The heroic Edward Snowden, in his own words, via Jesselyn Radack, at the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee in Brussels. I thank the European Parliament and the LIBE Committee for taking up the challenge of mass surveillance. The surveillance of whole populations, rather than individuals, threatens to be the greatest
Continue readingTag: fascist shift
wmtc: snowden, greenwald, miranda, and the creeping police state: one month later, we should still be disturbed
One month ago, something happened that should trouble us gravely. Something happened that people who believe in democracy and free speech and an independent media and civil liberties and human rights should find appalling and unacceptable. It’s old news by now; anything that occurs one month ago is ancient history.
Continue readingwmtc: the standard double-standard: prison for war resisters, immunity for war criminals
Abby Zimet reports on Common Dreams: Days before Bradley – now Chelsea – Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison for helping expose U.S. war crimes in Iraq, the Obama Department of Justice filed a petition in federal court arguing that the perpetrators of those crimes – Bush, Cheney,
Continue readingwmtc: rtod
Revolutionary thought of the day: No healthy democracy can endure when the most consequential acts of those in power remain secret and unaccountable. Glenn Greenwald
Continue readingwmtc: jeju island and the constitution-free u.s.-canada border: empire and resistance, at home and abroad
I’ve been hoping to write about this for months, but the right post and adequate time never seem to arrive at the same time. Rather than put it off any longer, I’ll pretend this is Tumblr or Pinterest or somesuch, and post it here without additional commentary. * * *
Continue readingwmtc: hear bradley manning’s complete statement, and help spread his words across the internet
The Freedom of the Press Foundation has posted the leaked audio recording of Bradley Manning’s statement to the military court in Ft. Meade. In it, Manning explains why he leaked more than 700,000 government documents to WikiLeaks. FPF also has posted transcript highlights, in case you can’t make it through
Continue readingwmtc: 40 years old and already irrelevant: happy birthday roe v wade
Right now there are no American women who were of reproductive age prior to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion. Yet reproductive rights in the US have never been more threatened. 2011 marked the passage of the most state-level restrictive abortion laws ever. 2012 saw the
Continue readingwmtc: naomi wolf: director kathryn bigelow is our generation’s leni riefenstahl
Naomi Wolf, in The Guardian: Zero Dark Thirty is a gorgeously-shot, two-hour ad for keeping intelligence agents who committed crimes against Guantánamo prisoners out of jail. It makes heroes and heroines out of people who committed violent crimes against other people based on their race – something that has historical
Continue readingwmtc: land of the free: anti-drone activist removed from flight and detained
Via Common Dreams: Pakistan’s anti-drone politician and former cricket-star, Imran Khan, was taken off an international flight from Toronto to New York for questioning over his political views, and his critical stance on US foreign policy, immigration officials have confirmed. “I was taken off from plane and interrogated by US
Continue readingwmtc: voting for obama because of the supreme court? please check your math
When making the case for the differences between US Democrats and Republicans, many people’s first thought is the Supreme Court. High on their list of the importance of SCOTUS is usually Roe v. Wade, the case that established abortion rights for American women. There was a time when I would
Continue readingwmtc: rtod: extremism normalized
Revolutionary thought of the day: Remember when, in the wake of the 9/11 attack, the Patriot Act was controversial, held up as the symbolic face of Bush/Cheney radicalism and widely lamented as a threat to core American liberties and restraints on federal surveillance and detention powers? Yet now, the Patriot
Continue readingwmtc: olympics. not.
The 2012 London Olympics and Paralympics kick off today, with Opening Ceremonies that are supposed to be completely over-the-top. With a £27 million price tag ($42.5 million Canadian) for those three hours alone, they ought to be. We’re told that one billion people worldwide will watch the Opening Ceremonies. I
Continue readingwmtc: i saw so much stupid, i got scared and ran away
I interrupt my Marxism 2011 notes to share with you a frightening vision. No, it wasn’t a vision. It was glimpse of horrifying reality. Last night I did a Twitter search for “Marxism”. But in addition to looking for #Marxism, I also searched on the word, without the hashtag. Big
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