested in CESJ’s ideas for democratizing access to capital credit for small businesses. He arranged for Norm to meet on Capitol Hill with the Congressman from Michigan, and an aide of Michigan Senator Debbie Stambaugh, to discuss capital homesteading and creating a model community investment corporation (CIC) that could serve as a “high tech incubator” for attracting business leadership back to Flint, Michigan. Pat bought ten copies of Capital Homesteading and is distributing them. He also joined CESJ and signed the Shared Vision Statement. Mr. Clawson appears to be very focused, with the ability to condense complex material. He describes himself as a liberterian and an “Unreformed Reaganite.” Kemp Harshman commented that Pat Clawson could help open doors to Bill O’Reilly and other talk shows. Norm suggested that Kemp contact Pat and mention that he had founded TV America and the History Channel.

TV America. Kemp Harshman reported that TV America may soon be getting underway. “Voom” is trying to set up a “Library of Congress” channel, and may be interested in programming from TV America.

Bruce Feiler e-mail re. Abraham documentary projects. Alan Wong made a first contact to Bruce Feiler, a journalist and author who has written on Abraham as a symbol for unifying the major religions in the Middle East. Dawn followed up by e-mail and received a brief but friendly response from Mr. Feiler, mentioning that he is in the middle of producing a documentary on the Middle East, but is interested in possibly featuring CESJ’s interfaith efforts in a later production. Kemp felt that Feiler could provide historical background for the Abraham Federation proposal. Dawn sent an e-mail back to him, but so far has received no further response.

Support Statement for Tariq Ramadan. The executive committee discussed having Norm Kurland sign on behalf of CESJ a statement by American and European Scholars in support of Islamic scholar Dr. Tariq Ramadan, and asking the U.S. government to allow him to travel to the U.S. to teach at Notre Dame University. Dr. Ramadan (who is the grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, but who does not support their anti-US and anti-Israel position) was denied a visa under the Patriot Act. A number of interfaith (including Christian and Jewish) groups and individuals feel that this was an abuse and infringement on his right of free speech. Norm stated that he has read six writings by Dr. Ramadan (see Norm’s E-mail file under “Islamic Justice”) and found nothing in them to be racist, anti-Jewish/Israel, or advocating harm to the United States, although Dr. Ramadan is critical of U.S. policy in the Middle East (as well as that of many Arab countries). Norm moved and Michael seconded a motion: “The executive committee, on behalf of CESJ, authorizes Norman Kurland to sign personally but indicating his affiliation with CESJ, the attached statement of support, adding his name on the list of names of supporting scholars or signing a comparable statement developed by the Center for Islam and Democracy.” Motion passed unanimously.

Focus Topic: Marketing Capital Homesteading

Status report on efforts to date (publicity, links on other sites, correspondence; Mike Alexander contact to Sen. Lieberman; Mike Greaney Guerilla Internet actions; Decision on Steve Roy website). Michael D. Greaney has been randomly selecting key words and putting them into various search engines. Upon visiting the websites that pop up as a result of the search, he has been sending brief e-mails to see if any interest can be stirred up in the Capital Homesteading concept. There has been some interest generated in this fashion. Norman Kurland reported that he showed the book flyer to Pat Clawson, and suggested that we make the same offer to Pat as to Steve Roy (to publicize the book on his website and earn a percentage of sales).

We have sold 30 copies total of Capital Homesteading so far this quarter, mostly out of CESJ’s stock. Geoff Gneuhs’ review has generated two telephone calls and a letter from a prison inmate in Texas who is a self-described distributist. Fr. Bill has gathered additional signatures (about 60) for the Statement of Shared Vision. Rick Osbourne (Joe Lunchbuckett) might do a simplified version of the Capital Homesteading idea for the JLB website. Rowland Brohawn sent letters on capital homesteading to both the Bush and the Kerry campaigns. Michael D. Greaney said he would hunt up weblogs to send Rowland’s letter. Norman Kurland said that the Joe Lunch Buckett campaign should be sent the same letter. Dawn K. Brohawn drafted a letter for Norman Bailey to send to Alan Greenspan and got a response from Mr. Greenspan. This should be followed up sometime in December by sending Greenspan copies of the previous exchange he had with Representative Bennie Thompson.

Mike Alexander, who works as an aide to Senator Lieberman on the minority staff, contacted Lieberman’s chief economic advisor who called Norman Kurland. Norm subsequently sent him some materials on capital homesteading and spoke with him, but the aide said that he is too busy to focus on a new idea, and thought capital homesteading was too big an idea to sell to people on Capitol Hill. Norman Kurland should be reminded to call the economic advisor after the election. Norman Kurland took additional materials to Mike Alexander today.

The Executive Committee discussed Steve Roy’s e-mail in September 2004 outlining the price for his associates to set up and maintain a CapitalHomestead.com website to market Capital Homesteading for Every Citizen. The group agreed that the figures were fair, and Steve has offered to split the first year’s fees. Before we give the green light to proceed, the group raised a few questions for Dawn to e-mail to Steve: 1) Why do we need to transfer the domain name from CESJ’s present registry service, when Kemp can arrange to change the administrative contact information listed in bulkregister.com? (Everyone agreed that CESJ would maintain ownership of the domain name.) 2) We would like to decide mutually with Steve and his colleagues on what the 5 pages will contain, 3) Does the price quoted by Steve include the cost of transferring the domain name, and if so, can we eliminate the $25 extra dollars if we keep the domain name with our present registry? (The total for the first year’s web service, including set up, would then be $349 and the follow-up charge would be $99.), 4) Will this set-up include setting up a Pay Pal button for donations?, 5) Will they put on links to both Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com? (We recommend that they sign up for both affiliate programs, which will generate extra earnings for them and will help us track sales from their site.), 6) Can Steve pay the invoice and bill us for half? The Executive Committee approved Steve’s proposal with the adjustment for the domain name transfer (less $25/year). Dawn will e-mail Steve with these questions and the decision of the Executive Committee.

Between now and the elections, what actions should we take? We should get the press release on Capital Homesteading out as soon as possible. (We’ll describe the book as “the manual for building a genuine ownership society, that won’t cost the taxpayer a cent and would radically shrink the budget deficit.”) We need to get the newspapers talking about it. Mike Greaney has prepared a draft press release and Dawn will edit it.

How can we get more CESJ people doing something to help? It’s probably too late to get any meaningful action out of CESJ’s network before the November elections, but we’ll lay the groundwork for communicating to whoever wins the presidential election.

Decision/Follow-Up Items

Response to Daniel Moore re affiliation between ACE Network and CESJ. Daniel Moore is in the process of forming the A.C.E. Network, which is offering a strategy for rapid job creation and expanded ownership through a consortium of non-profit and profit-making entities. He met with Dawn K. Brohawn and Norman G. Kurland in Ohio in April 2004. He has been trying to publicize his effort through press releases and Michael D. Greaney has been editing his material. In a recent series of e-mails, Moore requested a formal organizational affiliation with CESJ. Norman Kurland had recommended to Daniel Moore that before we would formally affiliate, he put together a study group to familiarize himself with CESJ’s Just Third Way paradigm, and that he should start by meeting at least once a week for six months. Then we would determine if there is a synergy in the arrangement.

Based on the material Moore has sent to CESJ, Norm, Michael and Dawn have raised concerns about certain aspects of the A.C.E. Network’s organizational form and operating principles. Moore’s proposed organization is inconsistent with CESJ’s view of clearly separating the powers and functions of profit and non-profit organizations, especially the danger of putting a non-profit in charge of the profit-making entity’s ownership and control. What he talks about is not really Justice-Based Management in that it appears to violate subsidiarity, concentrates economic power, and ignores the basic contradictions between profit and non-profit organizations. On a larger scale, Moore distrusts the free market system and is advocating that “it is most necessary that economic life be governed by an organization embracing true and effective directing principles” and that the A.C.E. Network become that “economic authority and free market restraining mechanism.”

Based on our examination of the A.C.E. Network proposal, the Executive Committee did not feel that a formal affiliation is appropriate, but that Daniel Moore should feel free to use and refer to CESJ’s materials and website. He should state clearly that his mention of CESJ does not imply any endorsement of affiliation. Kemp Harshman drafted a response to Daniel Moore which will be sent out by Norm on CESJ letterhead.

Focus topic for next meeting. Marketing the Capital Homesteading book and concept.

The next Executive Committee Meeting will be combined with the next quarterly Board Meeting will be held Saturday, 16^th October 2004 at 9:30 am.

A motion to adjourn was made by Michael D. Greaney and seconded by Dawn K. Brohawn. The motion passed unanimously and the meeting adjourned at 6:05 pm, Friday, September 23, after adjourning at 2:00 pm September 22 and reconvening at 5:00 pm on September 23.