Demonstraties VS #4: Nu kan het nog.

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Occupy Wal Street ook in Europa
De protestbeweging Occupy Wall Street begon een week of twee geleden in New York met enkele tientallen demonstranten. De aanhang groeit razendsnel, niet alleen in New York, maar ook elders in de Verenigde Staten. Het protest breidt zich nu ook uit naar Europa. Het heeft Ierland al bereikt en ook Nederland komt aan de beurt.
Verenigde Staten: Occupy Wall Street

Op Wall Street in New York begon het drie weken geleden als een bescheiden protest van een kleine groep activisten. Inmiddels is de beweging enorm gegroeid. Vorige week demonstreerden zo'n 5000 mensen bij Wall Street: tegen zelfverrijking in de financiële sector en de ongelijke verdeling van de welvaart.

Vakbonden, studentenorganisaties en bewonersgroepen hebben zich aangesloten bij het protest. De demonstraties verspreiden zich nu ook over het hele land. Op dit moment zijn er in 25 Amerikaanse steden betogingen.
Ierland: Occupy Dame Street

Geïnspireerd door de betogingen in de VS demonstreert een kleine groep activisten sinds dit weekend ook in de Ierse hoofdstad Dublin. Ze hebben zich verzameld op Dame Street, voor de Centrale Ierse bank.

De groep is nog klein, volgens de Irish Times waren er dit weekend zo'n tachtig mensen. Enkele demonstranten bivakkeren in tentjes voor de bank.
UK: Occupy the London Stock Exchange

Op de Facebookpagina Occupy the London Stock Exchange wordt opgeroepen om komend weekend deel te nemen aan een demonstratie in het financiële district van Londen. Meer dan 3000 mensen hebben zich via Facebook al aangemeld voor de demonstratie.

Kai Wargalla, een van de oprichters van de Occupy Londen Facebookpagina, vertelde over de acties aan de Amerikaanse zender NBC: "De protesten op Wall Street zijn de inspiratie geweest. Het is nu tijd om hier te beginnen. We hebben mensen nodig die opstaan en zich uitspreken".
Nederland: Occupy Amsterdam

Ook in Amsterdam en Den Haag worden in navolging van Occupy Wallstreet acties georganiseerd. Op 15 oktober willen demonstranten het Amsterdamse beursplein bezetten. De aanmeldingen voor de actie stromen binnen. Via de Facebookpagina Occupy Amsterdam hebben ruim 1200 mensen zich al aangemeld.
Madrid-Brussel: Mars van de Verontwaardigden

Tachtig dagen geleden begon een groep jongeren in Madrid aan een 1600 kilometer lange 'Mars van Verontwaardiging'. Ze liepen van Madrid naar Brussel waar ze gisteren aankwamen. De mars komt voort uit de Spaanse studentenprotesten.

Die protesten begonnen al veel eerder dan de protesten op Wall Street en de 'mars van verontwaardigden' verbindt zich dus niet direct aan de Occupy Wall Street beweging. Maar het sentiment van beide bewegingen is hetzelfde - beide ingegeven door de economische crisis en gericht tegen de elite die de macht heeft.

De Spaanse jongeren die nu in Brussel bivakkeren hebben op 15 oktober een grote demonstratie gepland voor het Europees Parlement. Die dag wordt beschouwd als een wereldwijde actiedag. Op de site 15oktober.net is te zien dat er in meerdere steden in de wereld acties staan gepland in navolging van Occupy Wall Street.

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NY police arrest 80 Wall St. protesters

The New York police have arrested at least 80 people protesting against Washington's management of the American financial system as well as Wall Street practices.

The demonstrators took to the streets Saturday during the “Occupy Wall Street” protest and gathered near the New York Stock Exchange, the Associated Press reported.

The demonstrations, which began about a week ago, have brought hundreds of Americans to the most important US financial district, protesting against a number of economic issues, including bank bailouts, home loan crisis, and the widening gap between the very rich and those struggling in the aftermath of the US financial crisis.

"We've got a whole bunch of people sitting in Washington that can't figure it out," said Bill Csapo, a protest organizer.

As of June 16, 2011, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), 395 banks have been seized by the US government. At least 46 US banks have failed in 2011 so far, compared to 157 in 2010, 140 in 2009, and 25 in 2008.

Another incident that provoked protesters into action was the Wednesday execution of Troy Anthony Davis, an African American, in the State of Georgia over his alleged role in the 1989 killing of an off-duty police officer.

His execution by lethal injection took place despite many legal holes in his case as well as Davis's insistence until his execution that he did not commit the alleged murder.

The police forces tried to corral the demonstrators using orange plastic nets at Manhattan's Union Square.

According to police sources, most of the arrests were made for blocking traffic, though one person has been charged with attacking an officer.

Protest spokesman Patrick Bruner has lambasted the police response as "exceedingly violent,” emphasizing that protesters sought to remain peaceful.

"They're being very aggressive ... half the people here have no idea what's going on ... I'm actually very ashamed to be a New Yorker," said Ryan Alley, a New York resident.

Statistics published by the Stolen Lives Project estimate that the number of cases in the United States relating to police brutality has reached thousands.

Most Americans that suffer abuse by the police do not report the case. Those who do file complaints, soon discover that police departments tend to be self-protective and that the general public tends to side with the police.

In 2010, there were at least 2,541 reports of misconduct and brutality perpetrated by US police.

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NAACP warns black and Hispanic Americans could lose right to vote


Civil rights group petitions UN over 'massive voter suppression' after apparent effort to disenfranchise black and Hispanic people

The largest civil rights group in America, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), is petitioning the UN over what it sees as a concerted efforted to disenfranchise black and Latino voters ahead of next year's presidential election.

The organisation will this week present evidence to the UN high commissioner on human rights of what it contends is a conscious attempt to "block the vote" on the part of state legislatures across the US. Next March the NAACP will send a delegation of legal experts to Geneva to enlist the support of the UN human rights council.

The NAACP contends that the America in the throes of a consciously conceived and orchestrated move to strip black and other ethnic minority groups of the right to vote. William Barber, a member of the association's national board, said it was the "most vicious, co-ordinated and sinister attack to narrow participation in our democracy since the early 20th century".

In its report, Defending Democracy: Confronting Modern Barriers to Voting Rights in America, the NAACP explores the voter supression measures taking place particularly in southern and western states.

Fourteen states have passed a total of 25 measures that will unfairly restrict the right to vote, among black and Hispanic voters in particular.

The new measures are focused – not coincidentally, the association insists – in states with the fastest growing black populations (Florida, Georgia, Texas and North Carolina) and Latino populations (South Carolina, Alabama and Tennessee). The NAACP sees this as a cynical backlash to a surge in ethnic minority voting evident in 2008.

In that year, black and Hispanic voters turned out in record numbers, partly in a wave of enthusiasm for Barack Obama. More than 2 million extra black voters turned out over 2004, an increase of 15%.

Among Hispanics, the upturn was even more pronounced. Two million additional voters attended the polls – a rise of 28% on the previous presidential election.

The scale of the assault on voting rights is substantial, according to experts on electoral law. The Brennan Center for Justice, based at New York University law school, estimates that the new measures could bar as many as 5 million eligible voters from taking part in choosing the occupant of the White House next year.

The 14 states that have embarked on such measures hold two-thirds of the electoral college votes needed to win the presidency. Put another way, of the 12 battleground states that will determine the outcome of the presidential race, five have already cut back on voting rights and two more are in discussions about following suit.

Ethnic minority groups are not the only sections of society at risk of losing their voting rights. The Brennan Center warns that young voters and students, older voters and poor income groups are also vulnerable.

The NAACP says voting rights are being whittled down at every stage of the electoral process. First of all, the registration of new voters is being impeded in several states by moves to block voter registration drives that have historically proved to be an important way of bringing black and Hispanic people to the poll.

Four states – Florida, Iowa, Kentucky and Virginia – continue to withhold the vote from anyone convicted of a criminal offence. In Florida, offenders who have completed their sentences have to wait at least five years before they can even apply to restore their right to register to vote.

Across the US, more than 5 million Americans are denied the right to vote on grounds that they were convicted of a felony, 4 million of whom have fully completed their sentence and almost half of whom are black or Hispanic.

Other measures have reduced the ease of early voting, a convenience that is disproportionately heavily used by African-Americans. Even more importantly, 34 states have introduced a requirement that voters carry photo ID cards on the day of the election itself.

Studies have showed that the proportion of voters who do not have access to valid photo ID cards is much higher among older African-Americans because they were not given birth certificates in the days of segregation. Students and young voters also often lack identification and are thus in danger of being stripped of their right to vote.

In Texas, a law has been passed that prevents students from voting on the basis of their college ID cards, while allowing anyone to cast their ballot if they can show a permit to carry a concealed handgun.

Benjamin Jealous, the NAACP's president, said the moves amounted to "a massive attempt at state-sponsored voter suppression." He added that the association will be urging the UN "to look at what is a co-ordinated campaign to disenfranchise persons of colour."

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Crystal Cox, Oregon Blogger, Isn't a Journalist, Concludes U.S. Court--Imposes $2.5 Million Judgement on Her

A U.S. District Court judge in Portland has drawn a line in the sand between "journalist" and "blogger." And for Crystal Cox, a woman on the latter end of that comparison, the distinction has cost her $2.5 million.

Speaking to Seattle Weekly, Cox says that the judgement could have impacts on bloggers everywhere.

"This should matter to everyone who writes on the Internet," she says.

Cox runs several law-centric blogs, like industrywhistleblower.com, judicialhellhole.com, and obsidianfinancesucks.com, and was sued by investment firm Obsidian Finance Group in January for defamation, to the tune of $10 million, for writing several blog posts that were highly critical of the firm and its co-founder Kevin Padrick.

Representing herself in court, Cox had argued that her writing was a mixture of facts, commentary and opinion (like a million other blogs on the web) and moved to have the case dismissed. Dismissed it wasn't, however, and after throwing out all but one of the blog posts cited by Obsidian Financial, the judge ruled that this single post was indeed defamatory because it was presented, essentially, as more factual in tone than her other posts, and therefore a reasonable person could conclude it was factual.

The judge ruled against Cox on that post and awarded $2.5 million to the investment firm.

Now here's where the case gets more important: Cox argued in court that the reason her post was more factual was because she had an inside source that was leaking her information. And since Oregon is one of 40 U.S. states including Washington with media shield laws, Cox refused to divulge who her source was.

But without revealing her source Cox couldn't prove that the statements she'd made in her post were true and therefore not defamation, or attribute them to her source and transfer the liability.

Oregon's media shield law reads:


. No person connected with, employed by or engaged in any medium of communication to the public shall be required by ... a judicial officer ... to disclose, by subpoena or otherwise ... [t]he source of any published or unpublished information obtained by the person in the course of gathering, receiving or processing information for any medium of communication to the public[.]

The judge in Cox's case, however, ruled that the woman did not qualify for shield-law protection not because of anything she wrote, but because she wasn't employed by an official media establishment.

From the opinion by U.S. District Judge Marco A. Hernandez:


. . . although defendant is a self-proclaimed "investigative blogger" and defines herself as "media," the record fails to show that she is affiliated with any newspaper, magazine, periodical, book, pamphlet, news service, wire service, news or feature syndicate, broadcast station or network, or cable television system. Thus, she is not entitled to the protections of the law

Cox tells Seattle Weekly that she plans to appeal the ruling by proving her assertion that Obsidian co-founder Kevin Padrick is guilty of bankruptcy fraud--a statement that, as Cox is quite proud of, is abundantly advertised if one simply Googles Padrick's name and sees the dozens of Cox's posts that spring up about him.

At this point Cox says that she still has no plans to get a lawyer.

We think that's a bad idea.

UPDATE: Attorney Bruce E. H. Johnson, the man who wrote the media shield laws in Washington state, has weighed in on whether Cox's fate would fly here. Read more here.

Read the full opinion below:

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Idea of civilians using drone aircraft may soon fly with FAA

Drone aircraft, best known for their role in hunting and destroying terrorist hide-outs in Afghanistan, may soon be coming to the skies near you.

Police agencies want drones for air support to spot runaway criminals. Utility companies believe they can help monitor oil, gas and water pipelines. Farmers think drones could aid in spraying their crops with pesticides.

"It's going to happen," said Dan Elwell, vice president of civil aviation at the Aerospace Industries Assn. "Now it's about figuring out how to safely assimilate the technology into national airspace."

Fox Business blasts The Muppets for brainwashing America's kids with anti-corporate, liberal agenda

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Dan Gainor, vicepresident van het Media Research Center, beaamt Bollings vermoeden. “Het is verbazingwekkend hoe ver de linksen gaan om kinderen tegen bedrijven op te zetten”, zegt de onderzoeker die tevens op de loonlijst staat van Fox. “In Gods naam, dit is een Muppet-film: het enige groene op het scherm zou Kermit de Kikker moeten zijn.”

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Wall Street protesters vow to reoccupy on movement's anniversary

Occupy Wall Street hopes call will re-energise movement after a series of evictions from New York to Los Angeles

Activists at Occupy Wall Street have issued a call to thousands of protesters across the US to reoccupy outdoor public spaces to mark the movement's three-month anniversary.

The Occupy movement has stalled in recent weeks after a wave of evictions swept away a raft of encampments, including the largest in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New York. On Wednesday, it suffered a fresh blow as police in riot gear cleared Occupy San Francisco camp on the orders of the mayor, who had been sympathetic to protesters, while Occupy Boston lost legal protection against eviction.

Organisers said they hoped the call to reoccupy on the 17 December would galvanise and grow the movement.

Amin Husain, a press spokesman for OWS, said: "We know that occupation empowers people and eliminates fear. It permits individuals to assert themselves as political beings even although the system doesn't represent them."

"The question is not to make a splash, the question is how are we going to get the space to make that happen."

Sandy Nurse, one of the direct action committee responsible for the call, said: "The need for physical space is one of the top five priorities for direct action. My personal opinion is that people have gotten scared. They have gotten arrest fatigue. They are not willing to put their bodies on the line. But the call would re-galvanise the movement and remind it how powerful it is."

Citing the conference call by mayors across the US to deal with various encampments, Nurse said: "They have identified occupation as a threat to them – that's how powerful it is."

Eleven mayors participated in a conference call in November about Occupy protests in their cities, including those in New York, Denver and Portland, Oregon, but they denied any co-ordination of raids to clear encampments.

The need for a physical space has been on OWS's agenda since police raided Zuccotti Park in November. In a piece published this week in the first issue of Tidal, a magazine published by the Occupy movement, Judith Butler, academic and feminist theorist at the University of California, Berkeley, spoke of its importance.

Butler said: "When bodies gather together as they do to express their indignation and to enact their plural existence in public space, they are also making broader demands. They are demanding to be recognised and to be valued; they are exercising a right to appear and to exercise freedom; they are calling for a liveable life.

"These values are presupposed by particular demands, but they also demand a more fundamental restructuring of our socio-economic and political order."

At one point, the movement had more than 1,000 occupations, but now they have less than 100 – and that number is dwindling daily. With the onset of winter's plummeting temperatures – which was already driving people from Zuccotti Park before the eviction – and the hardening attitudes of city authorities against encampments, notwithstanding the dearth of public spaces in the US, seeking a place to camp is a massive challenge for activists.

Even within OWS, where the movement began, activists have a battle on their hands. In Zuccotti Park, the space's owners have imposed strictly enforced rules which no longer allow tents or sleeping bags, or allow people to lie down, which would make it impossible to set up camp.

The place they want to occupy on December 17, is Juan Pablo Duarte Square, a currently vacant lot on the corner of 6th and Canal Street in Soho, about 15 minutes walk' from Wall Street, named after the founder of the Dominican Republic.

But it has already proved controversial.

It is owned by the real estate branch of Trinity Episcopalian church in Wall Street, Trinity Real Estate, one of the largest real estate companies in New York.

Activists at OWS, which had previously counted Trinity church among their supporters, have repeatedly asked for the use of this space for a winter camp. But Trinity church has refused, drawing criticism from other church leaders and a handful of activists who went on hunger strike, pledging not to eat until the church allowed protesters on the site.

In a statement on its website, Trinity said it offered its continued support of the movement – including providing meeting space at church buildings – but not the use of its enclosed vacant lot at the city-owned Duarte Square, which it leases to the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. The property, Trinity said, is unsuitable "for large-scale assemblies or encampments."

For activists, the matter is simple: they need the space and the church should hand it over.

Husain said: "They're part of the 1% and they are choosing profit over God."

The church is also facing pressure from the religious community.

Reverend John Metz, of the Episcopalian Church of the Ascension, in Brooklyn, who describes himself as a "real mainstream church guy" said: "Trinity church is in a challenging position. They are a church with an enormous real estate holding. It's one thing to deliberate and review grants. It's another thing for a church to respond in real time to one of the largest movement for social change that this country has see for four decades.

"This is an opportunity to engage in mutual actions to transform a space, and make it a catalyst for the revitalisation of public squares that have all been eliminated in the United States, to create a space where the cause for social justice can be forwarded."

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Ex-Philly police captain arrested at NY Occupy rally is warned to not wear uniform at protests

PHILADELPHIA — A retired Philadelphia police captain arrested in uniform during Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City has received written warnings from police and union officials.

Philadelphia police Commissioner Charles Ramsey sent a cease and desist letter to retired Capt. Raymond Lewis, saying the police department supports his First Amendment rights but “those rights do not extend to the improper and/or illegal use of the official uniform.”

“It could give the mistaken opinion that somehow this is a statement being made by a member of the police department, and it’s not,” Ramsey said in telephone interview Thursday. “He has every right to protest. But wear something else.”

The November Occupy protest featured people complaining about economic inequality and what they called corporate greed.

Ramsey said it doesn’t matter whether it’s a demonstration for Occupy Wall Street or another cause, wearing a uniform in a non-professional capacity is unacceptable — and could even lead to charges of impersonating a police officer.

“It has nothing whatsoever to do with the specific issues they’re talking about,” Ramsey said. “Whether I agree or disagree with what they’re saying, that uniform can’t be caught up in that.”

Lewis said the Fraternal Order of Police union local has filed a grievance against him stemming from last month’s incident and provided a letter to that effect signed by the local’s recording secretary, Robert Ballentine. A message left for Ballantine seeking comment Thursday wasn’t immediately returned.

The Fraternal Order of Police letter, dated Nov. 25, states the grievance was submitted “based on Lewis’ comments and actions ... while dressed in a Philadelphia Police Captain’s uniform at the New York City Occupy Wall Street protest, which also resulted in his arrest.”

In a written statement, Lewis said he believes the Fraternal Order of Police is seeking to revoke his union membership and possibly his pension.

“I find it incredibly interesting,” Lewis said, “that there are former Philadelphia police officers who were convicted of crimes, and served prison sentences, that have NOT had their memberships or pensions revoked.”

The Fraternal Order of Police letter only said the union’s grievance committee would contact Lewis “as this matter progresses.”

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Op zaterdag 10 december 2011 11:26 schreef Scorpie het volgende:
Ah, de geweldadige inslag van de Occupiers komt weer naar boven.

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NY, California hitting up millionaires, again

Associated Press= ALBANY, New York (AP) — Hollywood moguls and Manhattan stock brokers are facing a slap by the Occupy Wall Street movement as California and New York again target high-wage earners to address a continued fiscal crisis in the states.

On Wednesday, with the urging of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, New York raised its top tax rate on single filers making $1 million and joint filers making $2 million, a rate just slightly under the 2008 income tax surcharge that expires Dec. 31.

Earlier this month in California, Gov. Jerry Brown said he, too, wants to avoid further cuts to education and social services by proposing a ballot initiative asking voters to increase taxes. That could hit Californians making over $250,000 a year.

"Occupy turned the political conversation on its head," said Richard Brodsky, a senior fellow at the Wagner School at New York University. "Time was austerity and tax cuts were the only acceptable place to be. Now, income inequality and the 99 percent dominate practical politics. OWS paved the way; Cuomo and Brown seized the moment."

There's no evidence of a national groundswell after more than a dozen states tapped their well-heeled residents for temporary income tax hikes from 2006-2009. But while most of those states let their temporary tax increases lapse as scheduled, New York and California this month went back to seeking revenue from the wealthy.

Despite the political rhetoric, there's less need in either state to act to make their tax brackets more fair. California and New York already have more progressive systems than most states, according to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation based in Washington, D.C.

"California and New York are historically not going to be the most fiscally conservative states," said Mark Robyn, an economist with the Tax Foundation. "To say they reflect the overall country's attitude to taxing the wealthy at a disproportionate rate, that might be tenuous."

California and New York are also among only four states, with Washington state and Missouri, to show deficits in a midyear survey by the National Conference of Legislatures, said the group's Mandy Rafool.

California faces a $3.7 billion shortfall for the current fiscal year and projected $12.8 billion deficit in 2013. New York learned of an unexpected $350 million deficit this year, and a higher projected deficit for the 2012-13 fiscal year of $3.5 billion.

But Rafool said there's no inkling more states will follow California and New York, although tax revenues are growing only slowly in most states.

"It's an election year and we're seeing that revenues are recovering, spending is stable," Rafool said. "This is better than in the last four years. It's still not good, but it's better."

She said she'd be surprised if other states follow New York and California.

Instead, the common thread is that each state's finances are worse than most other states, and their Democratic leadership has felt pressure from the Occupy Wall Street movement and other progressives.

In New York, an Occupy Albany movement has camped outside the state Capitol all fall. At first, Cuomo, a Democrat who ran as a fiscal conservative last year, tried to evict them, only to be stymied by the local Democratic district attorney and mayor. Occupy Albany called Cuomo "Gov. 1 Percent" for opposing a millionaire tax and saying it would drive employers out of state. The Occupy Wall Street movement claims that there is growing inequality between the wealthiest 1 percent of the population and the remaining 99 percent.

Meanwhile the Democratic Party that Cuomo heads and his progressive allies continued to push for a new millionaire tax to avoid more cuts to education and health care.

In November, Cuomo made a hard left and pushed for the millionaire tax increase passed Wednesday that includes a modest, but rare middle class tax break. The package also provided more spending for jobs programs.

"My job as governor is to make the best decision at the time to meet the needs of the state at the time," Cuomo said Wednesday.

"You're seeing it play out on college campuses," said the California state Senate's Democratic leader, Darrell Steinberg of Sacramento. "You're seeing it play out in different communities throughout California. There's a real sense that the pendulum in terms of the way we've had to deal with these budget deficits, has gone too far."

But while there may be an immediate payoff in cash and politics, the long-term wisdom of soaking the rich has long been questioned.

"As many states face increasingly large budget shortfalls that are often related to economic cycles, leaning on high-income earners and small businesses to pick up a disproportionate amount of the bill raises serious equity concerns and is bad for government revenue stability," said Scott Drenkard, an analyst with the Tax Foundation.

He notes many businesses, 94 percent of which file as individuals, and high-income earners have the most volatile income. If the economy continues to slip, they will have less revenue and that could further hurt businesses or prompt them to flee.

New York and California already share another distinction: They have experienced some of the greatest flight of taxpayers from 1999 to 2009 and have tax structures considered among the least attractive to businesses, according to the Tax Foundation.

"It reminds me of the Bob Dylan song, you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing," said Doug Muzzio, a Baruch College politics professor in New York City. He said continuing fiscal crisis and the Occupy Wall Street movement could force the same consideration elsewhere.

"Without any real evidence except for what I've seen here, I would think that the other states almost invariably will have to examine it," he said.

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http://www.occupydrones.com/

We have the coolest free drone videos and soon we hope to provide the planet with LIVE DRONE VIDEO FEEDS from YOUR drone designed from OPEN PLANS we want YOU TO CREATE AND WHICH WE WILL PUBLISH ON THIS WEBSITE!

Come on folks, these bankster fuckers spend TRILLIONS each year spying on us so we propose we OCCUPY THE AIRSPACE; and track these FUCKERS in real-time as they go about their criminal plans to destroy democracy, freedom and civil rights worldwide!

- Video -

Looks totally cool, legal fun to be having, bankster chasing these SCUMBAGS around the planet. They don't want to give you any peace, so let you decide to give them NONE either, whenever they are in your locality! It's simply a GREAT idea, is it not? We're simply asking interested parties worldwide to do just one thing right now: join in the Occupy Drones discussion - TOTALLY FREE - simply be one of the first people on the planet to get stuck in! CLICK THIS NEXT LINK TO SUBSCRIBE UNDER NO OBLIGATION WHATSOEVER:
http://groups.google.com/group/occupy-drones

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Is Apple Using Patents to Hurt Open Standards?

Opera developer Haavard Moen has accused Apple of repeatedly using patents to undermine the development of web standards and block their finalization.

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the industry group that governs and oversees the development of web standards, requires that every specification it approves be implementable on a royalty-free basis, barring extraordinary circumstances that justify an exception to this rule. The specifications can contain patented technology, as long as royalty-free patent licenses are available.

Members of W3C—a group that includes representatives from Apple, Microsoft, Google, Mozilla, and Opera—are required to disclose any patents that they hold that are relevant to each specification. Depending on how far the specification is through the standardization process, they have between 60 and 150 days to make this disclosure.

If royalty-free licensing is available, the specification can proceed as normal. Participation in the development of a particular specification obliges W3C members to offer royalty-free licensing for technology used in that specification. Nonparticipants can also voluntarily offer a royalty free license, but they are not obliged to.

If, however, there is no commitment to offer royalty-free licensing for the patents in question, a Patent Advisory Group (PAG) is formed. The PAG will then assess whether the patent is truly applicable to the specification, and if so, how best to address the issue. The PAG might then seek prior art to invalidate the patent, or it might recommend that the specification be modified, to work around the patent. It might even advise abandonment of the specification. Only in exceptional circumstances will it decide that the specification should stand, in spite of the lack of royalty freedom.

Without an appropriate patent grant, browser vendors—whether open source or proprietary—cannot implement the specification without opening themselves up to a lawsuit. Such specifications would be, at best, an extremely risky proposition for anyone seeking to develop a browser, and none of the major browser vendors would even consider implementing a specification with known unlicensed patents.

Haavard identifies three separate occasions, twice in 2009, and again in 2011, where Apple has disclosed patents and not offered royalty-free licensing. In the first 2009 patent claim, Apple said that it had a patent covering W3C’s “widget” specification. A PAG was formed, and determined that Apple’s patent was not relevant. In the second 2009 claim, Apple claimed to have two patents covering W3C’s widget security specification. A PAG was again formed. It decided that one patent was not relevant, and the other didn’t apply. With both 2009 claims, Apple waited until the last minute to disclose its patents.

Touch Events

This time, Cupertino is claiming to have three patents, and an application for a fourth, that cover some of W3C’s touch event specification. This time the disclosure was made with about a month left to go. Again, the lack of royalty-free licensing means that a PAG is likely to be formed.

This in turn will delay the development of the specification and cost W3C members further time and money. The PAG process is not quick; the widget security PAG did not deliver its verdict until October of this year.

Haavard’s conclusion is that there is a pattern of behavior here; that Apple is trying to disrupt the standards process with its patent claims. He references the touch specification in particular—this is plainly an area where Apple has lots of expertise and interest in the technology, but the company opted out of working on the specification. If Apple had worked on the specification, it would have had to disclose sooner and offer licensing, and Haavard believes that avoiding this commitment is why Apple refused to work on the specification.

Apple’s is acting within its rights. W3C obliges members to disclose patent claims, and Apple is duly disclosing them. However, it’s easy to be sympathetic to Haavard’s argument. The two prior PAGs that resulted from Apple’s refusal to offer royalty-free patent licenses delayed and inconvenienced W3C, but ultimately on both occasions the groups decided that Apple’s patent claims were irrelevant. If Apple was hoping to keep some technology to itself, it did not succeed.

Moreover, W3C doesn’t require patent-holders to give up their competitive advantage. It’s acceptable to W3C for the royalty-free patent licenses to only cover implementations of the W3C specifications; if Apple wants to permit the royalty-free use of its touch patents in HTML5 browsers, but nowhere else, this would be an option. Such terms would allow browsers to implement the standard but still keep the technology off-limits to, for example, Android. But Apple did not offer such terms before, and so it seems unlikely that it will offer such terms this time.

Further, the only likely result of this is that Apple’s patents simply get worked around. W3C’s aversion to royalties means that it’s unlikely that it would accept any non-free license (should Apple even offer one), and the importance of touch input to phones and tablets means that W3C is unlikely to abandon the specification altogether. There’s no win possible for Apple—just wasted time and money for those seeking to make the web a more effective, more open platform.

Indeed, the result might even constitute a loss for Apple; the prior art that PAGs can uncover could jeopardize the patents themselves. The PAG subjects the patents to a certain amount of scrutiny—scrutiny that could be avoided through provision of a suitable license.

Apple has thus far not responded to our request for comment.

Apple’s work on WebKit and with W3C has undoubtedly helped the web community. But actions such as this show the company’s approach to standards and intellectual property is, at best, inconsistent, and and worst downright unhelpful: if open standards and Apple’s IP interests conflict, it’s the IP interests that win out. This may be good for Apple, but it’s bad for the open web.

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Activists show up to 'retake' Congress



By plane, train and bus, thousands of activists are converging on Washington, D.C. this week to “Take Back Our Capitol.” Though the pilgrimage borrows the some of the language of the Occupy protests, and includes a contingent of those activists, the crowd hails largely from nonprofits and political organizations.

"We came to tell members of Congress that they should represent the 99 percent not just corporations and the 1 percent," said Colleen Bugarske, 59, a volunteer from West Los Angeles with MoveOn.org, a national nonprofit political advocacy group.

For R.L Miller — a blogger and mom who runs a law practice in Oak Park, Calif. — the experience seems to highlight what activists have said is wrong: that government is disconnected from the people.



PhotoBlog: Images from the Capitol Hill protest

She boarded a plane at 5 a.m. Monday to join the three days of political action in the nation's capital. On Tuesday, with about 15 other activists from the Los Angeles nonprofit Good Jobs LA and an allied group from New York, she showed up around 12:30 p.m. at the Washington office of Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Calif., who represents Ventura County, where Miller lives. For about two hours, they knocked on the locked door every five minutes, trying to meet with Gallegly or at least schedule a meeting with him.

Staffers and other people came and went, but the door remained locked to activists standing in the hall. They were told, they said, that the Gallegly was not there — that he was on a flight into D.C. to take part in a vote. Later, however, he emerged from a side door and headed for the elevators with a security escort.

Before he could leave — and after proving to Gallegly that she lives in his district — Miller was able to ask him a question: “What are you doing for the poor and unemployed in our area?”

The congressman said he had given hundreds of toys to needy children over the weekend, said Miller and other activists. Then he wished them a merry Christmas.

"I said, 'I'm a constituent. Can I have a meeting with you this week?'" says Miller. To that, she says Gallegly replied: "I just gave you that meeting by wishing you a merry Christmas."

Then the elevator doors closed.

The activists remained stationed outside Gallegly’s office door after he left, but Miller’s repeated calls to his staff did not result in an appointment with the congressman.

Rep. Gallegly's office did not return calls from msnbc.com before the end of the business day Tuesday.

Miller noted that, by contrast, other congressional offices on the hallway appeared to be open for business. Some groups of activists were successful gaining entry to congressional offices — if not to have their concerns heard by representatives or staffers, then to hold sit-ins.

Miller said she had several concerns that she wanted to air. She wanted to ask him to support the renewable energy industry and to be more accessible to his constituents.

“I’ve lived in his district for 18 years,” she says. “He has been in Congress the whole time I’ve been there … He hardly shows his face around Ventura County.”

To be sure, many of the activists with Miller weren't from Gallegly's district.

“We’re standing in solidarity because … this is something that crosses state lines, something that affects all of us,” said Cara Noel, an activist who joined from United New York, a nonprofit that aids working-class people. “Because this is something we are all going through as part of the 99 percent. If people put (him) into office, they should be able to come and talk with him.”

quote:

Meet the Financial Wizards Working With Occupy Wall Street

High up in a Manhattan conference room on Sunday, a group of investment gurus discussed Occupy Wall Street. Should they support a set of tough-sounding financial reforms just proposed on the campaign trail by presidential candidate Jon Huntsman? Or was it reasonable to demand even deeper reforms? "This isn't enough," argued Cathy O'Neil, a former hedge fund quant who organizes the group, a branch of Occupy Wall Street known as the Alternative Banking Group. She proposed that the gathering of financial experts come up with improvements to Huntsman's plan and present them to Occupy Wall Street's General Assembly. Another OWS supporter, whose day job involves consulting for private equity firms, looked up from his laptop and smiled. "That's an excellent idea!"

quote:

Occupy activists face growing criticism after failed port shutdown bid

Unions join forces to condemn shutdown attempt as protesters say lack of success owed much to anti-union legislation

Occupy protesters were facing growing criticism over Monday's attempt to shut down the ports of America's west coast, with unions condemning the action that left hundreds of its members unable to work.

Terminals were effectively closed at Longview, Oakland and Portland, but plans to shut down the entire west coast failed after other protests saw relatively small turnouts.

Protesters have defended the attempted shutdown, claiming unions were unable to offer their support because they were "constrained" by anti-union legislation – and insisting they had the backing of rank-and-file workers.

The Occupy movement hoped to shut down the ports in support of an International Longshore and Warehouse Union battle in Longview, Washington, but the action never had the ILWU's backing, with senior union figures accusing protesters of being "arrogant, disrespectful and misguided" in the run-up to Monday.

Craig Merrilees, communications director at the ILWU, told the Guardian on Tuesday that in Oakland "three shifts of workers lost a day's pay, and many other port workers were in that situation".

"I'm sure the union president would want to emphasise that the cause of the 99% and the problem of corporate greed in America is a serious one, and efforts to address that are to be saluted and supported," he said.

"But it shouldn't happen at the expense of respecting the democratic structure and process of the ILWU and any other union."

Asked to what extent the shutdown had the support of ILWU members, Merrilees said it was hard to know, but pointed to the fact that Long Beach port – the second largest in the US – remained fully functional, with workers turning up to their shifts, despite Occupy LA and Occupy San Diego activists protesting there.

Occupiers argued that the lack of official union endorsement is because leaders have their hands tied. Protesters insist they had the backing of workers.

"Although we are working with and reaching out to rank-and-file port workers, we understand that labor unions are constrained under reactionary, anti-union federal legislation such as Taft-Hartley, passed during the cold war to reverse the gains of labor under the Depression-era Wagner Act, from taking job actions on the basis of solidarity or for political causes or demands," a statement on the Occupy The Ports website said.

However, unions' comments distancing themselves from the shutdown seem to have gone beyond adhering to legislative constraints.

In Vancouver the British Columbia Federation of Labour said it "does not support" the shutdown action, "or any action by the Occupy Vancouver group at Vancouver area ports that seeks to prevent our members from carrying out their assigned duties and working safely.

"[The federation] notes that the demonstration will not constitute a picket line as defined in the BC Federation of Labour's picket line policy."

In Oakland, the Alameda County Building and Construction Trades Council went even further, with its secretary-treasurer, Andreas Cluver, telling the San Francisco Chronicle that no union at the port was in support of the shutdown.

An open letter signed by five truck drivers pledged support for the Occupy port protests, and several union members served on planning committees for the action, but the lack of hard figures made it difficult to gauge true support for Monday's action.

The success of the port shutdown varied up and down the west coast. In Oakland, a city with a rich history of protest where thousands of protesters successfully shut down the port last month, the day went to plan, with Occupiers picketing the port in the morning and remaining in place for almost 24 hours.

Protesters in Portland shut three out of four terminals at the city's port, while at Longview – scene of the ongoing battle between the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and terminal operator EGT which inspired Monday's shutdown – the terminal was also closed.

Attempts to shut down other west coast ports, however, were less successful. The Port of Seattle said there had been "minimum impact to cargo movement", although seattlepi.com said around 100 protesters had prevented traffic from entering during the afternoon.

Similarly, in Vancouver about 100 protesters delayed between 40 and 50 trucks, but the port did not close. Maxim Winther, acting as a spokesman for Occupy Vancouver was candid in his assessment of the event.

"Regarding turnout today, I think it's clear we need more time to educate the public and educate each other on what these issues are and to really find actions and issues that do galvanise the public," he told Canadian Business.

The majority of the comments on social networking sites seemed positive as the protests unfolded on Monday, although the backing did not seem unanimous, as it has for previous Occupy actions, with some discussion on the west coast port shutdown Facebook page over whether the action was the best move.

"While I agree with the idea behind the Occupy movement, you are proving nothing by shutting down the freeways and the port; all of which are "occupied" by working class people," wrote one commenter.

"Those corrupt individuals whom you oppose are not in the port or the waterfront. Please don't be so foolish. You are alienating a large portion of your base supporters."

That prompted the response: "Where is your solidarity? You just called the Occupy movement foolish. Corrupt individuals are in the port."

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The Return Of Debtor’s Prisons: Thousands Of Americans Jailed For Not Paying Their Bills

Federal imprisonment for unpaid debt has been illegal in the U.S. since 1833. It’s a practice people associate more with the age of Dickens than modern-day America. But as more Americans struggle to pay their bills in the wake of the recession, collection agencies are using harsher methods to get their money, ushering in the return of debtor’s prisons.

twitter:

AnonymousIRC twitterde op woensdag 14-12-2011 om 18:13:41 RT @OccupyElders US military is awake & aware. Make this viral. http://t.co/Airsn1mD #occupy #ows #anonymous reageer retweet

VET SOLDIER says the Military is waking up to - FEMA camps and NDAA Reality!

quote:

Revealed: huge increase in executive pay for America's top bosses

Exclusive survey shows America's CEOs enjoyed pay hikes of up to 40% last year – with one chief executive earning $145m

Chief executive pay has roared back after two years of stagnation and decline. America's top bosses enjoyed pay hikes of between 27 and 40% last year, according to the largest survey of US CEO pay. The dramatic bounceback comes as the latest government figures show wages for the majority of Americans are failing to keep up with inflation.

America's highest paid executive took home more than $145.2m, and as stock prices recovered across the board, the median value of bosses' profits on stock options rose 70% in 2010, from $950,400 to $1.3m. The news comes against the backdrop of an Occupy Wall Street movement that has focused Washington's attention on the pay packages of America's highest paid.

The Guardian's exclusive first look at the CEO pay survey from corporate governance group GMI Ratings will further fuel debate about America's widening income gap. The survey, the most extensive in the US, covered 2,647 companies, and offers a comprehensive assessment of all the data now available relating to 2010 pay.

Last year's survey, covering 2009, found pay rates were broadly flat following a decline in wages the year before. Base salaries in 2009 showed a median increase of around 2%, and annual cash compensation increased just over 1.5%. The troubled stock markets took their toll, and added together CEO pay declined for the third year, though the decrease was marginal, less than three-tenths of a percent. The decline in the wider economy in 2007, 2008 and 2009 far outstripped the decline in CEO pay.

This year's survey shows CEO pay packages have boomed: the top 10 earners took home more than $770m between them in 2010. As stock prices began to recover last year, the increase in CEO pay outstripped the rise in share value. The Russell 3000 measure of US stock prices was up by 16.93% in 2010, but CEO pay went up by 27.19% overall. For S&P 500 CEOs, the largest companies in the sample, total realised compensation – including perks and pensions and stock awards – increased by a median of 36.47%. Total pay at midcap companies, which are slightly smaller than the top firms, rose 40.2%.

GMI released a preliminary report on 2010 CEO pay earlier this year, before all the data was available. Paul Hodgson, a senior research associate at GMI, said that report had shown a significant bounce but he had expected a wider sample to dampen the effect.

"Wages for everybody else have either been in decline or stagnated in this period, and that's for those who are in work," said Hodgson. "I had a feeling that we would see some significant increases this year. But 30-40% was something of a surprise." Bosses won in every area, with dramatic increases in pensions, payoffs and perks – as well as salary.

Still, there are no bankers among this year's big winners. Three of this year's top 10 earners come from the healthcare industry. Top earner John Hammergren at McKesson, the world's largest healthcare firm, made $145,266,91 last year – most of it from stock options.

The rising stock markets were especially good to CEOs, said Hodgson. Stock options were the main area that drove these outsized awards. "They got the options, the market collapsed, then it came back – and all of a sudden they were in the money again," he said.

And there will be more to come. GMI, formerly known as the Corporate Library, is expecting a rash of massive stock option bonuses as many firms awarded their top executives big option deals when the stock markets hit their lows in 2007-2008.

"There's still a lot of money just waiting in the market," said Hodgson. He described the upcoming awards as a "bombshell" likely to dwarf this year's figures.

2010 was a great year to lose your job as a CEO. Four of the 10 highest paid CEOs were retired or departing executives. Ronald Williams, former head of Aetna, a health insurer, exercised 2.4m options for a profit of $50.4m. Aetna's stock price declined by 70% from when Williams assumed the role of CEO in February 2006 until his retirement. At pharmacy chain CVS, Thomas Ryan made a $28m profit on his options. During Ryan's 13-year tenure as CEO, CVS Caremark's stock price decreased almost 54%.

Omnicare's Joel Gemunder retired last August and received cash severance of $16m, part of a final-year pay package worth $98.28m. Adam Metz, the former boss of General Growth Properties, a real estate company that specialises in shopping malls, walked away with a $46m cash bonus in 2010. GGP executives received nearly $115m in bonuses from the firm as it emerged from bankruptcy.

But this year's top earner may have his biggest payday still to come. Hammergren is due a $469m payoff if McKesson changes ownership. "Boards make these decisions, but they don't work out what happens if they stay in the job," said Hodgson.

"If they had have done, one hopes, they would have looked at each other and said: 'This is ridiculous.'"

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Huis VS neemt omstreden defensiewet aan

Het Amerikaanse Huis van Afgevaardigden heeft gisteravond ingestemd met een omstreden nieuwe defensiewet. Daarin is onder meer vastgelegd dat personen die worden verdacht van het beramen van aanslagen voor het terreurnetwerk al-Qaeda, in hechtenis worden genomen door militairen, en niet door justitie zoals dat het geval is bij burgers.

De nieuwe wet staat toe dat het leger terreurverdachten onbeperkt in hechtenis houdt. Mensenrechtenadvocaten hebben hier fel tegen geprotesteerd. Ook de Democratische afgevaardigde Barbara Lee sprak er schande van: 'Het opgeven van Amerikaanse idealen zal ons niet veiliger maken.'

Er worden nieuwe drempels opgeworpen voor de sluiting van kamp Guantanamo Bay op Cuba. Zo wordt het verboden om terreurverdachten uit Guantanamo Bay over te brengen naar de Verenigde Staten. Tevens wordt het moeilijker Guantanamo-gevangenen over te dragen aan derde landen die bereid zijn hen op te nemen. De sluiting van Guantanamo Bay was een belangrijke verkiezingsbelofte van Obama.

President Barack Obama had gedreigd zijn veto te gebruiken tegen de nieuwe regels, maar is nu akkoord gegaan met een iets afgezwakte versie. Die is tot stand gekomen in onderhandelingen met de Senaat, waar de Democraten de meerderheid hebben.

De aangenomen wet voorziet tevens in nieuwe sancties tegen de Iraanse centrale bank en instellingen buiten Iran die daarmee samenwerken. Ook worden honderden miljoenen dollar aan hulp aan Pakistan bevroren totdat Islamabad de strijd tegen terrorisme opvoert.

De wet behelst 662 miljard dollar aan defensieuitgaven. Meegeteld is de reguliere begroting van het Pentagon en de oorlog in Afghanistan.

twitter:

AnonymousPress twitterde op zaterdag 17-12-2011 om 23:50:35 HISTORIC! NYPD cannot kettle the protesters, too many and spread out all over the street ► WITNESS LIVE http://t.co/dPfLE6H8 #OWS #Occupy reageer retweet

quote:

PREFACE

July 2003

The following report, “Civil Disturbance and Criminal Tactics of Protest Extremists”, was prepared in response to the increase of protest activity worldwide and the escalation of violence and property destruction that has occurred in the pastseveral years. Information regarding the unlawful operational and tactical activities was collected and interpreted by multiple agencies. The information presented is for law enforcement and public safety officials to assist in effectively managing civil disturbances and large-scale protests.

The information in this report is unclassified, however it is important that this document be safeguarded against unauthorized disclosure to non-public safety personnel and that it is only used in an official capacity. This report contains“For Official Use Only” information and is not suitable for release to the press or the public. The information is being provided for your agency’s use only and may not be released to other individuals or agencies. Destruction of this materialshould be handled in a manner consistent with the continued protection of the information.

quote:

Occupy protests trigger envy, ire in Generation X

Associated Press= NEW YORK (AP) — The generation that gave the term "slacker" new meaning is looking with measures of rivalry, regret and tart bewilderment at a movement its successor mobilized in the name of "the 99 percent."

For some members of Generation X, the cohort sandwiched between the Baby Boomers and the so-called Millennial age group of many Occupy Wall Street protesters, the demonstrations represent a missed opportunity in their own youth to take up the cause of combatting economic inequality.

But for others, the Occupy movement is at best a showy rehash of similar recessionist angst they weathered with self-sufficiency and little more public display of disaffection than grunge rock and goatees — and at worst a reflection of a younger generation with a whiny, overweening idea of its own importance.

"Generation X is tired of your sense of entitlement. "Generation X also graduated during a recession ... and actually had to pay for its own music," declared Mat Honan, 39, a San Francisco-based writer for the technology blog Gizmodo.

He said by phone that he's sympathetic to the protesters' complaints about the financial system but felt a "generational disconnect" after reading a New York magazine story that portrayed the demonstrations as a response to a distinctly Millennial plight.

With its "we are the 99 percent" slogan, Occupy doesn't particularly see itself as a youth movement. People of a range of ages have joined some of the demonstrations. And plenty of 20-somethings, as well as their elders, want no part of them.

But with concern about student loans and post-graduation job opportunities a frequent theme, the protests are often seen as having a youthful face, and the limited demographic data available point to a heavy under-30 presence.

The median age was 28 in a mid-October survey of 301 people at Occupy Wall Street's former base camp in New York's Zuccotti Park, said Costas Panagopoulos, the Fordham University political science professor who conducted it. Separately, Democratic pollster Douglas Schoen surveyed 198 people at the park in mid-October and found 49 percent were under 30.

Another 38 percent were between 30 and 50 — the bookends of Generation X, in some generational researchers' view. They define it as those born between 1961 and 1981, encompassing nearly 88 million Americans; others bracket it a bit differently, often as 1965 to 1981.

Still, there's a perception among some Gen Xers themselves that they're at a generational remove from the Occupy protests.

"Our moms and dads witnessed the great advances for women and minorities born from the rebellion of the '60s. ... We learned how to blow up digital aliens with a joystick. Occupy Wall Street, can we believe in you?" recession blogger Lynn Parramore wrote, praising the protests, on the left-leaning online news service AlterNet.

A Gen X apology to the Occupy Wall Street contingent, expressing regret for conceptual hand-me-downs ranging from implying that going to college begets a good job to "taking away every reason to go outside," has gotten more than 1.7 million online views on the humor site Cracked.com.

On the other hand, Washington-based economics writer John Tamny branded the young Occupiers' mindset "an obnoxious repeat of Gen X" on the financial news site Real Clear Markets.

Some Gen Xers, after all, entered the workforce — or tried to — during recessions in the early 1980s and '90s, only to benefit from economic growth later in those decades, noted Tamny, 42.

He said he agrees with the young Occupiers' criticism of corporate bailouts and understands their career fears. But "when I hear people say, 'They'll never have a chance' — oh, come on. That was supposed to be me and my friends, and we figured it out," he said.

Dubbed Generation X after Douglas Coupland's 1991 novel about anomie and irony among a group of underemployed, wary young adults, the post-Baby Boomers garnered a reputation for alienation, political apathy and do-it-yourself individualism.

A recent report from the University of Michigan's Longitudinal Study of American Youth characterizes Gen Xers now as "active, balanced and happy." But in the public imagination, they're the latchkey kids who grew up amid the rise of divorce and working moms and became the detached young adults of films such as Richard Linklater's 1991 "Slacker" and Kevin Smith's 1994 "Clerks": autonomous, mistrustful of norms and organizations, more focused on finding individual meaning than trying to influence societal institutions.

"The big zeitgeist as Xers came of age in the '80s and '90s was: 'You're a free agent' ... so I think Xers look on at something like Occupy Wall Street with a little bit of curiosity," said historian Neil Howe, a co-author of noted books about Generation X and what he describes as its more optimistic, team-oriented, structure-loving successors in the Millennial group, also called Generation Y.

If Occupy Wall Street is reverberating in a generational rift, participant Malcolm Harris, 22, isn't surprised. To him, the generation before his grew up with rebellion being marketed to them as commoditized cool in such forms as MTV, creating a counterculture of disengagement.

"Conviction about anything becomes nearly impossible in that sort of situation," says Harris, the managing editor of The New Inquiry, a culture and criticism site. "No wonder they missed out on protest."

Not that they missed out entirely. In one particularly visible demonstration, anti-apartheid students created campus shantytowns in the 1980s to urge colleges to pull investment money out of companies that did business in South Africa. Amid those and other demonstrations, the Senate overrode President Ronald Reagan's veto in 1986 to impose sanctions against South Africa over its now-gone system of white-minority rule.

Those demonstrations faded by the time Joaquin Torrans graduated from high school in 1990. To him, "it seemed like we didn't have any causes to fight for."

"What we did all sort of miss was this issue ... of wealth inequality" and its consequences for politics, said Torrans, 40, a union stagehand living in North Richland Hills, Texas. He supports the Occupy protests.

But to Henry Rice, 41, the Occupy demonstrations are a wrongheaded outgrowth of a culture that expects too much for free. If he espouses a generational identity, it's as a child of the Regan Revolution and its conservative values.

"Educated people in my generation may have legitimate concerns about lobbyists and the power of money, but to camp in a park with a bunch of misguided people — I don't think that," said Rice, of Virginia Beach, Va. A retired Navy chief petty officer, he's now a Navy civilian public affairs specialist and studying to become a social studies teacher.

At 36, Pete Dutro is part of both Generation X and Occupy Wall Street. He's a member of its finance working group.

"Twenty-somethings really are the catalyst," he says, but "my generation paved the way for them to do this."

The tattoo artist and business student sees echoes in Occupy of the anti-consumerist, self-empowering DIY — for "do it yourself" — ethic he absorbed through the punk-rock scene of the 1980s and '90s. And he sees plenty of Gen Xers themselves among the Occupy crowd.

"There are a lot of us who have gotten tired of being apathetic," he said

quote:

Welcome To The United Police States of America, Sponsored By Twitter

Imagine my surprise this morning when, without warning, my shiny new Twitter account (@d_seaman) was suspended and taken offline.

No more tweets for you. You now have 0 followers.

My crime? Talking too much about Occupy Wall Street (I'm not an Occupier, but as a blogger and journalist it strikes me as one of the most important stories out there -- hence the constant coverage), and talking too much about the controversial detainment without trial provisions contained in the FY 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which would basically shred the Bill of Rights and subject American citizens to military police forces. The same level of civil rights protection that enemy combatants in a cave in Afghanistan receive!

But no, my tweets were 'annoying our users,' according to Twitter's suspension notice.

Well, not so much: nearly everyone following me appreciated my coverage of this issue, when few others in the media have had an interest in the NDAA or the widespread Occupy turnouts all over the country last night.

If they didn't appreciate it, ignorant bliss is only an 'unfollow' away. So why was I suspended only for covering two very serious news stories, and offering my own brand of commentary? I wasn't harassing users. I wasn't spamming. I wasn't hawking affiliate or porn links or any of the trash that should get one swiftly suspended from Twitter. (I've received some spam direct messages already; funny that those aren't suspended, but I was.)

I have contacted Ev Williams, co-founder of Twitter, and several tech journalists hoping to get some answers. I don't want to start a big thing -- I just want my account reactivated. This is America, not Iran, thanks in advance.

Also: it's worth questioning why #NDAA and #OWS, which are receiving consistently VERY high volumes of conversation/tweet traffic are not trending at all on Twitter, yet their featured 'worldwide trends' this morning include: Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, #myfavoritefood, and Kindergarten Cop.

UPDATE 1:19pm ET: I am apparently not the only user booted today for discussing NDAA and Occupy movement protests. See the screenshot below.

quote:

Occupy the classroom?

Economic instruction at the public level suffers from a lack of nuanced assertions, writes the author.

Cambridge, Massachusetts - Early last month, a group of students staged a walkout in Harvard's popular introductory economics course, Economics 10, taught by my colleague Greg Mankiw. Their complaint: The course propagates conservative ideology in the guise of economic science and helps perpetuate social inequality.

The students were part of a growing chorus of protest against modern economics as it is taught in the world's leading academic institutions. Economics has always had its critics, of course, but the financial crisis and its aftermath have given them fresh ammunition, seeming to validate long-standing charges against the profession's unrealistic assumptions, reification of markets and disregard for social concerns.

Mankiw, for his part, found the protesting students "poorly informed". Economics does not have an ideology, he retorted. Quoting John Maynard Keynes, he pointed out that economics is a method that helps people to think straight and reach the correct answers, with no foreordained policy conclusions.

Indeed, though you may be excused for skepticism if you have not immersed yourself in years of advanced study in economics, coursework in a typical economics doctoral programme produces a bewildering variety of policy prescriptions depending on the specific context. Some of the frameworks economists use to analyse the world favour free markets, while others don't. In fact, much economic research is devoted to understanding how government intervention can improve economic performance. And non-economic motives and socially co-operative behaviour are increasingly part of what economists study.

As the late great international economist Carlos Diaz-Alejandro once put it, "by now any bright graduate student, by choosing his assumptions... carefully, can produce a consistent model yielding just about any policy recommendation he favoured at the start". And that was in the 1970s! An apprentice economist no longer needs to be particularly bright to produce unorthodox policy conclusions.

Nevertheless, economists get stuck with the charge of being narrowly ideological, because they are their own worst enemies when it comes to applying their theories to the real world. Instead of communicating the full panoply of perspectives that their discipline offers, they display excessive confidence in particular remedies - often those that best accord with their own personal ideologies.

Consider the global financial crisis. Macroeconomics and finance did not lack the tools needed to understand how the crisis arose and unfolded. Indeed, the academic literature was chock-full of models of financial bubbles, asymmetric information, incentive distortions, self-fulfilling crises, and systemic risk. But, in the years leading up to the crisis, many economists downplayed these models' lessons in favour of models of efficient and self-correcting markets, which, in policy terms, resulted in inadequate governmental oversight over financial markets.

In my book The Globalization Paradox, I contemplate the following thought experiment. Let a journalist call an economics professor for his view on whether free trade with country X or Y is a good idea. We can be fairly certain that the economist, like the vast majority of the profession, will be enthusiastic in his support of free trade.

Now let the reporter go undercover as a student in the professor's advanced graduate seminar on international trade theory. Let him pose the same question: Is free trade good? I doubt that the answer will come as quickly and be as succinct this time around. In fact, the professor is likely to be stymied by the question. "What do you mean by 'good'?" he will ask. "And good for whom?"

The professor would then launch into a long and tortured exegesis that will ultimately culminate in a heavily hedged statement: "So if the long list of conditions I have just described are satisfied, and assuming we can tax the beneficiaries to compensate the losers, freer trade has the potential to increase everyone's well-being". If he were in an expansive mood, the professor might add that the effect of free trade on an economy's growth rate is not clear, either, and depends on an altogether different set of requirements.

A direct, unqualified assertion about the benefits of free trade has now been transformed into a statement adorned by all kinds of ifs and buts. Oddly, the knowledge that the professor willingly imparts with great pride to his advanced students is deemed to be inappropriate (or dangerous) for the general public.

Economics instruction at the undergraduate level suffers from the same problem. In our zeal to display the profession's crown jewels in untarnished form - market efficiency, the invisible hand, comparative advantage - we skip over the real-world complications and nuances, well recognised as they are in the discipline. It is as if introductory physics courses assumed a world without gravity, because everything becomes so much simpler that way.

Applied appropriately and with a healthy dose of common sense, economics would have prepared us for the financial crisis and pointed us in the right direction to fix what caused it. But the economics we need is of the "seminar room" variety, not the "rule-of-thumb" kind. It is an economics that recognises its limitations and knows that the right message depends on the context.

Downplaying the diversity of intellectual frameworks within their own discipline does not make economists better analysts of the real world. Nor does it make them more popular.

quote:

Occupy. Resist. Produce.

Earlier in the month, I wrote about how Occupy Wall Street has been largely forced "underground" following the NYPD raid on Zuccotti Park, which in the long-term might actually be more advantageous for the group. Instead of sitting around like ducks in a barrel waiting for police to come and destroy them, OWS is now a moving, camouflaged target that is capable of sudden, dramatic actions like occupying foreclosed homes.

When I moderated an OWS panel at Netroots Nation New York this weekend, members of Occupy The Hood and OWS said that these kinds of pro-active occupations (occupying warehouses, closed schools, foreclosed properties, banks, etc.) are the future of Occupy.

Nelini Stamp, one of the original Occupiers and the woman who announced to Zuccotti Park that Mayor Bloomberg had stood down from his plans to evict protesters for the Oct 14 park cleaning, said she imagined a day when OWS would occupy closed factories.

Such plans truly represent actual anarchist philosophy, not the property damaging hooligan cartoon character deemed "anarchist" largely by the media. As Noam Chomsky explained, "A consistent anarchist must oppose private ownership of the means of production and the wage slavery which is a component of this system, as incompatible with the principle that labor must be freely undertaken and under the control of the producer."

The tagline "Occupy. Resist. Produce" for Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis's 2004 film "The Take" served as a premonition of things to come in the United States.

The documentary takes place in Argentina in the wake of a dramatic 2001 economic collapse. Factories are now ghost towns. There is mass unemployment. In the wake of Neoliberalism ruin, workers at the Forja auto plant join a daring new movement to occupy bankrupt businesses and create jobs after the leaders of their country fail to do so.

"Armed only with slingshots and abiding faith in shop-floor democracy, the workers face off against the bosses, bankers and a whole system that sees their beloved factories as nothing more than scrap metal for sale," The Take's website reads.

OWS has already began to join the tradition of occupying and resisting at 702 Vermont Street in East New York, and Boston seems set to be the next large Occupy presence to adopt the same tactic.

. Observers say the tent encampments were just the beginning and the movement will have to enter another phase of organizing if it’s to accomplish policy changes. Some demonstrators say the movement will become floating — occupying warehouses, banks, closed schools and foreclosed properties, which Occupy groups around the country have already done.

Occupy now, as it always has, finds itself in a difficult position.

Part of the movement's power has always resided in its broad appeal and refusal to condense its message into a ten-point policy plan. While solely focusing on foreclosed homes or abandoned schools might limit the movement's appeal, the group stands to gain more favorability among mainstream Americans, who perhaps need clearly defined actions to really understand what Occupy is all about.

On the plus side, occupying abandoned factories is deeply symbolic on a multitude of levels. Occupiers would still be able to focus on foundational messages of job creation, healthcare access, fighting foreclosures and addressing the central failures of hyper-Capitalism.

Picking smart occupation targets would help limit damage inflicted by OWS's biggest criticism: that the movement is scattered and has no real platform. Of course, this notion is misguided. OWS stands for something -— many huge, broad things — because there are many huge things wrong with the country right now. But such broad criticisms overwhelm a plethora of Americans. Where to start if everything is so extremely fucked?

By occupying a foreclosed home, or abandoned school, or closed factory, OWS could help focus those sweeping critiques into one easy-to-understand microcosm. Families need shelter. Children need schools. Workers need to work. These things are universally understood and valued.

If there was any doubt this better-focused strategy can win Occupy mass appeal, those fears were put to rest when the New York Post, famous for belittling Occupy and everything it does, gave the group a favorable write-up for its occupation of a foreclosed home in East New York.

In the shockingly balanced article calmly titled, "Protesters help family Occupy foreclosed home," Jennifer Bain and Josh Saul detail how protesters helped move a mother and two children into a vacant home at 702 Vermont Street. There are no screaming accusations of anarchist hooligans or damage to property or any of the usual Post hysteria. Quite simply, protesters preemptively defeated any such allegations by picking a wise occupation target and sympathetic recipients.

While rushing to potentially soul-crushing jobs, it's easy to see how suits viewed the campers at Zuccotti as being the "dirty hippie" characters of Bill O'Reilly's nightmares. I simply lost count of how many times I heard a business person angrily shout "get a job!" at the Occupiers. As though finding a job is as easy as waking up in the morning. As though many of the protesters haven't been searching for a job for several months. However, that unfair characterization of Occupy is understandable given that camping in Zuccotti was a largely passive, albeit groundbreaking, act.

Switching gears and occupying factories, schools, and foreclosed homes is not only a way to take the movement underground and make it more easily defendable, but also a way to open up Occupy to extended mainstream appeal.

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UN Envoy Sharply Criticizes US for Repressive Actions Against OWS Protesters

The United Nations envoy for freedom of expression is drafting an official communication to the U.S. government demanding to know why federal officials are not protecting the rights of Occupy demonstrators whose protests are being disbanded — sometimes violently — by local authorities.

Frank La Rue, who serves as the U.N. “special rapporteur” for the protection of free expression, told HuffPost in an interview that the crackdowns against Occupy protesters appear to be violating their human and constitutional rights.

“I believe in city ordinances and I believe in maintaining urban order,” he said Thursday. “But on the other hand I also believe that the state — in this case the federal state — has an obligation to protect and promote human rights.”

“If I were going to pit a city ordinance against human rights, I would always take human rights,” he continued.

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US Citizen Convicted of Providing ‘Material Support’ to Terrorists

The defense claimed the verdict was an assault on First Amendment rights to free speech

An American citizen from a Boston suburb was convicted on Tuesday on terrorism charges, but the charges were loosely defined and the verdict may represent a significant blow to free speech rights.

Federal prosecutors claimed that Tarek Mehanna, 29, traveled to Yemen in 2004 with the hope of training as a terrorist and going on to fight American soldiers in Iraq. He failed to find any training camps, but returned home and allegedly promoted al Qaeda by writing about violent jihad against U.S. foreign policy on the Internet.

Mehanna and his lawyers instead claimed that he traveled to Yemen to receive training to become an Islamic scholar and that his writings on the Internet amounted to free speech.

“The charges scare people,” said J. W. Carney Jr., Mehanna’s lawyer and told reporters they would appeal. “The charges scared us when we first saw them. But the more that we looked at the evidence, the more that we got to know our client Tarek, the more we believed in his innocence.”

Post 9/11, the government has convicted many people on charges of “material support” to terrorists. But free speech advocates insist these are suffocating First Amendment rights and may grow to be even broader in the future.

Mehanna’s lawyers requested a jury instruction on First Amendment issues which included three points of instruction. The first reminded the jury of the right to hold views they regard as appalling. The second emphasized special protection for speech concerning public issues.

And the third explained the material support statute Mehanna was charged with, and makes clear: “To constitute a crime, the material support must be provided at the direction of the terrorist group, or in coordination with the terrorist group, or as a service provided directly to the terrorist group at its request. The statute does not prohibit someone from vigorously promoting and supporting the political goals of the group. This is considered independent advocacy, and is protected by the First Amendment.”

“The ACLU of Massachusetts,” read a statement by executive director of the Massachusetts ACLU Carol Rose, ”is gravely concerned that today’s verdict against Tarek Mehanna undermines the First Amendment and threatens national security.”

“Under the government’s theory of the case, ordinary people–including writers and journalists, academic researchers, translators, and even ordinary web surfers–could be prosecuted for researching or translating controversial and unpopular ideas. If the verdict is not overturned on appeal, the First Amendment will be seriously compromised.”

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OWS Fights Back Against Police Surveillance by Launching "Occucopter" Citizen Drone

In response to constant police surveillance, violence, and arrests, Occupy Wall Street protesters and legal observers have been turning their cameras back on the police.

_{December 22, 2011 |}

The police may soon be watching you in your garden picking your vegetables or your bottom. As police plans for increasing unmanned aerial surveillance take shape, there is a new twist. Private citizens can now buy their own surveillance drones to watch the police.

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Pool is attempting to police-proof the device: "We are trying to get a stable live feed so you can have 50 people controlling it in series. If the cops see you controlling it from a computer they can shut you down, but then control could automatically switch to someone else."

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Occupy Vancouver Picks Up the Tab

The media's latest attempt to undercut the message of Occupy movements all across the globe is by touting the "cost" of these protests. Many sources are reporting that Occupy movements are costing cities hundreds of thousands of dollars in police overtime because apparently it takes an entire precinct to make sure that 50 people don't sleep through the night.

When an internal city memorandum stated that Occupy Vancouver had cost its city nearly a million dollars in taxpayer money, the organizers did something brilliant: they broke down the cost of what they were doing for the city of Vancouver.

According to a recent press release from Occupy Vancouver member Eric Hamilton-Smith: "...over 37,000 meals were served, $672,000 of primary medical care was provided, and 30 people were housed for 37 days at a time when beds at primary shelters were not available." This assessment puts the overall price tag of benefits to the community at over one million dollars, approximately matching the "cost" attributed to the protests, as well as picking up the tab for services that would have been stuck to the community-at-large.

According to a Vancouver Sun article, with the average bed at a shelter costing $83/night, the movement has accounted for over $90,000 in housing services. The Sun notes that with the average soup meal kitchen meal costing $3.50, the 37,000 meals served by Occupy Vancouver accounted for over $129,000 in social services.

This is absolutely brilliant, and I suggest that all other Occupy movements take note of this.

Occupy Vancouver has proven that they are a tangible benefit to its own community in terms that even the most cross-eyed, close-minded, right-wing-funded dunderhead can understand: dolla dolla bills (Canadian, y'all.)

Occupy Wall Street, as well as other Occupy movements, may want to take stock (no pun intended, no pun achieved) of the benefits and services they are offering and place a reasonable monetary value on them. These numbers could be very important when it comes to defending the relevance of the Occupy movement as a whole; and make no mistake, the Occupy movement is going to have to vigorously defend its existence on multiple fronts for an indefinite amount of time.

Let me pre-empt a myopic critique of this plan of attack right here:"That's pretty ironic that you want to put a cash value on these things when the whole Occupy Wall Street thing is against money to begin with!"

No. And you can close your mouth if you're just breathing.

Two points:

1) The Occupy movement isn't against the concept or existence of money, you dolt. There has been much written about its purpose. If you would like my take, you can check this out. If you won't click that because I just called you a dolt, I apologize. I just have very little patience for ignorance. (Actually, I'm not really sorry. If you're old enough to read this, you should know better than to ignore things like the deliberate destruction of the global economy. If you don't think so, you probably just got some Chunky Monkey on your monitor, there.)

2) The Occupy movement is very big, and needs to have many tentacles, just like the financial-legislative complex that it is fighting against. There is not one simple model of change to be adopted in this fight; the new model to be adopted must be the adoption of many models. (Yeah, I know, it's like Noam Chomsky in the background of a Pink Floyd album cover.) One of these models must be the ability to express oneself in the native language of the unconscionable elite that populate our global community of Psychopathic Multi-Nationals Gone Wild and their opening band: Fuck the People, I'm Already Elected.

A well-oiled protesting machine must adopt many tactics, and assessing the value of providing services to a community must be one of them. Instead of fighting the "cost" issue, Occupy movements should proudly declare the "cost" of the services they are providing for their respective cities.

How much does a soup kitchen meal cost in Los Angeles? What is the daily cost to run a library in Portland? How much does a massive clean-up of Zuccotti Park cost? How much does a night in a homeless shelter cost the city of Atlanta? These are only a few ways that these protests are actually picking up social and civic services and alleviating taxpayer burden by subsidizing some of the costs associated with running a city.

There are many other services currently being provided, and many more that will come. I'm sure it won't be too long before an Occupy movement creates a Planned Parenthood, drug rehabilitation, or a domestic abuse education tent facilitated by qualified, licensed volunteers. Perhaps there are some out there already.

It would behoove Occupy movements all across the world to assess what services they offer and to evaluate the material benefit they offer their community. This is not only key information when justifying the movement itself, but it also throws down the gauntlet by clearly showcasing the valuable act of providing services that enhance a city.

As an extra bonus, such an evaluation would also prove to be a source of unflappable encouragement for those protestors thanklessly working for the social betterment of an antagonistic world filled with uninformed water-cooler chatter, villainizing media pundits and hostile civic and federal authorities.

This small bit of unified focus will prove to reap large benefits for the Occupy movement down the road, at the type of cost usually reserved for maniacal Wal-Mart holiday stampedes.

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The Citigroup Plutonomy Memos: Two bombshell documents that Citigroup's lawyers try to suppress, describing in detail the rule of the first 1%

“Are they real?” That’s the question people usually ask when they hear for the first time of the “Citigroup Plutonomy Memos.” The sad truth is: Yes, they are real, and instead of being discussed on mainstream media outlets all over America and beyond, Citigroup was surprisingly successful so far in suppressing these memos, using their lawyers to issue takedown-notices whenever these memos were being made available for download on the internet.

So what are we talking about? In 2005 and 2006, several analysts at Citigroup took a very, very close look at the economic inequalities within the USA and other countries and wrote two memos which were addressed to their very wealthy customers. If there is one group of people who need to know the truth about what is really going on within the society and the economy, minus the propaganda, then it’s businesspeople who have a lot of money to invest, and who want to invest wisely.

So Citigroup did their duty and published two explosive memos, which should have become mainstream news, but eventually did not. The first memo is dated October 16, 2005 (35 pages) and is titled: “Plutonomy: Buying Luxury, Explaining Global Imbalances”.

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THE UNITED STATES PLUTONOMY - THE GILDED AGE, THE ROARING TWENTIES, AND THE NEW MANAGERIAL ARISTOCRACY

Lets dive into some of the details. As Figure 1 shows the top 1% of households in the U.S., (about 1 million households) accounted for about 20% of overall U.S. income in 2000, slightly smaller than the share of income of the bottom 60% of households put together. Thats about 1 million households compared with 60 million households, both with similar slices of the income pie!

Clearly, the analysis of the top 1% of U.S. households is paramount. The usual analysis of the average U.S. consumer is flawed from the start. To continue with the U.S., the top 1% of households also account for 33% of net worth, greater than the bottom 90% of households put together. It gets better(or worse, depending on your political stripe) - the top 1% of households account for 40% of financial net worth, more than the bottom 95% of households put together.

This is data for 2000, from the Survey of Consumer Finances (and adjusted by academic Edward Wolff). Since 2000 was the peak year in equities, and the top 1% of households have a lot more equities in their net worth than the rest of the population who tend to have more real estate, these data might exaggerate the U.S. plutonomy a wee bit.

Was the U.S. always a plutonomy - powered by the wealthy, who aggrandized larger chunks of the economy to themselves? Not really.

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UPDATE:

Investigative journalist and blogger Lee Fang picks up the subject of the suppressed Citigroup-memos at his blog "The Second Alarm" and comments about the possible consequences of the pending SOPA/PROTECT IP-legislation for investigative blog journalism:

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Op zaterdag 24 december 2011 03:16 schreef Sehaninne het volgende:
Inderdaad, Papierversnipperaar doet goed werk imho.

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It Begins? Anti 'Money Power' Lawsuit Filed in Canada ...
Free-Market Analysis: Well, it is finally happening. A legal challenge to the power elite's money system has been launched in a Canadian Court "for the benefit of Canadians ... and to restore the use of the Bank of Canada for the benefit of Canadians. Here's some more from the press release mentioned above:

. The action also constitutionally challenges the government's fallacious accounting methods in its tabling of the budget by not calculating nor revealing the true and total revenues of the nation before transferring back "tax credits" to corporations and other taxpayers. The Plaintiffs state that since 1974 there has been a gradual but sure slide into the reality that the Bank of Canada and Canada's monetary and financial policy are dictated by private foreign banks and financial interests contrary to the Bank of Canada Act.

The Plaintiffs state that the Bank of International Settlements (BIS), the Financial Stability Forum (FSF) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) were all created with the cognizant intent of keeping poorer nations in their place which has now expanded to all nations in that these financial institutions largely succeed in over-riding governments and constitutional orders in countries such as Canada over which they exert financial control.

The Plaintiffs state that the meetings of the BIS and Financial Stability Board (FSB) (successor of FSF), their minutes, their discussions and deliberations are secret and not available nor accountable to Parliament, the executive, nor the Canadian public notwithstanding that the Bank of Canada policies directly emanate from these meetings. These organizations are essentially private, foreign entities controlling Canada's banking system and socio-economic policies.

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Op zondag 25 december 2011 19:50 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Aan zomaar lange artikelen posten zondaar enig inzicht of samenvatting hebben we niks aan. Dit is toch geen nieuwskrant maar een forum. Ergo het moet wat discussiewaarde hebben. Anders gaan we gewoon naar de volkskrant of NY times.

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Op zondag 25 december 2011 20:03 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Foutieve verbandlegging.

Het gaat erom dat er gewoon niet gedisscussieerd wordt rondom jouw artikelen. En daar is ergens iets goed fouts in. En het ligt vast niet aan mij, misschien moet jij ook de anderen een voor een afvragen of ook zij Engels kunnen

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Bovendien, al hebben jouw artikelen een bepaalde punt of betekenis op zich, dan nog zou je een soort causale band moeten kunnen leggen tussen de verschillende artikelen die een bepaalfe strekking weergeeft.

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Niet zozeer omdat het moet, maar eerder uit je verantwoordelijkheid als schrijver om ervoor te zorgen dat iedere lezer kan begrijpen waar het over gaat en wat de toevoegende waarde is

Zo voor de hand liggend duidelijk zijn jouw artikelen weer niet.

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Op zondag 25 december 2011 20:22 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Nogmaals foutieve conclusie trekkng.

Omdat niemand (behalve jij- wat op zich triest is, maar dat terzijde) ook maar iets schrijft kun je niet van uit gaan dat iedereen het mee eens is.

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Want in dat geval zouden ze toch nog hun instemming bekendmaken lijkt me, en dat is ook een geloofwaardige aanname mijnerzijds.

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Daarnaast het is weer die nuance die een goede schrijver onderscheidt van een ordinaire- die zorg voor zijn lezers en het leesplezier.

Ipv van wilde aannames uit te gaan, je kan beter uitleg geven waarom jij iets post ipv de volle verantwoordelijkheid bij de lezer neer te leggen.

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Op zondag 25 december 2011 20:32 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Volgens mij hebben we het daar nog nooit over gehad

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Op zondag 25 december 2011 20:31 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Je laat maar zien dat niet alleen jouw tekstselectie fout is maar ook je instelling helemaal.

Wat dit betreft ben je echt niet anders dan een Nigeriaanse spammer - als ze dat willen, dan lezen het toch niet, ik blijf maar spammen.

Hetzelfde principe, andere toneel.

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The Average Bush Tax Cut For The 1 Percent This Year Will Be Greater Than The Average Income Of The Other 99 Percent

As Occupy Wall Street protestors continue to demonstrate across the country, congress’ fiscal super committee failed to craft a deficit reduction package due to Republican refusal to consider tax increases on the super wealthy. In fact, the only package that the GOP officially submitted to the committee included lowering the top tax rate from 35 percent to 28 percent, even as new research shows that the optimal top tax rate is closer to 70 percent.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), who co-chaired the super committee, explained that the major sticking point during negotiations with the GOP was what to do with the Bush tax cuts. With that in mind, the National Priorities Project points out that those tax cuts this year will give the richest 1 percent of Americans a bigger tax cut than the other 99 percent will receive in average income:



The average Bush tax cut in 2011 for a taxpayer in the richest one percent is greater than the average income of the other 99 percent ($66,384 compared to $58,506).

The super committee failed to grapple with the extraordinarily costly Bush tax cuts for the richesttax policies that, according to the Congressional Budget Office, cost more in added federal debt than they add in additional economic activity, explained Jo Comerford, NPPs Executive Director. Frank Knapp, vice chairman of the American Sustainable Business Council, added in a statement yesterday, the high-end Bush tax cuts are a big part of the problem not the solutionIts obscene to keep slashing infrastructure and services for everybody on Main Street to keep up tax giveaways for millionaires and multinational corporations.

The Bush tax cuts have done nothing but blow up the federal debt and hand billions in tax breaks to the Americans who needed them least. As a reminder, past grand bargains when it came to the budget included substantial new revenues, to balance the pain of getting the countrys budget in order. Instead of adopting that approach, the GOP wants to continue lavishing tax breaks onto the 1 percent, while asking everyone else to sacrifice.

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As Central District News reported, police last night raided a house at 19th and Spruce, arresting three men for charges including “Criminal Trespassing, Property Damage and weapons violations. Other criminal charges may be forthcoming.”

According to the SPD’s account, the raid was in response to a 911 call that afternoon that alerted them about “multiple male and female subjects who had unlawfully entered and occupied a residence. …Preliminary investigation indicates that the suspects entered the house and subsequently damaged the interior of the house with graffiti. They also left garbage, open containers of food, and were cooking inside the house on a portable, gas-operated stove.”

The house had been bought out of foreclosure in August by Mountaincrest Credit Union, according to CDN. The way the CDN story reads, the house was under renovation and the occupiers were interrupting progress and damaging it—and they’d broken in.

But that story doesn’t match what I learned in a meeting just now with two of the 10 or 12 occupiers who had been in the house for about two weeks.

They held up the house key. An anonymous “elf” had come by the Occupy Seattle encampment at SCCC a few weeks ago and handed them the key and the address, they said. (A different anonymous donor also gave them a sailboat that they’ll begin using and painting in the spring.) Inside, they’d begun painting a forest landscape, and planned a waterfall down the staircase; they titled the house “Water.” They denied doing damage or being a haven for any kind of destructive activity and said they didn’t know of any complaints from neighbors. Instead, they saw the house as a home base for adding art to the immediate neighborhood. To that end, they’d completed a mural nearby yesterday, on Fir Street between 14th and 15th, on a garage wall offered to them by a resident. Also yesterday, another donor gave them furniture: a futon, bookcases.

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Rusland hekelt mensenrechten in VS

Rusland heeft scherpe kritiek op het mensenrechtenbeleid van de Amerikaanse regering. 'De situatie blijft ver van de idealen die Washington uitspreekt', staat in een rapport dat het ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken in Moskou woensdag heeft gepubliceerd.

Het is de eerste keer dat Rusland de mensenrechten wereldwijd heeft onderzocht.

Rusland klaagt onder meer over het 'weerzinwekkende' marinekamp Guantanomo Bay, waar terreurverdachten worden vastgehouden.
De Verenigde Staten publiceren sinds 1976 jaarlijks een rapport over de stand van de mensenrechten wereldwijd. Daarin staat regelmatig kritiek op Rusland.

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Cops Ready for War

Nestled amid plains so flat the locals joke you can watch your dog run away for miles, Fargo treasures its placid lifestyle, seldom pierced by the mayhem and violence common in other urban communities. North Dakota’s largest city has averaged fewer than two homicides a year since 2005, and there’s not been a single international terrorism prosecution in the last decade.

But that hasn’t stopped authorities in Fargo and its surrounding county from going on an $8 million buying spree to arm police officers with the sort of gear once reserved only for soldiers fighting foreign wars.

Every city squad car is equipped today with a military-style assault rifle, and officers can don Kevlar helmets able to withstand incoming fire from battlefield-grade ammunition. And for that epic confrontation—if it ever occurs—officers can now summon a new $256,643 armored truck, complete with a rotating turret. For now, though, the menacing truck is used mostly for training and appearances at the annual city picnic, where it’s been parked near the children’s bounce house.

“Most people are so fascinated by it, because nothing happens here,” says Carol Archbold, a Fargo resident and criminal justice professor at North Dakota State University. “There’s no terrorism here.”

Like Fargo, thousands of other local police departments nationwide have been amassing stockpiles of military-style equipment in the name of homeland security, aided by more than $34 billion in federal grants since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a Daily Beast investigation conducted by the Center for Investigative Reporting has found.
Interactive Map: States Spend Billions on Homeland Security

The buying spree has transformed local police departments into small, army-like forces, and put intimidating equipment into the hands of civilian officers. And that is raising questions about whether the strategy has gone too far, creating a culture and capability that jeopardizes public safety and civil rights while creating an expensive false sense of security.

“The argument for up-armoring is always based on the least likely of terrorist scenarios,” says Mark Randol, a former terrorism expert at the Congressional Research Service, the nonpartisan research arm of Congress. “Anyone can get a gun and shoot up stuff. No amount of SWAT equipment can stop that.”

Local police bristle at the suggestion that they’ve become “militarized,” arguing the upgrade in firepower and other equipment is necessary to combat criminals with more lethal capabilities. They point to the 1997 Los Angeles-area bank robbers who pinned police for hours with assault weapons, the gun-wielding student who perpetrated the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, and the terrorists who waged a bloody rampage in Mumbai, India, that left 164 people dead and 300 wounded in 2008.

The new weaponry and battle gear, they insist, helps save lives in the face of such threats. “I don’t see us as militarizing police; I see us as keeping abreast with society,” former Los Angeles Police chief William Bratton says. “And we are a gun-crazy society.”

Adds Fargo Police Lt. Ross Renner, who commands the regional SWAT team: “It’s foolish to not be cognizant of the threats out there, whether it’s New York, Los Angeles, or Fargo. Our residents have the right to be protected. We don’t have everyday threats here when it comes to terrorism, but we are asked to be prepared.”

The skepticism about the Homeland spending spree is less severe for Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and New York, which are presumed to be likelier targets. But questions persist about whether money was handed out elsewhere with any regard for risk assessment or need. And the gap in accounting for the decade-long spending spree is undeniable. The U.S. Homeland Security Department says it doesn’t closely track what’s been bought with its tax dollars or how the equipment is used. State and local governments don’t maintain uniform records either.

To assess the changes in law enforcement for The Daily Beast, the Center for Investigative Reporting conducted interviews and reviewed grant spending records obtained through open records requests in 41 states. The probe found stockpiles of weaponry and military-style protective equipment worthy of a defense contractor’s sales catalog.

In Montgomery County, Texas, the sheriff’s department owns a $300,000 pilotless surveillance drone, like those used to hunt down al Qaeda terrorists in the remote tribal regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. In Augusta, Maine, with fewer than 20,000 people and where an officer hasn’t died from gunfire in the line of duty in more than 125 years, police bought eight $1,500 tactical vests. Police in Des Moines, Iowa, bought two $180,000 bomb-disarming robots, while an Arizona sheriff is now the proud owner of a surplus Army tank.

The flood of money opened to local police after 9/11, but slowed slightly in recent years. Still, the Department of Homeland Security awarded more than $2 billion in grants to local police in 2011, and President Obama’s 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act contributed an additional half-billion dollars.

Law enforcement officials say the armored vehicles, assault weapons, and combat uniforms used by their officers provide a public safety benefit beyond their advertised capabilities, creating a sort of “shock and awe” experience they hope will encourage suspects to surrender more quickly.

“The only time I hear the complaint of ‘God, you guys look scary’ is if the incident turns out to be nothing,” says West Hartford, Conn., Police Lt. Jeremy Clark, who organizes an annual SWAT competition.

A grainy YouTube video from one of Clark’s recent competitions shows just how far the police transformation has come, displaying officers in battle fatigues, helmets, and multi-pocketed vests storming a hostile scene. One with a pistol strapped to his hip swings a battering ram into a door. A colleague lobs a flash-bang grenade into a field. Another officer, holding a pistol and wearing a rifle strapped to his back, peeks cautiously inside a bus.

The images unfold to the pulsing, ominous soundtrack of a popular videogame, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Though resembling soldiers in a far-flung war zone, the stars of this video are Massachusetts State Police troopers.

The number of SWAT teams participating in Clark’s event doubled to 40 between 2004 and 2009 as Homeland’s police funding swelled. The competition provides real-life scenarios for training, and Clark believes it is essential, because he fears many SWAT teams are falling below the 16 hours of minimum monthly training recommended by the National Tactical Officers Association.

“Luck is not for cops. Luck is for drunks and fools,” Clark said, explaining his devotion to training.

One beneficiary of Homeland’s largesse are military contractors, who have found a new market for their wares and sponsor training events like the one Clark oversees in Connecticut or a similar Urban Shield event held in California.

Special ops supplier Blackhawk Industries, founded by a former Navy SEAL, was among several Urban Shield sponsors this year. Other sponsors for such training peddle wares like ThunderSledge breaching tools for smashing open locked or chained doors, Lenco Armored Vehicles bulletproof box trucks, and KDH Defense Systems’s body armor.

“As criminal organizations are increasingly armed with military-style weapons, law enforcement operations require the same level of field-tested and combat-proven protection used by soldiers and Marines in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other high-risk locations,” boasts an Oshkosh Corp. brochure at a recent police seminar, where the company pitched its “tactical protector vehicle.”

The trend shows no sign of abating. The homeland security market for state and local agencies is projected to reach $19.2 billion by 2014, up from an estimated $15.8 billion in fiscal 2009, according to the Homeland Security Research Corp.

The rise of equipment purchases has paralleled an apparent increase in local SWAT teams, but reliable numbers are hard to come by. The National Tactical Officers Association, which provides training and develops SWAT standards, says it currently has about 1,650 team memberships, up from 1,026 in 2000.

Many of America’s newly armed officers are ex-military veterans from the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan. Charles Ramsey, who was police chief in Washington, D.C., on 9/11, upgraded the weaponry when he moved to Philadelphia in 2008. Today, some 1,500 Philly beat cops are trained to use AR-15 assault rifles.

“We have a lot of people here, like most departments, who are ex-military,” Ramsey says. “Some people are very much into guns and so forth. So it wasn’t hard to find volunteers.”

Some real-life episodes, however, are sparking a debate about whether all that gear also creates a more militarized mind-set for local police that exceeds their mission or risks public safety.

In one case, dozens of officers in combat-style gear raided a youth rave in Utah as a police helicopter buzzed overhead. An online video shows the battle-ready team wearing masks and brandishing rifles as they holler for the music to be shut off and pin partygoers to the ground.

And Arizona tactical officers this year sprayed the home of ex-Marine Jose Guerena with gunfire as he stood in a hallway with a rifle that he did not fire. He was hit 22 times and died. Police had targeted the man’s older brother in a narcotics-trafficking probe, but nothing illegal was found in the younger Guerena’s home, and no related arrests had been made months after the raid.

In Maryland, officials finally began collecting data on tactical raids after police in 2008 burst into the home of a local mayor and killed his two dogs in a case in which the mayor’s home was used as a dropoff for drug deal. The mayor’s family had nothing to do with criminal activity.

Such episodes and the sheer magnitude of the expenditures over the last decade raise legitimate questions about whether taxpayers have gotten their money’s worth and whether police might have assumed more might and capability than is necessary for civilian forces.

“With local law enforcement, their mission is to solve crimes after they’ve happened, and to ensure that people’s constitutional rights are protected in the process,” says Jesselyn McCurdy, senior legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. “The military obviously has a mission where they are fighting an enemy. When you use military tactics in the context of law enforcement, the missions don’t match, and that’s when you see trouble with the overmilitarization of police.”

The upgrading of local police nonetheless continues. Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio now claims to operate his own air armada of private pilots—dubbed Operation Desert Sky—to monitor illegal border crossings, and he recently added a full-size surplus Army tank. New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly boasted this fall he had a secret capability to shoot down an airliner if one threatened the city again. And the city of Ogden, Utah, is launching a 54-foot, remote-controlled “crime-fighting blimp” with a powerful surveillance camera.

Back in Fargo, nearby corn and soybean farmer Tim Kozojed supports the local police but questions whether the Homeland grants have been spent wisely. ”I’m very reluctant to get anxious about a terrorist attack in North Dakota,” Kozojed, 31, said. “Why would they bother?”

quote:

Infographic Of The Day: The Mega Companies Behind 90% Of Media

The media landscape is dominated by a mere six companies. Should we be worried? Nah.

We all know that everything you see on TV, and much of what you read online, is ultimately owned by a few mega corporations. But if you were pressed about how much those companies actually own, I'd bet you'd be off by about a factor of 2.

Frugal Dad--the same company behind that Walmart infographic we did recently--took it upon themselves to show exactly how concentrated our media landscape actually is.

quote:

Bevolking in donkere Amerikaanse steden is duisternis beu

Het is donker in een aantal dorpen en steden rondom de Amerikaanse stad Detroit, omdat er uit bezuinigingsoverwegingen duizenden lantarenpalen zijn weggehaald. Maar de bevolking van de in het donker gestoken stadjes begint steeds luider te morren, zo meldde de krant New York Times
.
Om geld te besparen werd eerder dit jaar in stadjes als Highland Park de straatverlichting gemarginaliseerd. Ruim twee derde verdween, vooral in buitenwijken. Met gevaarlijke situaties tot gevolg.

Automobilisten zien voetgangers pas als het al te laat is en ouders durven hun kinderen 's ochtends nauwelijks naar school te sturen. Anderen passen hun bezigheden noodgedwongen aan het daglicht aan.

Verloren hoop
Burgers hopen dat de gemeenten het besluit terugdraaien. 'Wat er met onze lantaarns is gebeurd, komt doordat politici de hoop hebben verloren', aldus een bewoner. Maar de overheid laat weten dat het donker blijft, zolang de kas meer verlichting niet toelaat.

quote:

Obama ondertekent omstreden defensiewet met ‘ernstige bezwaren’

De Amerikaanse president Barack Obama heeft gisteren zijn handtekening gezet onder de omstreden National Defense Authorization Act. Hij ondertekende de wet, hoewel hij “ernstige bezwaren” tegen een aantal bepalingen in de wet heeft.

Dat meldt persbureau AP. Het wetsvoorstel ter waarde van 662 miljard dollar voorziet in een grotere rol van het Amerikaanse leger bij het afhandelen van zaken tegen buitenlandse terreurverdachten en het mogelijk bevriezen van 700 miljoen dollar aan hulp aan Pakistan. Verder regelt de wet defensiezaken geregeld zoals de salarissen voor defensiepersoneel en het budget voor wapensystemen tot de oorlog in Afghanistan en nationale veiligheidsprogramma’s in de energiesector.

Het omstreden gedeelte van de wet zijn bepalingen over de detentie van terreurverdachten. In de bepalingen staat onder andere dat verdachten het recht op een proces kan worden ontzegd en dat zij voor onbepaalde tijd kunnen worden vastgehouden. Republikeinen en Democraten onderhandelden maandenlang over het wetsvoorstel, dat raakt aan de grondwettelijke bescherming van de Amerikaanse burgers. Op het laatste moment kwamen de twee partijen op 16 december tot een compromis.

Het Witte Huis overwoog in alle ernst de wet met een veto te blokkeren, maar kwam hier uiteindelijk op terug na garanties dat de president het laatste woord houdt over de detentie en doorverwijzing van terreurverdachten.

Feed the Stream van Al Jazeera bekeek op 15 december naar de online reacties op de NDAA

Feed The Stream 15/12/11 - NDAA causes a stir in the U.S.

twitter:

NotaThreat2u twitterde op zondag 01-01-2012 om 20:10:09 Installing #US Military Dictatorship ... 40% complete ██████████████░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ #NDAA #SOPA #USA #Congress #Obama #FEMA #Pentagon reageer retweet

quote:

Occupy The New Year: Hundreds Clash With NYPD At Zuccotti Park On Last Day Of 2011

Occupy Wall Street planned a New Year's Eve celebration at Zuccotti Park last night, saying on its Facebook event page, "Bring a drum! Bring your instrument! Arrive at the park by 10pm. In the 2 hours before, we will reclaim our park and the area around it. At the New Year, we will raise the 99%!" And the evening ended up involving a small tent being temporarily erected, protesters tearing down the police barricades, and a confrontation with police that resulted in numerous arrests. Oh, and there was pepper spray, too—happy 2012, people!

Newyorkist, who was at Zuccotti Park, exhaustively Tweeted the evening, "There is a small tent in Liberty. Toy sized. Police tried to remove. Ppl locked arms around it," "Police turning ppl away from park. Is it closed, I asked. No, one said. Can ppl come in? No, same said. Who's enforcing it? No one answered," "Just spoke with Captain Duffy of NYPD. Tells me NYPD closed park because 'going to be impending arrests. We don't want anymore ppl inside,'" "Officer told man who asked, as soon as tent is put away, Zuccotti Park will reopen," "Now 25 ppl circling park, chanting "we are unstoppable another world is possible," and "Via mic check: deal discussed btw mom, kids with tent and NYPD. Hand tent over & police will open park. Kids to personally hand tent over."

Then, some time after a Noise Demonstration outside the Metropolitan Correctional Center, protesters started to tear down the metal barricades set up around the park, and things turned aggressive. The Daily News reports, "Scuffles erupted between demonstrators and police, with one protester busted after an officer was slightly injured with a pair of scissors, police said. The officer was taken to Bellevue Hospital, and protesters said the police responded with pepper spray." (The Post says this occurred around 11:30 p.m.) And according to CityRoom:

. As midnight approached, the hundreds in Zuccotti Park shouted “Whose year? Our year!”

Just before 1:30 a.m., security guards and police officers entered the park, where only about 150 people remained. A line of officers pushed protesters from the park and led about five people out in handcuffs. One officer used two hands to repeatedly shove backwards a credentialed news photographer who was preparing to document an arrest.

A police commander announced through a megaphone that the park, which is normally open 24 hours a day, was closed until 9 a.m., but did not provide a reason. A few moments later, officers told the crowd that had just been moved from the park that the sidewalks surrounding Zuccotti Park were also closed, and directed people across Broadway.

Just before the park was cleared, about 200 protesters marched north through SoHo and into the East Village. At 13th Street and 2nd Avenue, officers surrounded dozens of protesters walking on the sidewalk around 3:00 a.m. and began arresting some of them.

The NYPD told us this morning that they were still processing arrests from the OWS incident(s), so it was too speculative to even offer a ballpark number. However, the NYPD said the number of OWS would be greater than the number of arrests from Times Square's New Year's festivities. Newyorkist Tweeted, "NLG member told me there has been 30 arrests tonight." Update: NY Daily News reports that 68 were arrested, on charges including assault, "some trespass, some obstructing govt admin."

Here's video around midnight from Zuccotti Park:

new year countdown at zuccotti park -- occupy 2012!

quote:

Occupy Iowa caucus protesters storm Democrats' war room

Protesters escorted away by police after visiting Democrats' headquarters in Iowa and demanding to meet senior officials

A newly-opened Democrat "war room" in Iowa found itself under siege on Sunday night, when a group of Occupy Iowa caucus protesters infiltrated the premises and demanded to meet senior Democrat officials.

Abour 15 protesters entered the base at the Renaissance Savery hotel, complaining they were being prevented from meeting with Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Some gained access to what the DNC is calling their war room – a centralised space set aside for providing press briefings during the Iowa caucuses – before being escorted out by police.

Dozens of Occupy protesters have been present at Republican candidates' events during the last week, while 12 people were arrested on Thursday night after blocking the Iowa Democratic party headquarters.

Protesters have been keen to stress that they see both Republicans and Democrats as in thrall to big business.

Earlier on Sunday a group of Occupy Iowa caucus protesters had hand-delivered a letter to Democrat staff at the Renaissance Savery, asking Wasserman Schultz to meet with them at the Occupy headquarters in Des Moines on Monday afternoon.

"The Democratic party has held the White House since 2008 and had a Democratic majority in Congress for two years," the letter said.

"During that time, President Obama and the Democratic party put the agenda of Wall Street and the corporate 1% first over the needs of 99% of the country. Your leadership failed us. You must do better in 2012."

Wasserman Schultz was asked to RSVP by 6pm Sunday. A member of her staff replied at the allotted time that she was not actually in Iowa until later in the week.

Occupiers received the message during a strategy meeting on Sunday evening and decided to march on the war room immediately, in protest at what some saw as "ducking" demonstrators' questions. About 15 people entered the Renaissance Savery unchallenged before being confronted by a lone security guard at the entrance to the Democrat's temporary HQ.

"We just came to request an audience with the chair of the Democrat national committee," David Goodner, from Occupy Iowa Caucus, told people outside the war room.

As hotel staff called the police, and two or three Occupy protesters managed to sneak into the room, Democrat staffers said Wasserman Schultz was not at the meeting, but said they would set up a meeting with "someone" from the party in the future.

A 10-minute standoff ensued, during which several protesters covered their mouths in gaffer tape, before the occupiers left the hotel, as a police officer arrived. There were no arrests.

"Seems like it's par for the course," said Tony Tyler, a protester who works in administration in Iowa.

"You get a smiling face that tells you they'll listen – but when it comes to actually sitting down with someone who has the power to make decisions, you get the cold shoulder."

The DNC war room opened on Sunday and will maintain a presence at the Renaissance Savery until Wednesday, the day after the Iowa caucuses.

Several protesters said they hoped to return to besiege the war room with a greater number of troops on Monday – subject to a consensus vote.

"I think Debbie's here, that's what I think," said Goodner on Sunday night. Despite promises from DNC staff members, he said he did not believe the party would put anyone forward to meet with Occupy Iowa caucus.

"No. I think we'll have to occupy their war room."

quote:

Video: Cops Arrest Activist For Yelling About NDAA In Grand Central

Three protesters were arrested and four issued summonses yesterday in Grand Central Terminal, where approximately 150 demonstrators formed a "flash mob" to protest President Obama's signing of the National Defense Authorization Act [NDAA], a military spending bill that also authorizes the military to detain American citizens indefinitely without due process. Obama signed it in Hawaii on New Year's Eve, and it hasn't gotten that much attention in the media, but some people at least are a little alarmed about this, and they were expressing their outrage during rush hour yesterday. In this video, protester Lauren Digioia gets arrested around the two minute mark:

#J3 #NDAA Grand Central Arrest #ows

Digioia, who has been involved with the Occupy Wall Street movement for some time (and was sexually assaulted in Zuccotti Park in October) was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. According to MTA rules, conduct that qualifies as disorderly includes behaving "in any manner which may cause or tend to cause annoyance, alarm or inconvenience to a reasonable person or create a breach of the peace."

So Digioia was presumably arrested for causing said "annoyance"—and while we can all agree that the OWS "people's mic" is annoying—it's interesting that the others who were raising their voices to repeat her words were not also arrested. It's unclear how Digioia's "disorderly conduct" differed from the other yelling demonstrators, except for the obvious fact that she was leading them to yell about NDAA. It looks like she was essentially arrested for being a political rabble-rouser, which we don't see listed in the MTA's rules of conduct.

The Grand Central demonstration was followed by a General Assembly at a privately-owned public space at 100 William Street, where activists had previously been threatened with arrest for peacefully assembling, despite the space being open to the public (as required by law). Last night, police did not interfere with the meeting, but asked protesters to leave a space open for people to pass through. (They complied.)

City Councilmember Jumaane Williams attended, and tells PolitickerNY, "I came out tonight to observe, to help make sure that the threats to right to assemble and protest are quelled. Council Member Steve Levin, Norman Siegel and I were able to help mediate with the building management and the NYPD to maintain an acceptable balance of everyone’s concerns." [Video via Animal New York]

quote:

Charges Dropped for Some Occupy Wall Street Protesters

Prosecutors dropped charges on Monday against nearly two dozen people picked up in the first mass arrest of Occupy Wall Street demonstrators. About 50 other cases are headed to trial.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office asked a judge to dismiss 21 cases stemming from a Sept. 24 march to Union Square, during which some protesters marched in the street without a permit.

Prosecutors said they could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the conduct in those cases was illegal. The people had faced charges of disorderly conduct.

The march came a week after the protest began at Zuccotti Park. The about 80 arrests helped draw attention to the movement after activists posted online a video that showed a police officer using pepper spray on a group, mostly women, whom officers had corralled behind orange netting near Union Square.

The authorities said the demonstrators blocked car and foot traffic, and rebuffed orders to disperse.

Many protesters say they followed police instructions.

quote:

The barricades around Liberty Park were an edifying example of our modern day police state showing flagrant disregard for our constitutionally protected first amendment rights.

The fact that it took the city this long to defend the rights of the people of New York City is an embarrassment to Mayor Bloomberg.

This court victory shows, once again, that the 99% will not be silenced by the corrupted 1% who desperately clings to power. The people, united, will never be defeated! Whose park? Our park!

Read more: http://globalgrind.com/ne(...)etails#ixzz1jApslczN

quote:

In a shocking column published yesterday, The New York Times asked readers to respond to the question, “Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?” Readers, commenters, and bloggers have been shocked to learn that the Times apparently doesn’t always check facts, and has been publishing, possibly for decades, the unchallenged utterances of politicians and pundits as fact.

“I’m looking for reader input on whether and when New York Times news reporters should challenge ‘facts’ that are asserted by newsmakers they write about.,” Arthur S. Brisbane, the Times Public Editor — a public, in-house ombudsman — asked.

(Brisbane was forced to issue an update, solving nothing, and certainly not improving the ludicrous situation.)

Brisbane poses as an example, that, “on the campaign trail, Mitt Romney often says President Obama has made speeches “apologizing for America,” a phrase to which Paul Krugman objected in a December 23 column arguing that politics has advanced to the “post-truth” stage.

quote:

TSA Air Marshal Is Arrested For Stealing An Occupiers iPhone and Then Slapping Her

TSA Air Marshall Stealing Phone From Occupier

TSA air marshal Adam Marshall was arrested by the Boston police department at 3:50 a.m. on Dec. 10 after he allegedly argued with members of Occupy, called some of them prostitutes, struck one of Occupy’s organizers and main tweeters in the face, grabbed her iPhone and then fled.

Marshall was pursued by some 25 occupiers, according to witnesses, ditching the phone as he ran, and then was arrested by Boston police who were preparing to evict the camp.

It’s unclear why a federal air marshal, the armed undercover Homeland Security agents who accompany select commercial flights, was hanging around near the camp at 3 in the morning. According to witnesses, he entered the camp a little over an hour before the police evicted the 72-day-old camp from Dewey Plaza, after the protestors lost a court battle to get a permanent injunction against police action.

Marshall is now being investigated by TSA’s internal affairs, according to the iPhone’s owner Robin Jacks, who says she met with DHS officials Wednesday.

twitter:

benbfranklin twitterde op dinsdag 17-01-2012 om 16:19:05 Ben Franklins BDay... a wonderfull date to take back the republic. #OccupyCongress #J17 #Anonymous reageer retweet

quote:

NYPD and Pentagon to place mobile scanners on the streets on NYC

New York City’s war on freedom could be adding a new weapon to its arsenal, especially if NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly has his say.

The head of the New York Police Department is working with the Pentagon to secure body scanners to be used throughout the Big Apple.

If Kelly gets his wish, the city will be receiving a whole slew of Terahertz Imagining Detection scanners, a high-tech radiation detector that measures the energy that is emitted from a persons’ body. As CBS News reports, “It measures the energy radiating from a body up to 16 feet away, and can detect anything blocking it, like a gun.”

What it can also do, however, is allow the NYPD to conduct illegal searches by means of scanning anyone walking the streets of New York. Any object on your person could be privy to the eyes of the detector, and any suspicious screens can prompt police officers to search someone on suspicion of having a gun, or anything else under their clothes.

According to Commissioner Kelly, the scanners would only be used in “reasonably suspicious circumstances,” but what constitutes “suspicious” in the eyes of the NYPD could greatly differ from what the 8 million residents of the five boroughs have in mind.

The American Civil Liberties Union has already questioned the NYPD over what they say is an unnecessary precaution that raises more issues than it solves.

“It’s worrisome. It implicates privacy, the right to walk down the street without being subjected to a virtual pat-down by the Police Department when you’re doing nothing wrong,” Donna Lieberman of the NYCLU says to CBS.

The scanners also raise the question of whether such searches would even be legal under the US Constitution. Under the Fourth Amendment, Americans are protected from unreasonable searches and seizures. Does scoping out what’s on someone’s person fall under the same category as a hands-on frisk, though?

To the NYPD, it might not matter. In the first quarter of 2011, more than 161,000 innocent New Yorkers were stopped and interrogated on the streets of the city. Figures released by the NYPD in May of last year revealed that of the over 180,000 stop-and-frisk encounters reported by the police department, 88 percent of them ended in neither an arrest nor a summons, leading many to assume that New York cops are already going above and beyond the law by searching seemingly anyone they chose. Additionally, of those 161,000-plus victims, around 84 percent were either black or Latino. At the time, the ACLU’s Lieberman wrote, “The NYPD is turning black and brown neighborhoods across New York City into Constitution-free zones.”

Given the alarming statistics, many already feel that officers within the ranks of the NYPD are overzealous with their monitoring of New Yorkers, regularly stopping them for unknown suspicions that nearly nine-out-of-ten times prove false. With the installation of the Terahertz Imagining Detection scanners though, those invasive physical searches wouldn’t just be replaced with a touchless, more intrusive monitoring, but will only allow New Yorkers one more reason to fear walking the streets.

“If they search you, you’re not giving consent, so they can do what they want, meaning they can use that as an excuse to search you for other means. I don’t think that’s constitutional at all,” New Yorker Devan Thomas tells CBS.

“There are a lot of cameras already here, so as people walk they’re being filmed. And most of the time they don’t know it,” adds Jennifer Bailly.

A lot is somewhat of an understatement. In Manhattan alone there are over 2,000 surveillance cameras, public and private, aimed at every passerby. That number is the same as the tally of both McDonalds and Starbucks on the island, combined, multiplied by a factor of eight.

CBS News adds that the plan puts the NYPD in direct cooperation with the Department of Defense, who is working on testing the scanners to find a way to bring them to the streets. Such a joint effort opens up questions about other endeavors the Pentagon could have planned out with the NYPD in the past, and certainly doesn’t mark the first time that New York’s boys in blue have worked hand-in-hand with federal agencies. Last year a report surfaced linking the NYPD to the CIA, as documents became available showing a connection between the local police department and government spies installing secret agents into Muslim majority communities in New York.

By using scanners such as the Terahertz Imagining detectors, however, New Yorkers will be forced to endure more than just an unknown number of eyes prying under their clothes. The consequences could be biologically catastrophic, with the scanning technique tied to problems with the human body’s ability to operate. According to MIT’s Technology Review, the THz waves used by the scanners “unzip double-stranded DNA, creating bubbles in the double strand that could significantly interfere with processes such as gene expression and DNA replication.”

quote:

Police Fire Projectiles at Students from Occupy UC Riverside Protesting Board of Regents

The cease-fire against California students appears to be over.

Students from UC Riverside, protesting today's Board of Regents meeting, were confronted by riot police, with multiple reports indicating they were fired upon with paint-filled bullets and other projectiles that injured several at the scene.

The students, many of whom are associated with Occupy UC Riverside, today protested and (ultimately) shut down a Board of Regents meeting where tuition hikes were planned to be discussed.

The meeting was adjourned when students who managed to get inside refused to be silent in the face of skyrocketing tuition costs. After the meeting was closed, the board members were escorted off of campus amidst what were, for most of the day, incredibly peaceful and nonviolent protests.

Here is a report from ABC's local affiliate on what transpired before police began attacking protesters:

quote:

Occupy protesters block banks in San Francisco

(01-20) 11:24 PST San Francisco, CA (AP) --

At least seven people have been arrested at an anti-Wall Street protest in downtown San Francisco for blocking an entrance to the Wells Fargo building.

A couple hundred protesters have gathered in the Financial District as part of daylong Occupy Wall Street-related demonstrations scheduled around the county demanding that banks end evictions and foreclosures. Traffic was rerouted through the area, as protesters spilled into the streets.

San Francisco Police Cmdr. Richard Corriea says the arrests came when a group refused to move from their human chain blocking an entrance to Wells Fargo's corporate headquarters.

Protesters are continuing to try blocking entrances to the building, as well as a nearby Bank of America branch. But police in riot gear and private security guards are chasing them away.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi(...)27.DTL#ixzz1k622YmM4

quote:

Money Insider: US Will See Violent Civil Unrest In 2012

_{Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Thursday, January 19, 2012}

Money insider Charles Ortel has warned that a worsening economic picture across the globe will see civil unrest hit the streets of America, not on behalf of leftist OWS types, but by an armed, “irascible and vocal Majority”.
Money Insider: US Will See Violent Civil Unrest In 2012 132696457 10w 636752g2

Ortel, a managing partner with Newport Value Partners, LLC in New York City, predicts that a failure of the so-called financial recovery will precipitate “A painful re-calibration of economic strength and geo-political standing during 2012 in the midst of widespread civil insurrection and cross-border war.”

Noting that Americans’ access to firearms will cause such riots to be bloodier than anything seen in Europe, Ortel predicts that a contented and silent Majority will be turned into “an irascible and vocal Majority,” as a result of numerous macro-economic and geo-political threats facing the country, including the collapse of the euro, the bursting of the financial bubble in China, and the looming debt crisis, all of which will contribute to weak economic growth.

“Some will manage to contain their activities to peaceful protests. However, we believe the far more likely scenario is that violence will result, especially in the United States where the wider population has more ready access to weaponry and where mobs have proven impossible to restrain,” Ortel writes.

The crisis will also be exacerbated by a shift in “the governing pole of political discourse,” which will see the usual right-left paradigm replaced by a clash between young and old, with the youth of developed nations increasingly irate at seeing the elderly enjoy the security of retirement benefits while their own economic futures look increasingly bleak.

Despite widespread protests and civil unrest sweeping almost all corners of the globe aside from America over the past two years, the prospect of disorder unfolding in the United States in a broader context than the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations is widely expected.


Indeed, with trust in both the executive and legislative branches of government at an all time low, pollster Pat Caddell warns that Americans’ lack of confidence in their leadership is so fervent that they are now “pre-revolutionary.”

Fully aware that Americans’ disenfranchisement with the political system, allied with falling living standards, is provoking people to become more radical in their outlook, U.S. authorities have been preparing for civil dislocation.

Halliburton subsidiary KBR is seeking sub-contractors to staff and outfit “emergency environment” camps located in five regions of the United States follows preparations over the last three years to deal with riots inside the United States that have already spread throughout Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

Major police departments like the NYPD staging “mobilization exercises” to train police to prepare for civil disorder in the United States.

A report produced by the U.S. Army War College’s Strategic Institute warns that the United States may experience massive civil unrest in the wake of a series of crises which it termed “strategic shock.”

“Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security,” stated the report, authored by [Ret.] Lt. Col. Nathan Freir, adding that the military may be needed to quell “purposeful domestic resistance”.

*********************

_{Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a regular fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show and Infowars Nightly News}

quote:

Highway Occupiers arrested in Georgia

Two members of a small band of Occupy marchers were arrested this morning in Madison County, Georgia when they refused to give identification to police officers. Sarah Handyside and Garth Kiser were arrested and released without charges today in what may have been police harassment. A mountain of phone calls from supporters around the country assisted in their release.

The highways Occupiers, or Walkupiers as they call themselves, set off from Washington, DC on December 4 and have been making their way to Atlanta, Georgia.

Soon after the marchers set off this morning in Hull, Georgia, they ran into trouble with police. After taking too long to cross a main road, two cops claimed they had received a complaint that the hikers were holding up traffic and making a disturbance. They requested ID, but most of their IDs were in their packs being transported by a support vehicle.

Two members refused to give their names citing lack of probable cause, and they were immediately arrested. The rest of the group warned the officers about bad publicity, but they probably had no idea what they were in for. The arresting officer’s badge number and sheriff’s phone number were immediately posted on Facebook.

“It was probably the quickest experience anyone has had in a jail so far,” said Paul Sylvester, an Iraq war veteran who joined the march in Raleigh. “Garth said the phone was ringing off the hook. There were 50 calls within 20 minutes.”

Handyside and Kiser vowed to hunger strike until release, and their friends joined them in solidarity. But their stay in jail was short. They were released by 7pm without charges. Sylvester credits all the phone calls by supporters.

Walkupiers have been arrested before on this journey, in Raleigh and Charlotte. Sylvester said that they often resist when they feel they encounter injustice. “It may seem like it’s not worth standing up for,” he said. “But it’s such an inspiration to a lot of people, and it brings us closer to communities.”

The marchers are taking a day off tomorrow to recuperate in Athens, Georgia. When they set off the following day, they will have a new addition, a three-time Afghanistan war veteran and medic.

They had originally planned to reach Atlanta on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, but now expect to get there by January 28 or 29.

Sylvester said he had good feelings about approaching Atlanta but was more excited about the possibility of continuing on to New Orleans. They’re working out the details now for extending the march.

quote:

#OCCUPYCHICAGO

Hey you redeemers, rebels and radicals out there,

Against the backdrop of a global uprising that is simmering in dozens of countries and thousands of cities and towns, the G8 and NATO will hold a rare simultaneous summit in Chicago this May. The world’s military and political elites, heads of state, 7,500 officials from 80 nations, and more than 2,500 journalists will be there.

And so will we.

On May 1, 50,000 people from all over the world will flock to Chicago, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and #OCCUPYCHICAGO for a month. With a bit of luck, we’ll pull off the biggest multinational occupation of a summit meeting the world has ever seen.

And this time around we’re not going to put up with the kind of police repression that happened during the Democratic National Convention protests in Chicago, 1968 … nor will we abide by any phony restrictions the City of Chicago may want to impose on our first amendment rights. We’ll go there with our heads held high and assemble for a month-long people’s summit … we’ll march and chant and sing and shout and exercise our right to tell our elected representatives what we want … the constitution will be our guide.

And when the G8 and NATO meet behind closed doors on May 19, we’ll be ready with our demands: a Robin Hood Tax … a ban on high frequency ‘flash’ trading … a binding climate change accord … a three strikes and you’re out law for corporate criminals … an all out initiative for a nuclear-free Middle East … whatever we decide in our general assemblies and in our global internet brainstorm – we the people will set the agenda for the next few years and demand our leaders carry it out.

And if they don’t listen … if they ignore us and put our demands on the back burner like they’ve done so many times before … then, with Gandhian ferocity, we’ll flashmob the streets, shut down stock exchanges, campuses, corporate headquarters and cities across the globe … we’ll make the price of doing business as usual too much to bear.

Jammers, pack your tents, muster up your courage and prepare for a big bang in Chicago this Spring. If we don’t stand up now and fight now for a different kind of future we may not have much of a future … so let’s live without dead time for a month in May and see what happens …

for the wild,
Culture Jammers HQ

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The United States, for example, has dropped markedly due to the targeting of journalists covering the Occupy Wall Street movement.

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Shock Docs: Total Federalization of Police Under New Homeland Security Mission

Mission Creep: DHS Agency Abandons Fighting Terrorism, Shifts to Hiring Police, Taking Over America

A new white paper presented to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence carves out an ‘evolving mission’ for Homeland Security that moves away from fighting terrorism and towards growing a vast domestic intelligence apparatus that would expand integration with local/state agencies and private-public partnerships already underway via regional fusion centers.

Crafted by the Aspen Institute Homeland Security Group, co-chaired by former DHS chief Michael Chertoff and composed of a who’s who of national security figures, the report outlines a total mission creep, as the title “Homeland Security and Intelligence: Next Steps in Evolving the Mission” implies.

Significantly, it puts on paper and into the Congressional record a proposed transition from outwardly dealing with the threats posed by terrorism towards intelligence gathering “focused on more specific homeward-focused areas.” That is, the homegrown, domestic threats we’ve heard so much about from Big Sis already.

In short, it confirms the intentions of key insiders– including former NSA/CIA head Michael Hayden, former Rep. Jane Harmon, former Secretary of State Madeline Albright, 9/11 Commissioners Philip Zelikow and Richard Ben-Viniste, former National Security Advisor Samuel Berger and others– to flesh out a plan we have already seen developing from an outside perspective– namely, to build a domestic Stasi-like force to takeover, monitor and control the population.

Moreover, the media has reported on this changed mission– towards the full spectrum domination of the people under a patently-fascist framework– with the same calm as the weekly weather forecast.

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Op zaterdag 28 januari 2012 17:41 schreef Synthercell het volgende:
Al die revolutionaire organisaties demonstreren niet voor het volk, maar zijn er om een revolutie in Amerika tot stand te brengen (wat tot op heden niet is gelukt) In Egypte is door het systeem (revolutionairen aan de kant van het systeem) hetzelfde op touw gezet. Het Egyptische volk dacht vrijheid te krijgen, maar kreeg een vervangend regiem (vandaar dat er nu weer honderdduizenden op het Tahrir plein staan)
Overal proberen revolutionairen de massa in beweging te zetten. De massa in beweging betekent dat het volk in groot gevaar aan het komen is (dit zag je ook in de jaren dertig gebeuren)

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Global Revolution brings you live stream video coverage from independent journalists on the ground at nonviolent protests around the world.

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Op zaterdag 28 januari 2012 22:17 schreef dikkebroekzak het volgende:

[..]

Betekent geweldloos dan dat ook de politie geen geweld heeft gebruikt? Of geldt die eis alleen voor de protesteerders?

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Police use tear gas on Occupy Oakland protesters

About 300 arrested in Oakland as police use tear gas after protesters pelted them with bottles, rocks and burning flares

Police have used tear gas and "flash" grenades to break up hundreds of Occupy protesters after some demonstrators started throwing rocks and flares at officers and tearing down fencing.

About 300 people were arrested in the most turbulent day of protests in Oakland since November, when police forcefully dismantled an Occupy encampment.

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, who faced heavy criticism for the police action last autumn, called on the Occupy movement to "stop using Oakland as its playground."

Police said the group started assembling at a downtown plaza on Saturday morning, with demonstrators threatening to take over the vacant Henry Kaiser convention centre. The group then marched through the streets, disrupting traffic.

The crowd grew as the day wore on, with afternoon estimates ranging from about 1,000 to 2,000 people.

The protesters walked to the vacant convention centre, where some started tearing down perimeter fencing and "destroying construction equipment," according to police.

Most of the arrests came around 8pm, when police took scores of protesters into custody as they marched through the city's down town area, with some entering a YMCA building, police spokesman Jeff Thomason said.

Police said they issued a dispersal order and used smoke and tear gas after some protesters pelted them with bottles, rocks, burning flares and other objects.

More help from other police agencies was also sent to Oakland, with busloads of Alameda County sheriff's deputies arriving in the downtown area late Saturday.

The demonstration comes after Occupy protesters said earlier this week that they planned to move into a vacant building and turn it into a social centre and political hub. They also threatened to try to shut down the port, occupy the airport and take over City Hall.

In a statement Friday, City administrator Deanna Santana said Oakland would not be "bullied by threats of violence or illegal activity."

Interim police Chief Howard Jordan also warned that officers would arrest those carrying out illegal actions.

The national Occupy Wall Street movement, which denounces corporate excess and economic inequality, began in New York City in the autumn but has been largely dormant lately.

Oakland, New York and Los Angeles were among the cities with the largest and most vocal Occupy protests early on. The demonstrations ebbed after those cities used force to move out hundreds of demonstrators who had set up tent cities.

In Oakland, the police department received heavy criticism for using force to break up earlier protests. Among the critics was Mayor Quan, who said she wasn't briefed on the department's plans. Earlier this month, a court-appointed monitor submitted a report to a federal judge that included "serious concerns" about the department's handling of the Occupy protests.

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Solidarity Sunday - Wear Black Fight Back

Yesterday, Occupy Oakland moved to convert a vacant building into a community center to provide education, medical, and housing services for the 99%. Police responded with tear gas, rubber bullets, beanbag rounds and mass arrests. The state has compounded its policy of callous indifference with a ruthless display of violent repression. The Occupy movement will respond, as we have always reponded: with an overwhelming show of collective resistance. Today, we take to the streets. Across the country, we will demonstrate our resolve to overcome repression and continue to build a better world grounded in love and solidarity for one another. All eyes on all Occupies.

SOLIDARITY SUNDAY, 7pm EST, Sunday, January 29. Check your local Occupation for convergence points.

Be there.

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What really happened at Occupy Oakland.

For the internet, here's a first-hand account of Occupy Oakland on 1/28/2012, because the news never tells the full story. I'll tell you about the street battle, the 300+ arrests, the vandalism, the flag burning, all in the context of my experience today. This is deeper than the headlines. No major news source can do that for you, but Reddit can.

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The police moved quickly to surround the entire area; they formed a line on every street that the side street connected to. Police state status: very efficient. They kettled almost the entire protest in the park near the Fox theater. AFTERWARDS, as in after they surrounded everyone, they declared it to be an unlawful assembly BUT OFFERED NO EXIT ROUTE.

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A few people attempted to escape into the YMCA; some mis-infonformed news reports claim that the YMCA got 'occupied'. Around 300 people were trapped, mostly young people.

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Outside the police lines, things were still happening. A group that escaped the trap decided to head back to Oscar Grant Plaza. I do not know how, but they opened the front door to city hall and occupied the building. Opened, as in no window smashing. The move was not meant to be an occupation but more of a show of solidarity to the 300 arrested protesters down the street. When all the people being arrested heard the news, they let out a big cheer... [...]

..At this point I ran to Oscar Grant Plaza. When I arrived there were only 8 riot cops guarding the open front door, but more arrived very quickly. No one was inside the building anymore, but many had gathered in the Plaza. Someone burned an American Flag in front of city hall. I've seen the same guy do it before; frankly he's weird and it's kind of his thing.

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The thing about Occupy, and especially Occupy Oakland, is it refuses to exclude. We are the 99%, and we mean it. The homeless and disenfranchised were welcome in the camp from day 1. The crime rate in Downtown Oakland went down, and some people finally had a safe place to sleep. Idealistic youth, google techies, students, teachers, parents, children, poor, homeless, workers, all coming together. It rekindled hope for a lot of people. Occupy changed the conversation. The idea is more important than any one protest. An idea cannot be stopped. It is no longer about occupations; instead, it's about bringing people together. The 99%, all with their own problems and concerns, have brought their collective attention to the root of the forces preventing them from making a better world.

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Oakland to assess damage after Occupy protests

OAKLAND, California (AP) — For weeks the protests had waned, with only a smattering of people taking to Oakland's streets for occasional marches that bore little resemblance to the headline-grabbing Occupy demonstrations of last fall.

Then came Saturday, which started peacefully enough — a midday rally at City Hall and a march. But hours later, the scene near downtown Oakland had dramatically deteriorated: clashes punctuated by rock and bottle throwing by protesters and volleys of tear gas from police, and a City Hall break-in that left glass cases smashed, graffiti spray-painted on walls and an American flag burned.

More than 400 people were arrested on charges ranging from failure to disperse to vandalism, police spokesman Sgt. Jeff Thomason said. At least three officers and one protester were injured.

On Sunday, Oakland officials vowed to be ready if Occupy protesters try to mount another large-scale demonstration. Protesters, meanwhile, decried Saturday's police tactics as illegal and threatened to sue.

Mayor Jean Quan personally inspected damage caused by dozens of people who broke into City Hall. She said she wants a court order to keep Occupy protesters who have been arrested several times out of Oakland, which has been hit repeatedly by demonstrations that have cost the financially troubled city about $5 million.

Quan called on the loosely organized movement to "stop using Oakland as its playground."

"People in the community and people in the Occupy movement have to stop making excuses for this behavior," she said.

Saturday's protests — the most turbulent since Oakland police forcefully dismantled an Occupy encampment in November — came just days after the group announced a new round of actions. The group said it planned to use a vacant building as a social center and political hub and threatened to try to shut down the Port of Oakland for a third time, occupy the airport and take over City Hall.

After the mass arrests, the Occupy Oakland Media Committee criticized the police's conduct, saying that most of the arrests were made illegally because police failed to allow protesters to disperse, and they threatened legal action.

"Contrary to their own policy, the OPD gave no option of leaving or instruction on how to depart. These arrests are completely illegal, and this will probably result in another class action lawsuit against the OPD," a release from the group said.

Deputy Police Chief Jeff Israel told reporters late Saturday that protesters gathered unlawfully and police gave them multiple verbal warnings to disband.

"These people gathered with the intent of unlawfully entering into a building that does not belong to them and assaulting the police," Israel said. "It was not a peaceful group."

Earlier this month, a court-appointed monitor submitted a report to a federal judge that included "serious concerns" about the department's handling of the Occupy protests. Police officials say they were in "close contact" with the federal monitor during the latest protests.

Social activism and civic unrest have long marked Oakland, a rough-edged city of nearly 400,000 across the bay from San Francisco. Beset by poverty, crime and a decades-long tense relationship between the police and the community, its streets have seen clashes between officers and protesters, including anti-draft protests in the 1960s that spilled into town from neighboring Berkeley.

Before the Occupy movement spawned violence, mass arrests and two shutdowns of the Port of Oakland, the city was disrupted by a series of often-violent demonstrations over a white Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer's fatal shooting of an unarmed black man named Oscar Grant on New Year's Day 2009.

Occupy protesters have invoked Grant's memory, referring to the downtown plaza named after Frank Owaga, the city's first Asian-American councilmember, by renaming the former space they occupied with tents as Oscar Grant Plaza.

Police maintained a guard at City Hall overnight, and dozens of officers were on the scene Sunday.

"They were never able to occupy a building outside of City Hall," Interim Police Chief Howard Jordan said Sunday. "We suspect they will try to go to the convention center again. They will get not get in."

City officials said they will call for mutual aid from other police jurisdictions if needed.

Quan, who faces two recall attempts, has been criticized for past police tear-gassing though she said she was not aware of the plans. On Saturday, she thought the police response was measured, adding that she has lost patience with the costly and disruptive protests.

She also said she hopes prosecutors will seek a stay-away order against protesters who have been arrested multiple times.

"It appears that most of them constantly come from outside of Oakland," Quan said. "I think a lot of the young people who come to these demonstrations think they're being revolutionary when they're really hurting the people they claim that they are representing."

Saturday's events began midday when a group assembled outside City Hall and marched through the streets, disrupting traffic as they threatened to take over a vacant convention center.

The protesters then walked to the convention center, where some started tearing down perimeter fencing and "destroying construction equipment" by the convention center shortly before 3 p.m., police said. The number of demonstrators swelled as the day wore on, with afternoon estimates ranging up to 2,000 people, although city leaders say that figure was much closer to several hundred.

A majority of the arrests came after police took scores of protesters into custody as they marched through the city's downtown, with some entering a YMCA building, Thomason said.

Michael Davis, 32, who is originally from Ohio and was in the Occupy movement in Cincinnati, said Sunday that Saturday was a hectic day that originally started off calm but escalated when police began using "flash bangs, tear gas, smoke grenades and bean bags."

"What could've been handled differently is the way the Oakland police came at us," Davis said. "We were peaceful."

The national Occupy Wall Street movement, which denounces corporate excess and economic inequality, began in New York City in the fall but has been largely dormant lately. Oakland, New York and Los Angeles were among the cities with the largest and most vocal Occupy protests early on. The demonstrations ebbed after those cities used force to move out hundreds of demonstrators who had set up tent cities.

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Secret Email System Revealed in "John Doe" Probe of Walker Staff

The morning after his "State of the State" address where Governor Scott Walker reassured Wisconsin "We are turning things around. We are heading in the right direction," the Milwaukee County District Attorney charged two more Walker staffers with multiple felony and misdemeanor counts of misconduct in public office.

Darlene Wink and Kelly Rindfleisch were charged with conducting partisan campaign work while on the public payroll. The alleged crimes took place while Walker was Milwaukee County Executive and running to be governor. These charges are no joke in the state of Wisconsin, where in 2005, two Senate Democrats and the Republican Assembly Speaker were sentenced to jail time for similar crimes in an episode dubbed "the Caucus Scandal."

This time, Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm is in charge of a secret "John Doe" investigation where he can compel testimony under oath and every person involved is subject to a gag order. Chisholm has used this process in the past to jail Democrats for similar misconduct in office.

If you are keeping count, these are the second set of charges against Walker aides. Earlier this month, Walker’s former county Housing Director Tim Russell and his top county veteran official were both arrested and charged with embezzling more than $60,000 in charitable contributions intended for veterans. Phone records retrieved from the investigation also led to charges against Russell’s boyfriend for child enticement.

There is no end in sight for this multifaceted investigation.

Secret Communication System Set Up by Russell

The whole scandal broke into the open when the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Darlene Wink, a low-level constituent services coordinator, was caught Facebooking nasty comments about Walker’s democratic campaign opponents while working at her county job. Reporter Dan Bice, who was tipped off about the on-line activity, interviewed Wink, but wasn't sure how big of a deal it was until he was called by the Walker team a few hours later and told she had resigned.

Now we know from the indictments that the activity went far beyond Facebook. Investigators found boxes for two wireless routers in an armoire in Walker’s County Executive office. Packaging labels found with the boxes bore the name "Timothy Russell."

The allegation is that Russell set up an unofficial networking system so that staffers could conduct campaign business on their personal laptops while their salaries were being paid by the taxpayers. The secret email system was available for use by certain staff for both official and unofficial business. Its existence was "never disclosed to county employees outside a closely held group within the Walker administration," says the indictments (available here). On county time, the staffers allegedly communicated extensively with Walker campaign staff, organized fundraisers, made invitations, exchanged fundraising lists and sent out campaign press releases.

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Occupy DC protesters in standoff with police as eviction deadline passes

Demonstrators in Washington refuse to comply after National Park Service orders the camp to be cleared on hygiene grounds

Occupy demonstrators in Washington DC have chosen to stand their ground in the face of newly-enforced anti-camping regulations – but protesters worry the authorities could move in at any moment.

The National Park Service in Washington announced it would enforce existing anti-camping rules – which bar demonstrators from holding camping gear, bedding and cooking supplies – at two parks that have served as a home to Occupy DC protesters since the fall. In response, demonstrators have turned the central feature of McPherson Square, a statue of General James B McPherson, into a makeshift tent, and have refused to comply with the orders.

The regulations have largely gone unenforced since the occupation of McPherson Square and Freedom Plaza began in October, but from noon on Monday, the NPS said that would no longer be the case. Critics of the protest camps cite health concerns and an alleged rat infestation as grounds to remove the demonstrators, but some see the sudden vigour to enforce the regulations as a pretext for eviction. Legba Carrefour of Occupy DC described the renewed enforcement of the anti-camping rules as "death by a thousand bureaucratic cuts."

By 12pm, the confrontation that many expected had not come, and a standoff began. Protesters in McPherson Square had draped a so-called "tent of dreams" over the statue and people quickly gathered inside.

Protester Caty McClure said there were "at least 50" people gathered inside the giant tent. A speaker explained that the tent represents the protesters' dreams of seeing a nation where corporations could not guide the democratic process, and where housing existed for all. Gathered around the statue the protesters chanted: "Let us sleep so we can dream." Protesters have surrounded the statue with smaller personal tents.

The plan, McClure explained, is for some protesters to hold a "sleep-in", while others stage a "sleep strike." McClure said NPS authorities had not moved in the protesters. "They're holding off for now," she said. McClure said she believed the "insane amount of media" at the park was keeping officials at bay.

McClure said she hoped the media would stick around. "Once they leave, the police are probably gonna roll in.'

National Lawyers Guild observer and attorney Ann Wilcox agreed that the heavy media presence at the park seemed to have discouraged any effort to crack down on the protesters.

"I don't think the police really want to move in with so much media," Wilcox said. "They might not even enforce it until tonight [Monday night] or tomorrow [Tuesday]."

Wilcox estimated there were "a couple thousand" people gathered at McPherson Square. At Freedom Plaza, she said a "skeleton crew" of about "40 or 50" protesters remained. Demonstrators at Freedom Plaza have a permit allowing for their protest, though they are still subject to the same anti-camping rules and have received the same notification from the NSP. In attempt to hold on to the permit, Wilcox explained, many protesters had cleared their belongings from the plaza.

The two occupations have consistently differed in their tactics, with the encampment at McPherson Square tending to be more provocative.

"It's a totally different approach," Wilcox said.

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New York prosecutors ask Twitter to reveal Occupy Wall Street man's tweets

Twitter agrees not to comply with subpoena from district attorney's office while protester's lawyer prepares rebuttal

Prosecutors have subpoenaed the Twitter records of an Occupy Wall Street protester who was arrested in October during a mass protest on the Brooklyn Bridge.

The 26 January subpoena from the Manhattan district attorney's office seeks "user information, including email address," along with three months' worth of tweets from @destructuremal, the Twitter handle for Malcolm Harris.

Harris, 23, a freelance writer and editor who lives in Brooklyn, said on Tuesday that Twitter sent a copy of the subpoena to him on Monday. He posted it on Twitter.

"When you get an email from Twitter Legal, you assume it's a phishing scam, trying to get your password," he said. "It turned out that it is a phishing scam, but it's from the prosecutors."

It is not clear what specific evidence prosecutors are after. But the subpoena is an example of posts on social media sites posing potential legal problems for authors.

Harris said his lawyer, Martin Stolar, would file a motion to quash the subpoena. Twitter has agreed not to comply with the subpoena while Stolar prepares the motion, Harris said.

A spokeswoman for the district attorney's office declined to comment.

The subpoena seeks Harris's tweets from 15 September – two days before the Occupy Wall Street movement began – to 15 December.

Harris is not sure what tweets could be fodder for prosecutors; Twitter's interface does not allow him to review all of his old tweets. Stolar was not available for comment.

A Twitter spokesman declined to comment on the case but confirmed that the San Francisco-based company's policy is "to notify users about law enforcement and governmental requests for their information, unless we are prevented by law from doing so", in order to protect users' rights.

Harris is one of hundreds of Occupy-related defendants whose cases are still winding their way through American courts.

A special courtroom has been set up to handle more than 1,800 cases in New York, the vast majority involving misdemeanour charges.

He was charged with disorderly conduct and is due back in court on 29 February.

Like a number of Occupy protesters, he has vowed to take the case to trial rather than accept a deal from prosecutors.

The National Lawyers Guild is representing many of the arrested protesters.

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Op maandag 30 januari 2012 20:16 schreef Papierversnipperaar het volgende:
Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker, Koch Bros.:

[..]

Het artikel gaat verder.

FBI Investigating Wisconsin Governor Walker

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The New York Times‘ Scott Shane reported this morning on the Bureau of Investigative Journalism study I wrote about yesterday, detailing that the U.S. drone program, as the NYT put it, “repeatedly targeted rescuers who responded to the scene of a strike, as well as mourners at subsequent funerals.” Shane’s article contains this paragraph:

. A senior American counterterrorism official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, questioned the report’s findings, saying “targeting decisions are the product of intensive intelligence collection and observation.” The official added: “One must wonder why an effort that has so carefully gone after terrorists who plot to kill civilians has been subjected to so much misinformation. Let’s be under no illusions — there are a number of elements who would like nothing more than to malign these efforts and help Al Qaeda succeed.”

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With camps gone, Occupiers prepare for new fights

(Reuters) - Their encampments are largely gone, but the U.S. Occupy movement is far from dead, with organizers focused on a next wave of protest.

In Iowa, a major farming state, Occupy activists are mobilizing with other groups against agricultural biotechnology firm, Monsanto. In Oklahoma, Occupy plans to target retail giant Walmart for protests. Groups in more than 50 cities are planning a national protest day February 29, targeting numerous corporations.

Occupy groups in Chicago are forging bonds with the teachers and transit unions. In Cincinnati, Occupy is boosting numbers by building coalitions with civic groups and the Green Party.

To an extent, the groups say their message has been validated by President Barack Obama, a Democrat who has focused on income inequality in his election-year calls for tax reform. But for the most part, Occupy groups have yet to align themselves with a presidential campaign or even get involved in state or local elections.

"We need candidates who are about the people. We don't have any right now. To change that we have to start with each and every one of us," said Nancy Bohannon of IndyOWS, an Occupy group in Indianapolis that is trying to help with voter education.

In interviews with Occupy groups in more than a dozen states - on both coasts and across the Midwest - activists described training for nonviolent confrontation, plans for spring rallies at state capitols and preparations for a major presence at the G-8 and NATO summits to be held in Chicago in May.

"We have had to get back to more conventional grassroots organizing methods to get more people involved and engaged," said Chris Schwartz, a member of Iowa's Occupy Cedar Valley. "What we're doing is building out infrastructure for the spring."

"The encampments were fun and cathartic and they served a purpose in bringing all of us together," said Zach Chasnoff, 33, a landscaper who belongs to Occupy St. Louis. "Now we begin the hard work."

Academics who track middle-class populist movements say that Occupy - originally formed to protest Wall Street excess - is at an important juncture. The tent cities that popped up across the country offered strong symbols but had little policy impact.

"The question is whether they can become more effective while keeping a large number of volunteers engaged and excited. This is where a lot of popular movements hit the shoals and founder," said Steven Schier, a politics professor at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota.

Schier said that unlike the Tea Party movement, which focuses on limited government, Occupy's issues range from social and economic justice to environmentalism and human rights.

"If you asked me to describe the Tea Party agenda I could define it pretty well, but the Occupy movement is more amorphous," he said. "As it becomes more specific it may lose people and resources."

Robert Liebman, an associate sociology professor at Portland State University, said he sees the protesters "doing a lot of thinking, networking and training."

"Before you get people out onto the streets en masse, you have to do networking and planning, plus work out what role everyone can play," he said. He said Occupy's activities remind him of the civil rights movement's early days.

DIFFERENT STRATEGIES

Like the conservative Tea Party, the Occupy movement is a loose collection of local groups, without national leaders.

Occupy wants systemic change but, unlike the Tea Party, it has yet to embrace the political process. Most Occupiers interviewed by Reuters said they prefer to stay out of politics, a hallmark of the movement thus far.

Although Occupiers are tracking the upcoming elections, Reuters only encountered one who is seeking political office. Nate Kleinman of Occupy Philadelphia is running against Democratic Representative Allyson Schwartz in Pennsylvania's 13th district.

"I expect others will run for office sooner or later," Kleinman said. "We have to get this country back on track."

Unlike the highly individualistic conservatives in the Tea Party, the Occupy movement has moved quickly to build coalitions, especially in smaller cities.

Kellie Stewart, 46, used the internet to help organize from St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, population around 2,000.

"There aren't enough of us here to do anything," she said. "So I turned to the Internet to help create a statewide group."

Occupy Wisconsin helps groups coordinate statewide, and similar groups are springing up elsewhere, such as Occupy Indiana and Occupy Oklahoma. Occupy the Midwest is planning a March regional conference in St. Louis.

More than 50 groups plan to take part in the February 29 "Shut Down the Corporations" event, focusing on companies in their areas. In New York, the target will be Bank of America.

"This is part of an effort to boost national coordination," said history student Mark Bray, a member of Occupy Wall Street. "But this is not a top-down organization where people have to get approval from a political party or NGO."

"The Occupy groups in Texas and Iowa are not waiting for us to tell them what to do. They're just going out and doing it."

Activists in smaller cities say they needed to shift their focus from encampments to spreading their message more broadly.

"We aim to peeling back the sleeping eyelids of the American people," said IndyOWS' Bohannon. "We're going to wake them up."

Some groups are planning to return in the spring to encampments that led to confrontations with authorities in Washington, D.C., and Oakland, California. In New York, Occupy Wall Street is considering "pop-up Occupations" for a day in a park, plus other forms of public protest.

"Some people feel that re-encamping would serve as a symbol and that it's something we need to do," said John Zarebski, 62, a skilled tradesman and member of Occupy Lansing in Michigan. "Others feel we should devote our resources elsewhere."

"A MOVEMENT OF MOVEMENTS"

Activists like university student Jessica Garraway of Occupy Cedar Valley - a coalition of activists from Cedar Falls, Iowa and nearby Waterloo - say they are in this for the long haul.

"We have our eyes on a prize far beyond just one election," Garraway said. "There is a systemic problem here that has to be addressed."

They argue that enthusiasm will not dissipate just because the tents have come down.

"I've been waiting for years for people to rise up and get more involved," said Justin Jeffre, 38, of Occupy Cincinnati, a singer best known as part of the once-popular boy band '98 Degrees.' "It finally feels like we have a movement of movements."

(Reporting By Nick Carey; Editing by Marilyn W. Thompson and Vicki Allen)

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US Returns Jotform.com Domain; Still Refuses To Say What Happened

There's been a lot of interest in the story of the Secret Service completely shutting down Jotform.com through a request to GoDaddy. It appears that the suspension is now ending, though it hasn't fully propagated. What's amazing is that no one in the US government (or at GoDaddy) seems to be willing to explain what happened. When GoDaddy completely shut down JotForm.com with no notice, the folks at JotForm had to inquire as to what the hell happened to their entire website. They were merely told to contact a Secret Service agent. That agent then told JotForm she was too busy to respond to them and would get back to them within a week.

Think about that for a second. The US government completely takes down a small business' website and then is too busy to explain why.

JotForm noted that it was willing to cooperate fully if there were specific users that were a problem, but the Secret Service did not seem to care that it had almost destroyed an entire startup's business:

. When I contacted the Secret Service, the agent told me she is busy and she asked for my phone number, and told me they will get back to me within this week. I told them we are a web service with hundreds of thousands of users, so this is a matter of urgency, and we are ready to cooperate fully. I was ready to shutdown any form they request and provide any information we have about the user. Unfortunately, she told me she needs to look at the case which she can do in a few days. I called her many times again to check about the case, but she seems to be getting irritated with me. At this point, we are waiting for them to look into our case.

So far, the Secret Service still isn't talking, returning a bland and meaningless statement to press requests:

. "We are aware of the incident and we're reviewing it internally to make sure all the proper procedures and protocols were followed."

GoDaddy, similarly, appears to be staying almost entirely silent.

All of this is completely unacceptable. Almost everything about this sets off alarm bells about over aggressive (and potentially illegal) censorship by the US government of protected free speech. We've been seeing a much more aggressive and overreaching effort by US officials against websites over the past 18 months or so, and at some point, they're going to get smacked down by a court who will explain to them the nature of the First Amendment and the fact that you can't unilaterally take down entire websites without recognizing the collateral damage on legitimate web businesses.

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Chris-Mouse (profile), Feb 17th, 2012 @ 6:26am

The government may get smacked down by a court, but only if it ever gets to a court. The government seems to be doing a very good job of delaying things until their victims either give up or run out of money.

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Obama Administration Asks Supreme Court to Dismiss ACLU Challenge to Warrantless Wiretapping Law

Today, the government asked the Supreme Court to overturn an appeals court ruling that allowed our lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the 2008 FISA Amendments Act to go forward. That law gives the government unprecedented authority to monitor Americans’ international emails and phone calls.

The appeals court ruling, which was issued in March 2011, held that our case could forward, rejecting the administration’s arguments that the case should be dismissed because our clients could not prove their communications would be collected under the law.

Needless to say, we’re disappointed by the government’s filing today. ACLU deputy legal director Jameel Jaffer stated in a press release, “It’s crucial that the government’s surveillance activities be subject to constitutional limits, but the administration’s argument would effectively insulate the most intrusive surveillance programs from judicial review. The Supreme Court should leave the appeals court’s ruling in place and allow our constitutional challenge to proceed.”

We filed our suit less than an hour after the FISA Amendments Act was signed into law by President Bush in July 2008. The suit was filed on behalf of a broad group of attorneys and human rights, labor, legal and media organizations whose work requires them to engage in sensitive telephone and email communications with people outside the U.S. Our plaintiffs include Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, The Nation, the Service Employees International Union and journalists Chris Hedges and Naomi Klein. The Justice Department claims that the plaintiffs should not be able to sue without first showing that they have been monitored under the program – information that the government refuses to provide.

The FISA Amendments Act is the most sweeping surveillance statute ever enacted by Congress. It allows dragnet surveillance of Americans’ international communications with none of the safeguards that the Constitution requires. Little is known about how the Act has been used. In response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the ACLU, the government revealed that every six-month review of the Act had identified “compliance incidents,” suggesting either an inability or an unwillingness to properly safeguard Americans’ privacy rights. The government has withheld the details of those “compliance incidents,” however, including statistics relating to abuses of the Act.

The Act is scheduled to sunset in December 2012, and we’re calling for amendments that would prohibit dragnet surveillance, require the government to be more transparent about how the law is being used and place stronger restrictions on the retention and dissemination of information that is collected.

Join us: Ask Congress to Fix FISA today! And for more about the battle over warrantless wiretapping, read this blog post.

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Occupy movement targets corporate interest group with ties to legislators

Protest planned against the American Legislative Exchange Council, which critics say has undue influence on US lawmakers

Co-ordinated protests are planned in some 60 cities later this month against a right wing group which activists say has an unfair hand in writing state legislation that favours corporate interests.

Working under the banner Shut Down the Corporations, activists plan to target corporate members of the American Legislative Exchange Council (Alec) with nationwide protests on 29 February.

Organisers say Alec, a nonprofit free-market policy group whose membership includes some 2,000 state legislators, wields undue influence by drafting legislation beneficial to its corporate members, which in some cases is then used as a model for legislation in states across America.

The nationwide protest is being co-ordinated by Occupy Portland, with activists across the country due to take part – including from Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Oakland.

"We call on people to target corporations that are part of the American Legislative Exchange Council which is a prime example of the way corporations buy off legislators and craft legislation that serves the interests of corporations and not people," reads a statement on Shut Down the Corporations' website.

David Osborn, from Occupy Portland, said "non-violent direct action" was being encouraged, including protests, rallies and sit-ins.

"In different places it's going to look really different," he said. "In some places it's going to be more of a rally, or a protest outside a corporation that's involved with Alec, whether that's Bank of America, or Pfizer, Altria, or whatever. In other places, and certainly here in Portland, it's going to take more of the form of civil disobedience or direct action, where people will be doing a sit-in or other creative things to disrupt business as usual."

Alec was founded in September 1973 as a "nonpartisan membership association for conservative state lawmakers". The organisation, which counts the conservative billionaire Koch brothers among its financial backers, has a membership some of the largest companies in America.

One of the better known examples of Alec's influence can be found in Arizona's SB 1070 bill. The legislation, seen as one of the strictest anti-illegal immigrant laws in America's history and criticised by Barack Obama, was modelled on Alec's "No Sanctuary Cities for Illegal Immigrants Act", which had been approved by an Alec task force made up, in part, of prison companies that stood to benefit from the act being passed.

Democratic lawmakers in Arizona and Wisconsin are seeking to introduce the Alec Accountability Act in their states, which would require Alec to register as a lobbying organisation and subsequently disclose its financiers.

Mark Pocan, a Democratic member of the Wisconsin state assembly who is gunning for Congress in in Wisconsin's 2nd Congressional District, is behind the proposed Wisconsin legislation.

"Alec is like a giant corporate dating service [for] lonely legislators and their special interest corporate allies," Pocan told the Guardian. "Alec operates best when it operates in the shadows. Once people find out that it's really nothing but a front for corporate special interests you start to know that the ideas they put forward aren't in the public good."

Occupy Wall Street has been involved in planning the February 29 protests, which will take place in New York on the day, said Ed Needham, who acts as a spokesman for the group.

"People really see it as an incredible example of the type of corrosive relationship between money and politics," he said.

"It's really to shine a focus on what Alec is and how it's very much an instrument of the corporations in terms of buying off state and federal legislators and crafting legislation that is strictly within the 1% interest."

Last year the Center for Media and Democracy and The Nation magazine published a leak of more than 800 pieces of Alec's model legislation, which can be found on the Alec Exposed website. The list includes legislation that Alec Exposed and Shut Down the Corporations say was used to draft anti-Labour legislation in Wisconsin and the controversial Arizona immigration law.

Kaitlyn Buss, director of communications at Alec, said the protests were "not embarrassing in the slightest".

"Alec feels that we understand that not everyone agrees with the principles that were founded on, which is to promote free markets, limited government and federalism throughout American government," she said. "We fully respect the right and expression of those who are protesting but it's not going to distract us from what our mission is."

Buss said legislation that originates with Alec is "brought to us by state legislatures" and then "approved by their legislative board of directors".

"What we do value is the energy and the job creation of the private sector and argue very strongly that they should be part of conversation of what our laws are, what our regulations are," she said.

"Most of these regulations end up very strongly affecting the private sector of our economy, so Alec, as we promote free markets and limited government, it all works together that we value the private sector, but the actual legislation is very legislative driven."

Alec's website says that "each year, close to 1,000 bills, based at least in part on Alec model legislation, are introduced in the states.

"Of these, an average of 20 percent become law."

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Oakland Cops Failing To Activate Body-Mounted Cameras During Protests

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Relations between Oakland police and the city’s residents have never been good, which is one reason why the department issued body-mounted cameras to its officers last year.

The goal was to increase accountability, which is important for a department that is facing a federal takeover this March.

However, the above video, which shows several officers with their body-mounted cameras turned off – a departmental violation - is just the latest example of Oakland police officers not wanting any accountability.

The video is also a clear demonstration of just how high tensions are between Oakland police and citizens.

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Occupied Economy

^{A brief history of the first corporate century.}

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Corporate globalization has been called the most fundamental redesign of social, economic, and political arrangements since the Industrial Revolution. Corporations have swept real economic and political power away from governments. Of the hundred wealthiest countries and corporations listed together, more than half are corporations. ExxonMobil is richer than 180 countries and there are only about 195 countries. Without the responsibilities or costs of nationhood, corporations can innovate and produce at unprecedented speed and scale. Yet they can also undertake acts of enormous environmental destruction and report a profit.

The behavior of corporations arises from their wide freedom of action and their limited liability for harms caused. Further, shareholders own and profit by the corporation, but limited liability means shareholders can lose no more than the money invested; they arent held responsible for anything the corporation does. If they were, stockholders might know what companies they own and why. They might demand corporate responsibility. They might invest more carefully. But because theyre not, they dont.

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Cop Identified in Scott Olsen Incident?

^{Video and police records indicate that Oakland Police Officer Robert Roche threw a stun grenade at protesters trying to help the injured Iraq War vet.}

One of the most indelible images of the Occupy movement to date is that of Marine veteran Scott Olsen being carried away from a skirmish line of riot police at 14th Street and Broadway on October 25 in Oakland. Stunned and bleeding from an ugly gash on his forehead, the 24-year-old Wisconsin native had been struck in the head by an unknown projectile during the first salvo of tear gas, flash-bang grenades, and less-than-lethal munitions fired at hundreds of Occupy Oakland supporters facing off against Oakland police and several other Bay Area law enforcement agencies called in on mutual aid.

Video from the tear gas-soaked night of the 25th shows a prone Olsen lying in front of metal barricades and police in riot gear. As several protesters ran to Olsen's aid, someone from the cluster of police appears to lob a flash-bang grenade into the crowd gathered around the young veteran. The stun grenade explodes amid a cloud of tear gas and deafening noise, scattering Olsen's rescuers.

The footage of the flash-bang grenade exploding practically on top of Olsen and his rescuers, as well as dramatic video of a stunned and bloody Olsen being carried away from the intersection, went viral within hours, propelling Occupy Oakland to international attention and setting the stage for the November 2nd General Strike.

In the weeks and months afterward, rumors and accusations flew about the identity of the officer who fired the projectile that wounded Olsen, and the one who threw the concussion grenade on top of him. Rumors circulated on the Internet that either a San Francisco sheriff's deputy or an officer from the Palo Alto Police Department was responsible. Members of Anonymous even went so far as to publish pictures and the personal information of a San Francisco sheriff's deputy they believe tossed the stun grenade at Olsen.

But an extensive review of video footage and Oakland Police Department records by this reporter indicates that Robert Roche, an acting sergeant in the Oakland Police Department and member of OPD's "Tango Teams," threw the flash-bang at Olsen and his rescuers. It's also not the first time that Roche's actions have come under scrutiny. Police records show that Roche had previously killed three people in the line of duty.

In one clip of footage shot on October 25 by KTVU, the camera zooms in on a helmeted, gas-mask wearing officer in OPD insignia pointing a shotgun at the crowd. Olsen's inert body is also visible in front of the barriers. Another video clip shows the same officer training his shotgun on the crowd, lowering the firearm as a crowd gathers around Olsen, and stepping back behind a line of San Francisco sheriff's deputies on the barricade line. A grenade is then tossed at Olsen's body as rescuers arrive.

According to former San Francisco Sheriff Mike Hennessey and Sergeant Kara Apple, a Palo Alto Police spokeswoman, officers from neither agency were equipped with less-than-lethal shotguns or flash-bang grenades that night. A list of OPD crowd-control munitions published by Al Jazeera last year includes the Remington .357 shotgun and two types of CS or pepper spray-loaded blast grenades.

Two stripes and a star, OPD's insignia for acting sergeants, are visible on the officer's left sleeve. In both clips, the officer is holding his shotgun with his right hand on the trigger, his helmet visor is up and the numbers "35" are visible on his helmet. According to an OPD roster of the three-digit helmet numbers assigned to individual officers and the personnel detail for October 25, Officer Robert Roche is the only one with a helmet number beginning with "35" who was assigned to a Tango Team that night. Roche's helmet number that night was "357," according to OPD records.

Three attorneys who reviewed the two clips mentioned above concur that the shotgun-wielding officer is the same in both clips. "From the positioning of that officer in the line and his weapon, it appears it was likely the same cop who tossed the grenade at the medics trying to help Scott Olsen," said R. Michael Flynn, president of the San Francisco Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. Jim Chanin, one of the two attorneys who have overseen OPD's federal consent decree since 2003, concurred. "His movements and appearance strongly suggest that it's the same officer that threw the grenade," Chanin said. Chanin also observed that the officer's helmet number began with "35."

Rachel Lederman, another NLG-affiliated attorney, also believes the officer is the same and identifiable by the "35" on his helmet. Lederman characterized the officer's actions as "illegal" and "evil." Tossing a flash-bang grenade into a crowd and at a wounded person is "not only improper under [OPD's] crowd control policy — the guy should be fired," Lederman said.

Sergeant Chris Bolton, chief of staff to Police Chief Howard Jordan, said the investigation into the Olsen incident is ongoing. "Any known or alleged uses of force against Mr. Olsen are assigned to an independent investigator," Bolton said in a statement. "Based on available video, photographs, and reports, the department has identified several officers that they are subjects of those open investigations." Bolton added, however, that "no investigative findings or discipline have been announced or imposed."

Roche is a rifle officer who has also served in gang enforcement units. He has been involved in three fatal shootings during his career. In 2006, he fatally shot seventeen-year-old Ronald Brazier after the teenager fired on Roche and two other officers. In 2007, Roche shot and killed an unarmed Jeremiah Dye in a crawlspace under an East Oakland house. Dye had run from police after his cousin shot and wounded an OPD officer during a traffic stop. In March 2008, fifteen-year-old Jose Buenrostro was shot to death by Roche and two other officers while in possession of a sawed-off rifle on 79th Avenue in East Oakland. Buenrostro's family received a $500,000 wrongful death settlement from the City of Oakland in 2010, even though police claimed that Buenrostro pointed the weapon at them. Buenrostro's family contended that he did not threaten the officers.

Alameda County District Attorney's Office records indicate that Roche was cleared of criminal conduct in both the Brazier and Dye shootings.

Roche and Sergeant Ronald Holmgren, who supervised Tango Team 2 during the October 25 crowd control actions, were not assigned to the Tango detail on the evening of the November 2 General Strike, according to Oakland Police Department records. However, Roche was photographed on the street during the January 28 confrontation with Occupy Oakland protesters, shotgun in hand.

OPD's "Tango teams," or tactical teams, have been at the heart of some of the most intense clashes of the Occupy Oakland movement (see "Oakland Used Violent Cops Against Occupy," 12/21/2012). Aside from the Olsen incident, video from the evening of the November 2 General Strike shows an unidentified OPD officer wearing a rucksack emblazoned with "Tango Team" striking US Army veteran Kayvan Sabeghi with a baton. Sabeghi was later hospitalized for a ruptured spleen.

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How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the "One Percent"

While many of us are working to ensure that the Occupy movement will have a lasting impact, it’s worthwhile to consider other countries where masses of people succeeded in nonviolently bringing about a high degree of democracy and economic justice. Sweden and Norway, for example, both experienced a major power shift in the 1930s after prolonged nonviolent struggle. They “fired” the top 1 percent of people who set the direction for society and created the basis for something different.

Both countries had a history of horrendous poverty. When the 1 percent was in charge, hundreds of thousands of people emigrated to avoid starvation. Under the leadership of the working class, however, both countries built robust and successful economies that nearly eliminated poverty, expanded free university education, abolished slums, provided excellent health care available to all as a matter of right and created a system of full employment. Unlike the Norwegians, the Swedes didn’t find oil, but that didn’t stop them from building what the latest CIA World Factbook calls “an enviable standard of living.” [...]

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Jake Tapper, Jay Carney Clash During White House Press Briefing (VIDEO)

ABC News' senior White House correspondent Jake Tapper challenged White House Press Secretary Jay Carney after he started off the briefing by praising the three journalists who have recently died in Syria.

The New York Times' Anthony Shadid died of an apparent asthma attack last week while crossing the Syrian border. The Sunday Times of London's Marie Colvin and French photojournalist Rémi Ochlik were killed during a shelling attack on Wednesday in Homs.

Tapper asked Carney about the praise the White House has recently given to journalists who have been killed. Tapper then asked, "How does that square with the fact that this administration has been so aggressively trying to stop aggressive journalism in the United States by using the Espionage Act to take whistleblowers to court?"

He added, "Currently I think that you’ve invoked it the sixth time, and before the Obama administration, it had only been used three times in history. You’re — this is the sixth time you’re suing a CIA officer for allegedly providing information in 2009 about CIA torture. Certainly that’s something that’s in the public interest of the United States. The administration is taking this person to court. There just seems to be disconnect here. You want aggressive journalism abroad; you just don’t want it in the United States."

Carney said he did not want to speak to any particular case. He defended the praise he has given to brave reporters "who are placing themselves in extremely dangerous situations in order to bring a story of oppression and brutality to the world." He added, "I think that is commendable, and it’s certainly worth noting by us. And as somebody who knew both Anthony and Marie, I particularly appreciate what they did to bring that story to the American people."

As for Tapper's question about the Espionage Act, Carney said, "I think that there are issues here that involve highly sensitive classified information, and I think that...divulging that kind of information is a serious issue, and it always has been."

Tapper fired back, "So the truth should come out abroad; it shouldn’t come out here?" Carney responded, "Well, that’s not at all what I’m saying, Jake, and you know it’s not."

This is not the first time Tapper and Carney have clashed at White House press briefings. In December, Tapper had his feathers ruffled when Carney addressed a reporter in the back of the press room and skipped over his question.

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Occupy National Convention To Be Held In Philadelphia

PHILADELPHIA -- A group of protesters affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement plans to elect 876 "delegates" from around the country and hold a national "general assembly" in Philadelphia over the Fourth of July as part of ongoing protests over corporate excess and economic inequality.

The group, dubbed the 99% Declaration Working Group, said Wednesday delegates would be selected during a secure online election in early June from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories.

In a nod to their First Amendment rights, delegates will meet in Philadelphia to draft and ratify a "petition for a redress of grievances," convening during the week of July 2 and holding a news conference in front of Independence Hall on the Fourth of July.

Any U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident who is 18 years of age or older may run as a nonpartisan candidate for delegate, according to Michael S. Pollok, an attorney who advised Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge last year and co-founded the working group.

"We feel it's appropriate to go back to what our founding fathers did and have another petition congress," Pollok said in an interview with The Associated Press. "We feel that following the footsteps of our founding fathers is the right way to go."

In 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted by the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and cited King George III's failure to redress the grievances listed in colonial petitions as a reason to declare independence.

One man and one woman will be elected from each of the 435 congressional voting districts, according to Pollok, and they will meet in Philadelphia to deliberate, draft and ratify a "redress of grievances." One delegate will also be elected to represent each of the U.S. territories.

Organizers won't take a position on what grievances should be included, Pollok said, but they will likely include issues like getting money out of politics, dealing with the foreclosure crisis and helping students handle loan debt.

Details of the conference are still being worked out, Pollok said, but organizers have paid for a venue in Philadelphia. Pollok would not identify the venue, but said it was "a major state-of-the art facility." Pollok said the group planned to pay for the conference through donations.

Once the petition is completed, Pollok said, the protesters will deliver copies to the White House, members of Congress and the Supreme Court. They will demand that Congress takes action in the first 100 days of taking office next year. If sufficient action isn't taken, Pollok said, the delegates will go back to their districts and try to recruit their own candidates for office.

Philadelphia Managing Director Richard Negrin said the city has been in communication with the conference organizers and said the biggest concerns are logistical. The conference is coming at a time when thousands of tourists flock to the City of Brotherly Love for Fourth of July festivities.

"It's mostly a police and traffic control concern," Negrin said. "We think that as the cradle of liberty we have to be careful and hold our constitutional rights especially reverent here. ... We're not going to be heavy handed."

Hundreds of Occupy Philadelphia protesters set up an encampment in a plaza at City Hall in early October in unity with the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York. The city eventually ordered them to leave so it could break ground on a $50 million renovation project at the plaza and evicted the remaining protesters in late November.

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http://pastebin.com/9Ucs8WUu

Press release from Anonymous:

Anonymous donates forensic video enhancement software kit to Occupy Oakland in order to assist the Oakland community by holding police officers accountable for violent and illegal acts.
International, February 21, 2012

Anonymous has announced the recent donation of it's OccupyCSI forensic video software system to Occupy Oakland, in the interest of the Oakland community at large, with the purpose of enhancing and analyzing video footage from the Occupy Oakland protests in order to find the forensic truth in the recorded footage of the Oakland Police Department's handling of protesters.

The OccupyCSI software kit is comprised of many unique software programs including Amped Five® video forensic software, Faces 4.0® facial composite software, the Izotope RX advanced audio forensic software 2.01, organizational tools like Maltego Case Files and Treesheets, and encrypted chat and VPN, for private, encrypted communications during investigations.

The three elements of the OccupyCSI Video Forensic Package:
The InvestigatorBoy™ tool-set is the first and most comprehensive forensic video/image processing software environment in the world. It has over nine thousand proprietary designed, user-friendly plug-ins and facilities that enhance, denoise and deblur. Including is the recent additions that create the ability to perform unprecedented hexa-resolve vector-zooms of forensic video micro-evidence (e.g. faces, badge numbers).

The VideoCrystalz™ tool-set is the first real-time forensic video processing software with the world’s only (Anonymous' U.S. Patent) fully automatic real-time double-universal de-multiplexing, including real-time track zone and real-time ultra-universal DVR capture. VideoCrystalz™ allows for patented lossless video capture with encoding that doubles video storage, and the ability to perform a video search (e.g. cars and people).

Anonymous' PeenMeasure™ tool-set is the world’s only fully-automatic photogrammetronic software that allows the user to perform accurate bio-metric neo-measurements of a suspect’s dimensions (e.g. height, width, area), including measurements from video surveillance and photographs during police actions. This software is important to the work of Occupy as it allows the user to know the suspected officer's biometric measurements based on the PeenMeasure™ calculations which in turn helps the user eliminate and narrow down individuals who might have been considered suspect.

Anonymous CEO Dr. David Davidson said, in regards to the donation, “It is our sincere hope that in donating our forensic video OccupyCSI software to Occupy Oakland, we are helping to assist the entire community through the forensic video enhancement and 3D super-analysis of numerous videos that were recorded during the Occupy Oakland protests. Pictures tell the truth and when enhancing these videos and photos forensically, unlawful acts committed by police officers will be seen and analyzed clearly and scientifically, no matter what rank of the officer who committed them.”

About Cignatech, the company who recently donated software to the Oakland Police Department:
In 2010, Cignitech, Inc. received the Advertising Genius Award for excellence in the field of Revolution-based Capitialism. Cignitech is the only forensic video company in the world that, free of charge, armed an out-of-control police state with both proprietary forensic video acquisition hardware and scientific forensic software. In 2012, Cignitech, Inc. was the first company in the world that tried to vampirically capitalize on the Occupy Movement for the free advertising the company would receive in the press.




Brought to you by Anonymous. Special Thanks to Doxcak3.
This is #OO -->

Let's Enhance

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http://www.adbusters.org/(...)cal-briefing-26.html

Hey you wild cats, dreamers, redeemers, horizontals,

The stage is set for a climactic showdown in Chicago.

The crisis of capitalism is deepening. Youth unemployment has reached 50% in Spain and Greece… 30% in Portugal and Italy… 22% in the UK… almost 20% in the US. Hundreds of millions of people around the world are waking up to the fact that their future does not compute… that their lives will be a never ending series of ecological, financial, political and personal crises… and that if we don’t rise up and start fighting for a different kind of future, we won’t have a future.

That struggle ignites again May 1.

#OCCUPYCHICAGO will be the focal point of this global spiritual insurrection… 50,000 of us will converge on the windy city and confront the G8 and NATO leaders with an ultimatum. We will set up impromptu encampments throughout the city and wage a full-spectrum memewar backed up by new tactics of anarchic swarming. Our militant in-your-face nonviolence will inspire thousands of towns, cities and campuses around the world to rise up in solidarity just like they did last October.

This is a worldwide, multi-front mutiny against the way our economic and military leaders are running the world.

On the CULTURAL FRONT we confront the corpo-commercial lie machine – we shift the way information flows and meaning is produced. We train a new breed of livestreamers, citizen journos and p2p visionaries and unleash them in the streets to be the eyes of the world during the month of May.

On the ENVIRONMENTAL FRONT we demand the G8 reach consensus on drastically reducing their carbon footprints and immediately ratifying a binding international accord on climate change.

On the ECONOMIC FRONT we throw our movement’s weight behind one simple demand: the implementation of a 1% Robin Hood Tax on all financial transactions and currency trades.

On the GEOPOLITICAL FRONT we tell Obama, Cameron, Sarkozy, Putin, Merkel, Noda, Monti, Harper and the NATO military leaders to stop the warmongering and start fighting for peace. We block the looming Iran war with a preemptive global initiative that just about everyone in the world can get behind: a nuclear-free world starting with a nuclear-free Middle East that includes both Israel and Iran.

On the PERSONAL FRONT, hundreds of millions of us vow to live the month of May without dead time… to experience joyous camaraderie… to open ourselves to an imminent life changing epiphany. We follow Miles Davis’ advice on how to play jazz: be spontaneously alive and “play what’s not there.”

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Matt Taibbi: Bank of America is a “raging hurricane of theft and fraud”

There are two things every American needs to know about Bank of America.

The first is that it’s corrupt. This bank has systematically defrauded almost everyone with whom it has a significant business relationship, cheating investors, insurers, homeowners, shareholders, depositors, and the state. It is a giant, raging hurricane of theft and fraud, spinning its way through America and leaving a massive trail of wiped-out retirees and foreclosed-upon families in its wake.

The second is that all of us, as taxpayers, are keeping that hurricane raging. Bank of America is not just a private company that systematically steals from American citizens: it’s a de facto ward of the state that depends heavily upon public support to stay in business. In fact, without the continued generosity of us taxpayers, and the extraordinary indulgence of our regulators and elected officials, this company long ago would have been swallowed up by scandal, mismanagement, prosecution and litigation, and gone out of business. It would have been liquidated and its component parts sold off, perhaps into a series of smaller regional businesses that would have more respect for the law, and be more responsive to their customers.

But Bank of America hasn’t gone out of business, for the simple reason that our government has decided to make it the poster child for the “Too Big To Fail” concept. Because it is considered a “systemically important institution” whose collapse would have a major, Lehman-Brothers-style impact on the economy, two consecutive presidential administrations have taken extraordinary measures to keep Bank of America in business, despite a staggering recent legacy of corruption schemes, many of which were simply overlooked by regulators.

This is why the question of whether or not Bank of America should remain on public life support is so critical to all Americans, and not just those millions who have the misfortune to be customers of the bank, or own shares in the firm, or hold mortgages serviced by the company. This gigantic financial institution is the ultimate symbol of a new kind of corruption at the highest levels of American society: a tendency to marry the near-limitless power of the federal government with increasingly concentrated, increasingly unaccountable private financial interests.

The inevitable result of that new form of corruption is this bank, whose continued, state-supported existence should naturally outrage all Americans, be they conservative or progressive.

Conservatives should be outraged by Bank of America because it is perhaps the biggest welfare dependent in American history, with the $45 billion in bailout money and the $118 billion in state guarantees it’s received since 2008 representing just the crest of a veritable mountain of federal bailout support, most of it doled out by the Obama administration.

For instance, with its own credit rating hovering just above junk status, Bank of America has been allowed to borrow tens of billions of dollars against the government’s credit rating using little-known bailout programs with names like the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program. Since the crash of 2008, it’s also borrowed billions if not trillions in emergency, near-zero interest rate loans from the Federal Reserve – it took out $91 million in rolling low-interest financing from the Fed on just one day in January, 2009.

Conservatives believe that a commitment to free market principles and limited government will lead us out of our economic troubles, but Bank of America represents the opposite dynamic: a company that is kept protected from the judgments of the free market, and forces the state to expand to take on its debts.

Last summer, for instance, the Bank – in order to satisfy creditors who were nervous about the enormous quantity of risky assets on its balance sheet – decided to move some $73 trillion (that’s trillion, with a T) in exotic derivative bets from one end of the company into the federally-insured, depository side of the bank.

This move, encouraged by the Obama administration, put the American taxpayer on the hook for an entire generation of irresponsible gambles made by another failed investment firm that should have gone out of business, but was instead acquired by Bank of America with $25 billion in taxpayer help – Merrill Lynch.

When did we make it the job of the taxpayer to buy failed companies, and rescue companies from their own bad decisions? How is that conservative?

Meanwhile, if you’re a progressive, Bank of America is the ultimate symbol of modern predatory capitalism. This company has knowingly sold hundreds of billions of worthless securities to unions and pension funds (New York state filed two different lawsuits against Bank of America and its subsidiaries on behalf of its pension fund, one of which was settled for $624 million) brazenly overcharged its depositors (it was forced to pay customers $410 million in restitution for bogus overdraft charges), and repeatedly lied to its shareholders (most notoriously, it lied about billions in losses on Merrill Lynch’s books before asking shareholders to approve its merger with the firm).

Moreover, Bank of America has ruthlessly preyed upon millions of homeowners, throwing them out on the street on the strength of doctored, “robosigned” paperwork created through brazenly illegal practices they helped pioneer — the firm sped struggling families to foreclosure court using perjured affidavits produced in factory-like fashion by the hundreds or thousands every day, with full knowledge of management. Through the firm’s improper use of an unaccountable private electronic mortgage registry system called MERS, it also systematically evaded millions of dollars in local fees, forcing some communities to cut services and raise property taxes.

Even when caught and punished for its crimes by the authorities, Bank of America has repeatedly ignored court orders. It was one of five companies identified in two separate investigations earlier this year that were caught continuing the practice of robosigning, even after promising to stop in a legally binding consent decree. Last summer, the state of Nevada sought to terminate a settlement over mortgage abuses it had entered into with Bank of America after it found the company was brazenly violating the agreement, among other things raising payments and interest rates on mortgage customers, despite the fact that the settlement only allowed them to modify loans downward.

Over and over again, we see that leveling fines and punishments at this bank is not enough: it simply ignores them. It is the very definition of an unaccountable corporate villain.

Companies like Bank of America are a direct threat to national security, for many reasons. For one thing, they drive smaller, more honest banks out of business: since the market knows the federal government will never let Bank of America fail, it charges less to lend the bank money. That gives Bank of America, despite its near-junk credit rating, a competitive advantage over a smaller, regional bank that might have a better credit rating, but doesn’t have the implicit support of the federal government.

Worse still, stock market investor dollars that normally would go to more customer-friendly, more creative, and more commercially dependable firms will instead continue to flow to Too-Big-To-Fail behemoths like Bank of America, as buying stock in a company with implicit state support will be considered almost a safe-haven investment, like buying gold or Treasury bills.

This robs more deserving and ingenious entrepreneurs of scarce capital, and also encourages existing companies to pour resources not into better performance and increased productivity, but into lobbying and government influence. The result will be fewer Googles and Apples, more bad banks, and more campaign contributions for politicians.

Moreover, we’ve seen throughout our history that when criminal organizations are not punished, they tend to be encouraged to commit more crimes. Five years from now, our government’s decision to avoid jailing Bank of America executives for their roles in the vast robosigning program may result in a situation where no court document of any kind can be trusted, as companies will realize that it is cheaper and easier to simply invent legal affidavits than to draw them up properly and accurately.

What will your defense be against a future lawsuit for a credit card debt or a foreclosure, when your bank walks into court with a pile of invented documents? Will you wish then that you’d fought harder for Bank of America to be punished now?

And the state’s decision to allow Bank of America to pay a middling, $137 million fine for the rigging of bids for five years of municipal bond issues – a very serious crime that robbed taxpayers of millions in revenue, and incidentally is exactly the sort of thing we used to put mobsters in jail for, when the rigged contracts were for cement instead of bonds – may mean that down the road, all municipal bond issues will be rigged.

In recent years, Too-Big-To-Fail banks like Bank of America and Chase and Wells Fargo have been caught rigging the bids for financial services in dozens of municipalities nationwide. Worse, these same banks have repeatedly been let off the hook by regulators, who rarely seek jail sentences for the offenders, and more often simply apply fractional fines to the companies caught. This behavior, if left unchecked, will ultimately mean that we will all have to pay more for our roads, our traffic lights, our sewers, in fact all public services, as the banker’s secret bonus will soon become an institutionalized part of the invoice. And it’ll be our fault, because we didn’t do anything about it now.

The only way to prevent this kind of slide to total lawlessness is to break this unhealthy relationship between bank and government. It would be a great sign of America’s return to healthier capitalism if we could allow one of the worst of public-private monsters, Bank of America, to sink or swim on its own, in the free market.

We don’t want Bank of America to fail. Our position is, it already is insolvent, and already has failed – and only our tax dollars, and our government’s continued protection, is keeping that failure from becoming more common knowledge. There are many opinions about the nature of modern American capitalism. Some think the system is no longer able to meet the needs of ordinary people and needs to be radically overhauled, while others like it just the way it is.

But one thing that everyone on this spectrum of beliefs can agree upon is that our system doesn’t work when corrupt companies, companies that should fail in the free market, are kept alive by the government. When we allow that, what we get is a system that is neither capitalism nor socialist, but somewhere more miserably in between – a bureaucratic state in which profit is not tied to performance, but political power.

We have to break that cycle, and we can. Even with the enormous levels of state support, Bank of America has been teetering on the edge of collapse for years now. In December of 2011, its share price briefly dipped below $5, a near-fatal event in the firm’s history. The market has reacted violently to bad news about the bank on multiple occasions in the last year – after news of layoffs, after hints that the government might not bail the bank out completely in the event of a collapse, and after significant new lawsuits were filed. Each of these corrections nearly sent the company into a tailspin, but it was always rescued in the end by the widespread belief that Uncle Sam would bail it out in the event of a collapse.

We need to put a dent in that belief. We need to convince politicians and investors alike to allow failure to fail.

– Matt Taibbi, February 29th, 2012, Occupy Wall Street

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G-8 summit to be held at Camp David, not Chicago

The G-8 economic summit will be held at Camp David, not in Chicago as had been scheduled.

The White House announced the change in the following statement:

"In May, the United States looks forward to hosting the G-8 and NATO Summits. To facilitate a free-flowing discussion with our close G-8 partners, the president is inviting his fellow G-8 leaders to Camp David on May 18-19 for the G-8 Summit, which will address a broad range of economic, political and security issues.

"The president will then welcome NATO allies and partners to his hometown of Chicago for the NATO Summit on May 20-21, which will be the premier opportunity this year for the president to continue his efforts to strengthen NATO in order to ensure that the Atlantic Alliance remains the most successful alliance in history, while charting the way forward in Afghanistan."

Mayor Rahm Emanuel had personally lobbied his old boss, President Barack Obama, to host both summits. It would have been the first time since 1977 in London that the two organizations held meetings in the same city at the same time.

Emanuel's office put out a statement this afternoon saying he wished "President Obama and the other leaders well at the G8 meeting at Camp David and look forward to hosting the NATO Summit in Chicago.

"Hosting the NATO Summit is a tremendous opportunity to showcase Chicago to the world and the world to Chicago and we are proud to host the 50 heads of state, foreign and defense ministers from the NATO and ISAF countries in our great city May 19-21."

Chicago police estimated that 2,000 to 10,000 demonstrators were expected to show up for the overlapping G-8 and NATO summits. At least two major demonstrations were already planned for downtown during the summit, and organizers said they wanted to send crowds of marchers down Michigan Avenue in the middle of the day.

Meetings of leaders of international economic organizations like the G-8 have drawn violent large-scale protests for more than a decade.

Perhaps the most infamous U.S. incident occurred in Seattle in 1999, when a protest against a World Trade Organization meeting devolved into widespread rioting. About 35,000 protesters descended on the city, and police used tear gas and rubber bullets against crowds downtown in what became known as “The Battle of Seattle.”

Businesses reported more than $2 million in damage. Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper later resigned under heavy criticism of how the department handled the situation.

A 2001 riot at the G-8 meeting in Genoa, Italy, left one person dead and hundreds injured. Before a G-20 economic summit in Pittsburgh in 2009, police fired pepper spray at marchers who threw rocks and rolled garbage bins. Recent meetings have seen less violence, however.

twitter:

Occupy_DC twitterde op vrijdag 09-03-2012 om 01:48:36 #HR347 was just signed into law by #Obama. This government is corrupt. It does not represent us. http://t.co/9OwzU3FM #occupyDC #ows reageer retweet

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Inside that new anti-Occupy bill

HR 347 is drawing fire -- but many of its shameful restrictions already exist

In recent days, there has been a considerable amount of online speculation over a bill that made its way through the House and the Senate last week with little opposition — HR 347, or the Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011. Some have decried it as specifically anti-Occupy legislation with the aim to further curtail First Amendment rights. HR 347 makes it a prosecutable offense to knowingly, and without lawful authority, enter “(1) the White House or its grounds or the Vice President’s official residence or its grounds, (2) a building or grounds where the President or other person protected by the Secret Service is or will be temporarily visiting, or (3) a building or grounds so restricted due to a special event of national significance.”

This would, of course, include the areas restricted in Chicago for the NATO summit and Camp David for the G-8. However, concerns focusing solely on the passing of HR 347 seem to be a red herring of sorts, as most of its content has long been enshrined into law.

The new bill specifically addresses certain trespassing violations in D.C., which currently do not fall under the remit of federal law (i.e., HR 347 now makes it a federal issue if you trespass onto White House grounds). The only other significant change in the bill is a shift in language, which will make it easier to prosecute those who are found to unlawfully have entered these restricted areas. The law used to say that the person must have entered the area “knowingly” and “willfully.” HR 347, however, scrapped the “willfully,” which essentially now renders it a crime to remain in a restricted area, even if you do not know that it’s illegal for you to be there.

“By striking out ‘willfully’ they make it easier to prosecute under ‘knowingly,’” explained Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, executive director of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund. She noted with some exasperation that the campaigns focusing energies against HR 347 miss the bigger, ongoing fight for basic free speech and threats to it, as this specific law is only an amendment to laws that were primarily established in 2006. For Verheyden-Hilliard, HR 347 is best understood as the government “looking at the tools in their arsenal and polishing them up” in time for major, protest-drawing summits and political conventions this year.

This is not to say that free speech issues raised by HR 347′s passage should be ignored, but rather contextualized against a backdrop where protest and dissent are already consistently treated as illegal.

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Politie New York manipuleerde misdaadcijfers

Een rapport van een New Yorkse politieagent waarin staat dat zijn district tientallen misdaden niet meldde, is gisteren (lokale tijd) door interne onderzoekers geldig verklaard.

Volgens de agent uit Brooklyn werden rapporten in zijn district niet verzonden. Ook werden slachtoffers ontmoedigd om aangifte te doen. Op die manier hield het district de misdaadcijfers lager. Inmiddels zijn zeven agenten op het matje geroepen en is de baas van het district overgeplaatst.

De agent trok al in 2010 aan de bel, maar toen werd hij gearresteerd en belandde zelfs enkele dagen in een gesticht. Hij is nog steeds geschorst, maar heeft inmiddels een rechtszaak aangespannen.

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In Court Today: CIA Claims That Torture Technique Is an “Intelligence Method” Exempted From FOIA

Today I will argue in the federal court of appeals in New York that the CIA must release cables describing its use of waterboarding. The CIA has argued that, even though President Obama has declared waterboarding to be illegal, the cables do not have to be turned over in our Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit because waterboarding is an “intelligence method.” We have argued that the CIA’s interpretation of the law is fundamentally inconsistent with the purpose of FOIA — to expose official misconduct to public scrutiny — and that, therefore, the government may not suppress details relating to an interrogation technique that even it recognizes to be unlawful.

The CIA’s characterization of torture as an “intelligence method” is shameful, and at bottom it is simply another effort to prevent the public from learning the full scope of the torture program. We know from documents the government has already released that the CIA’s use of waterboarding violated even the minimal guidelines established by its legal memos. The Obama administration should fulfill its commitment to transparency and release these additional documents.

After the CIA revealed in 2007 that it had violated the district court’s orders in our case by destroying videotapes depicting the torture of two detainees, the court ordered the agency to turn over any documents that would allow the public to reconstruct what was on the tapes. The CIA identified 580 documents that describe what was on the tapes, but it has refused to release them. The agency is also refusing to release a photo of one of the detainees, Abu Zubaydah, apparently taken around the time he was being interrogated.

The American public has a right to know the full truth about the torture that was committed in its name.

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Passion vs puritanism as America is gripped by a war over sexuality


US politics is overshadowed by bitter debates over sexual politics, from abortion to contraception and personal morality. But it is not just rightwingers who fear the increasing sexualisation of society

Dr Marty Klein pulled no punches when it came to what he thought of the ferocious debate in America over contraception. As the nation's political classes veer between condemning government funding for birth control and defending it as a basic women's right, the California sex therapist and author of America's War on Sex bluntly said his country was on a perilous path.

"America has entered a new dark age where people are proud of their ignorance," he told the Observer. "The US is careering towards a society that is reshaping women's reproductive rights. It used to be abortion. Now it's contraception. How can contraception be a battleground? It is crazy."

That might be so, but the spat is white hot and part of a much larger argument. Only last week protests broke out in Texas, Arizona, Utah, Georgia and Alabama that all involved some aspects of sex and sexuality. In Utah, it was over the passing of a law that means the only sex education children will get in school will be about abstinence. In Texas, it was about cuts to health insurance that covers birth control. In Georgia, eight of the nine women in the state senate walked out over a bill that attacked abortion rights.

Barely a day has gone by in recent weeks without some fresh fight breaking out over sexual politics. The most fierce was over radio shock jock Rush Limbaugh's comments on Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke, who had testified in Congress on the importance of government funding for birth control. Limbaugh told millions of conservative listeners that this made Fluke a "slut" and "prostitute".

He said: "If we are going to pay for your contraceptives and thus pay for you to have sex, we want something. We want you to post the videos online so we can all watch." The comments sparked outrage, triggered an advertiser boycott of Limbaugh's show and dragged in all the Republican nomination candidates and Barack Obama.

Limbaugh apologised, but many liberals saw it as a sign of the powerful forces on the right determined to undo decades of advancement in sex and women's rights. Few people symbolise that more than former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, who is now the main challenger to Mitt Romney for the Republican presidential nomination.

A devout Catholic and hardened culture warrior, Santorum is a hero to conservatives for his hardline views on abortion and contraception. For Nancy Cohen, author of the current hit book Delirium: How the Sexual Counter-Revolution is Polarising America, Santorum's rise is the inevitable result of decades of backlash against 1960s sexual liberation. "It is insanity to be having this conversation in our politics when you are a world power. The rest of the world is watching with their jaws agape," she said.

But the image of America gripped by a fervent new puritanism is not the full picture. Any survey of the wider cultural landscape reveals sex has never been more prevalent in American life. On television and in movies sex is everywhere.

Reality shows like The Jersey Shore show their cast members coupling with each other and random strangers. Stars such as Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian, built lucrative businesses on the back of sex tapes. Gossip websites debate the sex lives of celebrities with a prurient detail that would shock even the most infamous of scandal rags from Hollywood in the 1930s, and they do it for an audience online of millions.

Sex sells like never before, even for the most tangential of products. In sport there is even a Lingerie Football League, whose female players done skimpy outfits and teams have names like the Los Angeles Temptation.

The American sex industry is said to be worth more than $12bn a year. Recent regulations in California aimed at ensuring all porn actors have to use condoms saw protests that such a law would see the industry relocate, with a resultant loss of jobs and taxes. At the same time porn actor James Deen has been cast as the lead in a new Hollywood film The Canyons. Deen has now become such a popular porn star – especially with young women – that he was the subject of a segment on ABC's headline news show Nightline.

In fact, sexual freedom in America has gone so far that conservatives are not the only ones wringing their hands. The sexualisation of young girls – such as Bratz dolls with their bee-stung lips and short skirts – has outraged liberals and feminists, as has the growth of a casual "hook up" culture on American college campuses. Even Klein admits that – sexually speaking – Americans have never been so inventive. "The range of things that people do in their bedrooms is without doubt getting broader and the entertainment options around sex are also broader," he said. But how to explain such vibrant sexual freedoms alongside such a widespread backlash? "Two words: mental illness!" joked Klein. "When people ask me is America getting more progressive sexually or is it getting more conservative, I just answer: 'Yes'."

Cohen has a thesis. In her book she describes a "shadow movement" that has aggressively campaigned to set back women's rights, focused on issues around sex and birth control. It is, she says, largely motivated by religion. That gives it a powerful motivation and it has developed sophisticated techniques to influence mainstream politics, especially via the social-conservative wing of the Republican party.

Klein believes it gives the movement power far beyond its numbers and a louder voice than a more silent majority. "These people are brilliant political organisers. They are ideologues and holy crusaders. They believe that if they lose, then civilisation hangs in the balance," he said.

Unique factors in American history also help to explain the situation. Religion continues to play a big role in public life, which stands in stark contrast to many European countries. About 43% of Americans regularly go to church and it is hard to have a political career in the US without professing a deep faith. The power of religion provides a ready-made vehicle for campaigning on sexual mores. It also means sex is the one part of life where the normal rules of the free market are given a willful pass. "The only place in life in America where more freedom of choice is seen as bad is sex," said Klein.

Many commentators say the hardline Protestantism of 17th-century settlers casts a long shadow over modern sexuality, leading to a distrust of sexual behaviour as pleasure and seeing it as a religious duty for reproduction. Certainly Santorum's pronouncements on the evil of contraception fit this narrative. Despite his Catholicism, Santorum is a huge hit with the evangelicals. But others say the Puritans have been misjudged by history.

"There is evidence they understood and celebrated sex within certain confines, like marriage," said Professor Thomas Foster, a cultural history expert at the Catholic DePaul University in Chicago. "Puritans talk about the clitoris. My classes are always amazed when they hear about that," he added.

Another theory is that American ideas about public and private morality are rooted in the nations' founding fathers. Whereas in France and Italy, there is little link seen between a politician's private life and political behaviour, in America the reverse is true. "There was a sense with the founding fathers that the person who is virtuous in their private life is able to be virtuous in their public life," Foster said. Thus Bill Clinton's affair with a White House intern nearly destroyed his presidency.

A final theory holds that, because America was founded as a revolutionary experiment against the autocracies of Europe, it has a very different sense of "modernism". While European countries have organically evolved social mores over centuries, America has always been in turmoil at the previous generation's social behaviour because such fights are locked into the nation's sense of self-invention. In this view, the current battle over contraception is simply yet another part of the American experience.

"These debates are old. They are as old as the first colonies," said Foster. Or to put it another way, the only thing more American than having sex is arguing about it.

What's your take on the so-called sexual counter-revolution? Is there a war on women? We want to hear your thoughts. Join our People's Panel and share your perspective.

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Billionaire Hedge Fund Manager Backs Romney, Says Rich Need More Power

Billionaire hedge fund manager Kenneth Griffin is backing Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election, and he says that the ultra-wealthy should have more influence over the country.

Griffin is the head of Citadel, one of the biggest hedge funds in the world. His personal net worth is estimated at $2.3 billion.

In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Griffin explained that he didn’t think the 1% had enough power: “I think (the ultra-wealthy) actually have an insufficient influence, those who have enjoyed the benefits of our system more than ever now owe a duty to protect the system that has created the greatest nation on this planet.”

Griffin has donated $150,000 to Restore Our Future, a pro-Romney Super PAC. He has also donated $560,000 to the Republican Governor’s Association, and in the past has donated thousands to Karl Rove’s American Crossroads, a pro-Republican group that has regularly been caught creating grossly inaccurate advertising.

The Tribune also reports that Griffin has donated $1.5 million to Americans For Prosperity, the shadowy front group operated by billionaires Charles and David Koch. Americans for Prosperity has funded much of the “tea party” movement.

In 2005, Griffin was a backer of credit derivatives — the complex financial instruments that helped to cause much of the economic crisis in 2008. He described derivatives as “an entirely new and vital way of spreading risk.” Billionaire investor Warren Buffet described these same tools as “financial weapons of mass destruction.”

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Subpoenas Issued Demanding Logs and IP Addresses for some Occupy Websites

In a very interesting twist on the Occupy movement Subpoenas are being issued demanding information relating to many of the Websites that related to the Occupy cause. One of the Subpoenas that was posted on Scribd.com is asking for quite a bit of information including “Any and all documents and records relating to the following articles posted on the Website including records of the IP addresses and pseudo names of the blog posters.”

This latest development is a very drastic measure and one that we are pretty confident will backfire on the courts in question. The establishment of a website in support of a political, social or economic cause should still be protected under the 1st amendment right to free speech. So far there are three Subpoena’s posted on the Scridb site started by someone called CabinCr3w (including one for occupy Boston), but we are sure that more will follow as the local and state governments attempt to track down what they obviously feel are dangerous criminals (never mind the real ones out there).

These Subpoenas are the latest in the move to criminalize the online activist movement (Anonymous and now the Occupy Movement). We have already watched as the FUD campaign has pushed ahead with articles that are now trying to portray Sabu (Hector Xavier Monsegur) as a “Gun Carrying Drug Dealer”.

So why the subpoenas all of a sudden? Well there are a couple of reasons that jump to mind. The first is that the people in charge a guessing that many of the individuals that support (or are involved with) the occupy movement are also involved or support Anonymous. This is not that big of a leap of logic, but it is a dangerous situation where the state and local governments are close to abusing (or disregarding) certain rights. This is not that far away from asking for the logs files and IP addresses of visitors to ANY site on the internet that might have an opposing view about the existing government.

The problem with this tactic is that they are very likely to be trampling on innocent people’s rights and freedoms all under the guise of trying to catch those dangerous criminals called Anonymous… not to mention that it really is not going to work the way they want. However, they are drunk with the way that Monsegur was caught (though a domain registry) and are hoping for more success of the same type. We have a feeling that the Electronic Frontier Foundation will be stepping in soon considering their stance on this type of legal abuse.

In the meantime, you can expect to see more court action and also more stories in the press playing up the limited success of the FBI’s actions with Sabu. My personal favorite headline is the one that claims Anonymous is “reeling” from the capture of Sabu and the final breakup of LulzSec. If nothing else this shows the ignorance of the situation that most media and the government agencies have of Anonymous, the Occupy Movement and, well to be honest pretty much anything else that relates to the way the Internet has changed activism and social communication between people, nations, cultures and ideologies.

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NYPD Treating Protesters Like Muslims

It's no longer a secret that Muslims anywhere near New York City have been extensively tracked and cataloged by the NYPD, whether or not they pose a threat to security. Today, the New York Times reports that Occupy Wall Street protesters, waiting in the wings for a planned spring resurgence, are being treated in much the same way, at least according to their lawyers. "Not only are the police disrupting people's rights to free expression," said an attorney for a group of demonstrators who were arrested — but not prosecuted — while buying coffee on a planned "day of action" last year. "They are taking preemptive steps by arresting people who might be just thinking about exercising their rights."

"I felt like I had been arrested for a thought crime," said 20-year-old Kira Moyer-Sims, who was charged with obstructing governmental administration and is now planning to sue the city, along with two others.

Separate demonstrators report officers showing up to private meetings to intimidate them. The Times points to expanded surveillance powers granted to the police department in 2003, with terror prevention in mind, but the director of the ACLU says now, "The NYPD surveillance does not appear to be limited to unlawful activity."

And imagine being a person of color:

. Mark Adams, a 32-year-old engineer from Virginia, said he was arrested in November at an Occupy Wall Street protest in Midtown and was questioned by a police detective and an agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who asked about his involvement with Occupy Wall Street, requested his e-mail address and inquired whether he had ever been to Yemen or met anyone connected to Al Qaeda.


Adams is a U.S. citizen, but was born in Pakistan, so he's a potential violator of the worst offense of all: protesting while Muslim.

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Tactical Briefing #27.

Alright you wild cats, nimble dreamers and jammer tacticians,

In a sudden about-face, the United States has conceded a victory to Occupy and moved May’s G8 summit to Camp David, an impenetrable military base in rural Maryland. Wow! Looks like the specter of 50,000 occupiers ready to swarm with a list of demands has turned the climactic Showdown in Chicago into a humiliating G8 Backdown. Bravo! Splitting the G8 and NATO summits was a deft move… but now we’ve got a major tactical rethink on our hands.

The big question is do we follow Mao’s advice (“when the enemy retreats, we pursue”) or Sun Tzu’s (“Do not pursue an enemy who simulates flight”)? We’ve heard persuasive arguments on all sides. Some occupiers say the movement should lay chase and go for #OCCUPYCAMPDAVID against all odds … a month of tree-sits, lockdowns and nomadic encampments in the woods and nearby Thurmont. Others believe it’s best to up the ante with #OCCUPYCHICAGO: an even bigger mobilization beginning with the May Day General Strike. Still others advocate an unpredictable everywhere-at-once global insurgency of anarchic swarms throughout the month of May.

When Ben Ali first attacked then tried to hide from his people, he was toppled. When Mubarak refused to negotiate and tried to beat his people back into line, he was deposed. Now the White House and the G8 are repeating the mistakes of last year’s autocrats … first they try to scare us with tough talk of repressive anti-Occupy ordinances, crowd suppression technologies and paramilitary policing, then they make a hasty retreat to the safety of Camp David.

The world’s leaders flee from us … so what do we do? Maybe we just laugh at them?

On May 18, the day the G8 leaders meet in Camp David, why don’t we, the people of the world have a #LAUGHRIOT. Let roars of laughter rise up from towns and cities everywhere at the spectacle of the world’s leaders trying to crisis manage the economy from behind closed doors and razor wire fences.

Laughter is one of the most powerful tactical weapons of memewar … it signals supremacy and loss of fear. So let’s pull off the greatest comedy of howling flash mobs, riotous street parties and hysterical pranks the world has ever seen. May 18 could be a monumental tipping point… an ahahaha! moment when the people of the world have a collective epiphany, and from that point on start thinking differently about how the world should be governed.

Jammers, whatever we do this Spring, let’s float like butterflies and sting like bees! Let’s bend the G8 and NATO to our will with shock tactics and audacious culture jams that capture the imagination of the world. We may be far closer to a Global Spring than any of us has so far dared to imagine …

for the wild,
Culture Jammers HQ

OccupyWallStreet.org / Tactical Briefing #25 and #26 / OccupyWallst.org / G8Protest.org / OccupyChi.org / CANG8.org / Takethesquare.net / OccupyMay1st.org / MayDayNYC.org / Facebook / Twitter / Reddit

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Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs

TODAY is my last day at Goldman Sachs. After almost 12 years at the firm — first as a summer intern while at Stanford, then in New York for 10 years, and now in London — I believe I have worked here long enough to understand the trajectory of its culture, its people and its identity. And I can honestly say that the environment now is as toxic and destructive as I have ever seen it.

To put the problem in the simplest terms, the interests of the client continue to be sidelined in the way the firm operates and thinks about making money. Goldman Sachs is one of the world’s largest and most important investment banks and it is too integral to global finance to continue to act this way. The firm has veered so far from the place I joined right out of college that I can no longer in good conscience say that I identify with what it stands for.

It might sound surprising to a skeptical public, but culture was always a vital part of Goldman Sachs’s success. It revolved around teamwork, integrity, a spirit of humility, and always doing right by our clients. The culture was the secret sauce that made this place great and allowed us to earn our clients’ trust for 143 years. It wasn’t just about making money; this alone will not sustain a firm for so long. It had something to do with pride and belief in the organization. I am sad to say that I look around today and see virtually no trace of the culture that made me love working for this firm for many years. I no longer have the pride, or the belief.

But this was not always the case. For more than a decade I recruited and mentored candidates through our grueling interview process. I was selected as one of 10 people (out of a firm of more than 30,000) to appear on our recruiting video, which is played on every college campus we visit around the world. In 2006 I managed the summer intern program in sales and trading in New York for the 80 college students who made the cut, out of the thousands who applied.

I knew it was time to leave when I realized I could no longer look students in the eye and tell them what a great place this was to work.

When the history books are written about Goldman Sachs, they may reflect that the current chief executive officer, Lloyd C. Blankfein, and the president, Gary D. Cohn, lost hold of the firm’s culture on their watch. I truly believe that this decline in the firm’s moral fiber represents the single most serious threat to its long-run survival.

Over the course of my career I have had the privilege of advising two of the largest hedge funds on the planet, five of the largest asset managers in the United States, and three of the most prominent sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia. My clients have a total asset base of more than a trillion dollars. I have always taken a lot of pride in advising my clients to do what I believe is right for them, even if it means less money for the firm. This view is becoming increasingly unpopular at Goldman Sachs. Another sign that it was time to leave.

How did we get here? The firm changed the way it thought about leadership. Leadership used to be about ideas, setting an example and doing the right thing. Today, if you make enough money for the firm (and are not currently an ax murderer) you will be promoted into a position of influence.

What are three quick ways to become a leader? a) Execute on the firm’s “axes,” which is Goldman-speak for persuading your clients to invest in the stocks or other products that we are trying to get rid of because they are not seen as having a lot of potential profit. b) “Hunt Elephants.” In English: get your clients — some of whom are sophisticated, and some of whom aren’t — to trade whatever will bring the biggest profit to Goldman. Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t like selling my clients a product that is wrong for them. c) Find yourself sitting in a seat where your job is to trade any illiquid, opaque product with a three-letter acronym.

Today, many of these leaders display a Goldman Sachs culture quotient of exactly zero percent. I attend derivatives sales meetings where not one single minute is spent asking questions about how we can help clients. It’s purely about how we can make the most possible money off of them. If you were an alien from Mars and sat in on one of these meetings, you would believe that a client’s success or progress was not part of the thought process at all.

It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off. Over the last 12 months I have seen five different managing directors refer to their own clients as “muppets,” sometimes over internal e-mail. Even after the S.E.C., Fabulous Fab, Abacus, God’s work, Carl Levin, Vampire Squids? No humility? I mean, come on. Integrity? It is eroding. I don’t know of any illegal behavior, but will people push the envelope and pitch lucrative and complicated products to clients even if they are not the simplest investments or the ones most directly aligned with the client’s goals? Absolutely. Every day, in fact.

It astounds me how little senior management gets a basic truth: If clients don’t trust you they will eventually stop doing business with you. It doesn’t matter how smart you are.

These days, the most common question I get from junior analysts about derivatives is, “How much money did we make off the client?” It bothers me every time I hear it, because it is a clear reflection of what they are observing from their leaders about the way they should behave. Now project 10 years into the future: You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that the junior analyst sitting quietly in the corner of the room hearing about “muppets,” “ripping eyeballs out” and “getting paid” doesn’t exactly turn into a model citizen.

When I was a first-year analyst I didn’t know where the bathroom was, or how to tie my shoelaces. I was taught to be concerned with learning the ropes, finding out what a derivative was, understanding finance, getting to know our clients and what motivated them, learning how they defined success and what we could do to help them get there.

My proudest moments in life — getting a full scholarship to go from South Africa to Stanford University, being selected as a Rhodes Scholar national finalist, winning a bronze medal for table tennis at the Maccabiah Games in Israel, known as the Jewish Olympics — have all come through hard work, with no shortcuts. Goldman Sachs today has become too much about shortcuts and not enough about achievement. It just doesn’t feel right to me anymore.

I hope this can be a wake-up call to the board of directors. Make the client the focal point of your business again. Without clients you will not make money. In fact, you will not exist. Weed out the morally bankrupt people, no matter how much money they make for the firm. And get the culture right again, so people want to work here for the right reasons. People who care only about making money will not sustain this firm — or the trust of its clients — for very much longer.

Greg Smith is resigning today as a Goldman Sachs executive director and head of the firm’s United States equity derivatives business in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

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Goldman Sachs Mobilizes Rapid Smear Campaign Against Whistleblower

Today, Goldman Sachs employee Greg Smith excoriated the investment bank in a New York Times op-ed, resigning due to the banks “toxic and destructive” culture, one in which the bank’s trading profits took precedence over its customers’ financial well-being. Goldman managers allegedly called customers “muppets,” and traders routinely asked how much was being made ripping off one customer or another.

Goldman has been quick to push back on Smith’s claims, portraying him as just a disgruntled employee. Some employees told Fox Business’ Charlie Gasparino that Smith doesn’t know what he’s talking about because he “never made more than $750,000 a year.”

And of course, the financial press has begun reporting anonymous attacks on Smith, quoting “people familiar with the matter” saying that Smith was angry with the size of his bonus and his lack of promotion:

. – The Wall Street Journal reported that “people familiar with the matter” said that Smith is just miffed that his bonus was small: “The circumstances of Mr. Smith’s departure aren’t entirely clear. When Goldman doled out annual bonuses earlier this year, Mr. Smith’s small payment became a point of friction, according to people familiar with the matter.”

. – Forbes’ Nathan Vardi wrote that Smith is just “having a midlife crisis“: “Smith is not the first person who wants to tell his former bosses to shove it. He is also not a whistleblower.”

The financial prognosticators at CNBC decided to mock Smith, saying that he would go form a media firm with Rolling Stone writer and staunch Goldman critic Matt Taibbi and the characters from Sesame Street. CNBC also compared Smith to Tom Cruise’s character in Jerry Maguire, airing the clip of that film when Cruise asks “who’s coming with me?” repeatedly, with no one actually going with him. Fox Business, meanwhile, insinuated that Smith just left because he didn’t get a promotion and was paid a small bonus. Watch a compilation:

Conservative Financial Press Attacks Goldman Whistleblower

Bloomberg’s William Cohan, author of “Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World,” said today that Smith is “now in the Witness Protection Program” due to his sure ostracism from Wall Street.

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Occupy in America: looking back on six months of protest

Saturday is Occupy's six-month anniversary. What it was like where you were? Browse the photos and share your memories

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Op zaterdag 17 maart 2012 05:01 schreef Probably_on_pcp het volgende:
Hier nog een goeie docu over hoe Obama alleen maar naar voren is geschoven om het volk te bespelen. Zijn beleid wordt belicht en het komt duidelijk naar voren dat hij achter de schermen helemaal niet de man is die hij pretendeert te zijn:

http://metanoia-films.org/lifting-the-veil/

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The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center

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Under construction by contractors with top-secret clearances, the blandly named Utah Data Center is being built for the National Security Agency. A project of immense secrecy, it is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks. The heavily fortified $2 billion center should be up and running in September 2013. Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.” It is, in some measure, the realization of the “total information awareness” program created during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its potential for invading Americans’ privacy.

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Before yottabytes of data from the deep web and elsewhere can begin piling up inside the servers of the NSAs new center, they must be collected. To better accomplish that, the agency has undergone the largest building boom in its history, including installing secret electronic monitoring rooms in major US telecom facilities. Controlled by the NSA, these highly secured spaces are where the agency taps into the US communications networks, a practice that came to light during the Bush years but was never acknowledged by the agency. The broad outlines of the so-called warrantless-wiretapping program have long been exposedhow the NSA secretly and illegally bypassed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which was supposed to oversee and authorize highly targeted domestic eavesdropping; how the program allowed wholesale monitoring of millions of American phone calls and email. In the wake of the programs exposure, Congress passed the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which largely made the practices legal. Telecoms that had agreed to participate in the illegal activity were granted immunity from prosecution and lawsuits. What wasnt revealed until now, however, was the enormity of this ongoing domestic spying program.

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So the agency had one major ingredienta massive data storage facilityunder way. Meanwhile, across the country in Tennessee, the government was working in utmost secrecy on the other vital element: the most powerful computer the world has ever known.

The plan was launched in 2004 as a modern-day Manhattan Project. Dubbed the High Productivity Computing Systems program, its goal was to advance computer speed a thousandfold, creating a machine that could execute a quadrillion (1015) operations a second, known as a petaflopthe computer equivalent of breaking the land speed record. And as with the Manhattan Project, the venue chosen for the supercomputing program was the town of Oak Ridge in eastern Tennessee, a rural area where sharp ridges give way to low, scattered hills, and the southwestward-flowing Clinch River bends sharply to the southeast. About 25 miles from Knoxville, it is the secret city where uranium- 235 was extracted for the first atomic bomb. A sign near the exit read: what you see here, what you do here, what you hear here, when you leave here, let it stay here. Today, not far from where that sign stood, Oak Ridge is home to the Department of Energys Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and its engaged in a new secret war. But this time, instead of a bomb of almost unimaginable power, the weapon is a computer of almost unimaginable speed.

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The Secret Sharer

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The morning that Al Qaeda attacked the U.S. was, coincidentally, Drake’s first full day of work as a civilian employee at the N.S.A.—an agency that James Bamford, the author of “The Shadow Factory” (2008), calls “the largest, most costly, and most technologically sophisticated spy organization the world has ever known.” Drake, a linguist and a computer expert with a background in military crypto-electronics, had worked for twelve years as an outside contractor at the N.S.A. Under a program code-named Jackpot, he focussed on finding and fixing weaknesses in the agency’s software programs. But, after going through interviews and background checks, he began working full time for Maureen Baginski, the chief of the Signals Intelligence Directorate at the N.S.A., and the agency’s third-highest-ranking official.

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In the late nineties, Binney estimated that there were some two and a half billion phones in the world and one and a half billion I.P. addresses. Approximately twenty terabytes of unique information passed around the world every minute. Binney started assembling a system that could trap and map all of it. “I wanted to graph the world,” Binney said. “People said, ‘You can’t do this—the possibilities are infinite.’ ” But he argued that “at any given point in time the number of atoms in the universe is big, but it’s finite.”

As Binney imagined it, ThinThread would correlate data from financial transactions, travel records, Web searches, G.P.S. equipment, and any other “attributes” that an analyst might find useful in pinpointing “the bad guys.” By 2000, Binney, using fibre optics, had set up a computer network that could chart relationships among people in real time. It also turned the N.S.A.’s data-collection paradigm upside down. Instead of vacuuming up information around the world and then sending it all back to headquarters for analysis, ThinThread processed information as it was collected—discarding useless information on the spot and avoiding the overload problem that plagued centralized systems. Binney says, “The beauty of it is that it was open-ended, so it could keep expanding.”

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In the weeks after the attacks, rumors began circulating inside the N.S.A. that the agency, with the approval of the Bush White House, was violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act—the 1978 law, known as FISA, that bars domestic surveillance without a warrant. Years later, the rumors were proved correct. In nearly total secrecy, and under pressure from the White House, Hayden sanctioned warrantless domestic surveillance.

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When Binney heard the rumors, he was convinced that the new domestic-surveillance program employed components of ThinThread: a bastardized version, stripped of privacy controls. “It was my brainchild,” he said. “But they removed the protections, the anonymization process. When you remove that, you can target anyone.” He said that although he was not “read in” to the new secret surveillance program, “my people were brought in, and they told me, ‘Can you believe they’re doing this? They’re getting billing records on U.S. citizens! They’re putting pen registers’ ”—logs of dialled phone numbers—“ ‘on everyone in the country!’ ”

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But Susan Landau, a former engineer at Sun Microsystems, and the author of a new book, “Surveillance or Security?,” notes that, in 2003, the government placed equipment capable of copying electronic communications at locations across America. These installations were made, she says, at “switching offices” that not only connect foreign and domestic communications but also handle purely domestic traffic. As a result, she surmises, the U.S. now has the capability to monitor domestic traffic on a huge scale. “Why was it done this way?” she asks. “One can come up with all sorts of nefarious reasons, but one doesn’t want to think that way about our government.”

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In December, 2005, the N.S.A.’s culture of secrecy was breached by a stunning leak. The Times reporters James Risen and Eric Lichtblau revealed that the N.S.A. was running a warrantless wiretapping program inside the United States. The paper’s editors had held onto the scoop for more than a year, weighing the propriety of publishing it. According to Bill Keller, the executive editor of the Times, President Bush pleaded with the paper’s editors to not publish the story; Keller told New York that “the basic message was: You’ll have blood on your hands.” After the paper defied the Administration, Bush called the leak “a shameful act.” At his command, federal agents launched a criminal investigation to identify the paper’s source.

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a successor to Trailblazer, code-named Turbulence

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The Purpose of Occupy Wall Street Is to Occupy Wall Street
_{by Michael Moore}

Occupy Wall Street. What other political movement in modern times has won the sympathy and/or support of the majority of the American public—in less than two months? How did this happen? I think it was a revolt that has been percolating across the country since Reagan fired the first air traffic controller. Then, on September 17, 2011, a group of (mostly) young adults decided to take direct action. And this action struck a raw nerve, sending a shock wave throughout the United States, because what these kids were doing was what tens of millions of people wished they could do. The people who have lost their jobs, their homes, their “American dream”—they cathartically cheered on this ragtag bunch who got right in the face of Wall Street and said, “We’re not leaving until you give us our country back!"


By purposely not creating a formal, hierarchical organization with rules and dues and structure and charismatic leaders and spokespeople—all the things their parents told them they would need in order to get anything done—this new way allowed people from all over the country to feel like they were part of the rebellion by simply deciding that they were part of the rebellion. You want to occupy your local bank—do it! You want to occupy your college board of trustees—done! You want to occupy Oakland or Cincinnati or Grass Valley—be our guest! This is your movement, and you can make it what you want it to be.

In the old days, if you were starting a movement, you had to first educate the public about the problem you were trying to fix, and then you had to persuade them to join you. To move America toward a nonracist, nonsexist, nonhomophobic, peace-seeking nation took years—decades—and we’re still not there. But with Occupy Wall Street, you don’t have to convince the majority of Americans that greed rules Wall Street, that the banks have no one’s interests but their own at heart or that corporate America is out to squeeze every last bit of labor and wages out of everyone’s pocket. Everybody gets it. Even those who oppose it. The hardest part of this or any movement—building a majority—has already happened. The people are with us. So now what do we do?

Here’s what we don’t do: don’t turn Occupy Wall Street into another bureaucratic, top-down organization. That will certainly kill it. Baby boomers who grew up working within traditional organizations need to calm down and not shoehorn this movement into the old paradigm of “Let’s elect people to office and then lobby them to pass good laws!” Let Occupy take its natural course. The candidates for office that we need are in this movement. (Are you one of them? Why not? Someone has to do it, and it would be better if it was you!) The laws that must be enacted to make this a more just nation will come in due time. And not ten years from now; some of this will happen this year. The leading candidate for Congress from my hometown of Flint, Michigan, has already taken a pledge to make “getting money out of politics” his top goal once in office. Others have joined him. We need to vote for them and then hold them to it.

But right now, Occupy has to continue as a bold, in-your-face movement—occupying banks, corporate headquarters, board meetings, campuses and Wall Street itself. We need weekly—if not daily—nonviolent assaults right on Wall Street. You have no idea how many people across the country would come to New York City to participate in wave after wave of arrests as they/we attempt to shut down the murderous, thieving machine that is Wall Street. Forty-five thousand people a year die simply because they don’t have health insurance. Do you think they have any relatives, friends, neighbors, parishioners who might be a little upset? How about the 4 million people losing their homes to the banks? Or the millions of students being crushed by debt? I think we could organize a few of them to shut down Wall Street.

And in town after town across America, people need to do similar things, but on a local level. Evictions of people who have been foreclosed upon must be met by citizens occupying the front door of the repossessed home and nonviolently blocking the bank from tossing the family out to the curb. When a neighbor can’t get the medical procedure she needs, people in town must occupy the hospital or the lobby of the insurance company. When a university raises students’ tuition for the umpteenth time, those students must occupy the administration’s office until the board of trustees relents.

It’s important to remember, though, that Occupy Wall Street is about occupying Wall Street. The other Occupies that have sprung up around the country are in solidarity, and while they attack the tentacles and the symptoms of the beast that exist locally everywhere, the head can be chopped off only in one place—and that place is in downtown Manhattan, where this movement started and must continue.

Our kids—the heart and soul of this movement—have watched us for years beating our heads against the walls of power, always marching on Washington, sending in checks to the environmental groups, giving up red meat—and what they got from this is that they are the first generation who will now be worse off than their parents. They still love us (which is remarkable when you think of the world we’ve handed them), but they are taking a different path from ours. Let them. The kids are all right. Do they know where their path will lead? Not necessarily—but that’s the beauty of Occupy Wall Street. The mystery of what’s ahead is the lure. Millions want in on that adventure because, deep down, they know they have no choice. And they know that there’s more of them than the men on Wall Street who currently occupy America. They have no choice but to win.

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N.Y. Passes DNA Requirement For Convicted Criminals

Early on Thursday, lawmakers in New York approved a bill that will make the state the first to require DNA samples from almost all convicted criminals — and make its DNA database one of the largest in the nation.

Most states, including New York, already collect DNA samples from felons, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. What's remarkable about the New York bill is that it would expand the state's database to include DNA from people convicted of almost any crime, even misdemeanors as minor as jumping over a subway turnstile.

Donna Lieberman, director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, is concerned the strain of all that additional DNA will overwhelm the state crime labs that handle it.

"Instead of helping us solve crimes, this may result in the conviction of innocent New Yorkers," she says. "What we've seen in other jurisdictions is that when you engage in the massive expansion of the database like that, there are shortcuts that are taken and there's negligence, there's fraud, there's contamination. And it's really an enormous hurdle for defendants."

The bill's authors did exempt minor marijuana convictions from the DNA reporting requirement. But its backers, including Richard Aborn at the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, say there's a good argument for including even the most minor offenses in the database.

"We know from lots of studies and lots of data now that violent criminals very often begin their careers as nonviolent criminals," Aborn says. "And the earlier you can get a nonviolent criminal's DNA in the data bank, the higher your chances are of apprehending the right person."

That may be why the bill has enjoyed the support of district attorneys all across the state. Aborn says the bill's authors did a good job of making sure that defense lawyers will have access to the database, too. And he points out that DNA can be used to prove innocence, as well as guilt.

"DNA is really the 21st century fingerprint. And it's actually a more accurate fingerprint," he says, "because it has a higher degree of reliability."

But Lieberman disagrees. "This isn't just like a fingerprint," she says. "This is like a whole range of genetic material."

And that material can potentially reveal far more about you, including your genetic makeup and family background. The New York Civil Liberties Union and others wanted to see stronger oversight of the state agency that will handle the database. In fact, so did Assemblyman Joseph Lentol of Brooklyn, who co-sponsored the bill. But Lentol thinks the benefits of the DNA database outweigh the risks.

"If you've committed a crime and you get into the database, all this does is put you in the database," he says. "And it will sit there forever so long as you don't commit another crime. Nobody's gonna use it; no health agencies are going to have access to it."

Maybe not now, say privacy advocates. But they worry that once the DNA is on file, there's no going back.