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May 19, 2015
Scotland Yard kept a secret dossier on Star Trek and the X-Files in the run up to the millennium amid security concerns... For years Star Trek fans – known as Trekkies – have been the butt of jokes about their penchant for wearing pointy ears and attending science fiction conventions. But the police feared British fans of the cult American show might boldly go a little too far one day.
It has emerged that Scotland Yard kept a secret dossier on Star Trek, The X-Files, and other US sci fi shows amid fears that British fans would go mad and kill themselves, turn against society or start a weird cult. The American TV shows Roswell and Dark Skies and the film The Lawnmower Man were also monitored to protect the country from rioting and cyber attacks. Special Branch was concerned that people hooked on such material could go into a frenzy triggered by the millennium leading to anarchy. An undated confidential report to the Metropolitan Police, thought to have been filed around 1998-99, listed concerns about conspiracy theorists who believed the end of the world was nigh.
The dossier – called UFO New Religious Movements and the Millennium – was drawn up in response to the 1997 mass suicide by 39 cultists in San Diego known as Heaven's Gate. The group members were "ardent followers of The X-Files and Star Trek" according to Special Branch. The secret briefing note was obtained from the Met under the Freedom of Information Act by Sheffield-based British X-Files expert Dr Dave Clarke while researching a new book, How UFOs Conquered the World. Dr Clarke, who teaches investigative journalism at Sheffield Hallam University, said: "The documents show the police and security services were concerned about the export of some new religious movements concerning UFOs and aliens from the USA in the aftermath of the mass suicide by followers of the Heaven's Gate.
HIGHLY ILLOGICAL...OR AS SAID IN GALAXY QUEST (A FILM PARODY OF STAR TREK) BY the character Guy Fleegman:
"Did you guys ever WATCH the show?"
AS IF FANDOM WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MENTALLY ILL OF THE WORLD....
Secret files reveal police feared that Trekkies could turn on society
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/11611086/Secret-files-reveal-police-feared-that-Trekkies-could-turn-on-society.htmlScotland Yard kept a secret dossier on Star Trek and the X-Files in the run up to the millennium amid security concerns... For years Star Trek fans – known as Trekkies – have been the butt of jokes about their penchant for wearing pointy ears and attending science fiction conventions. But the police feared British fans of the cult American show might boldly go a little too far one day.
It has emerged that Scotland Yard kept a secret dossier on Star Trek, The X-Files, and other US sci fi shows amid fears that British fans would go mad and kill themselves, turn against society or start a weird cult. The American TV shows Roswell and Dark Skies and the film The Lawnmower Man were also monitored to protect the country from rioting and cyber attacks. Special Branch was concerned that people hooked on such material could go into a frenzy triggered by the millennium leading to anarchy. An undated confidential report to the Metropolitan Police, thought to have been filed around 1998-99, listed concerns about conspiracy theorists who believed the end of the world was nigh.
"Fuel is added to the fire by television dramas and feature films mostly produced in America," the report said.
"These draw together the various strands of religion, UFOs, conspiracies, and mystic events and put them in an entertaining storyline.”
It added: "Obviously this is not sinister in itself, what is of concern is the devotion certain groups and individuals ascribe to the contents of these programmes."
The dossier – called UFO New Religious Movements and the Millennium – was drawn up in response to the 1997 mass suicide by 39 cultists in San Diego known as Heaven's Gate. The group members were "ardent followers of The X-Files and Star Trek" according to Special Branch. The secret briefing note was obtained from the Met under the Freedom of Information Act by Sheffield-based British X-Files expert Dr Dave Clarke while researching a new book, How UFOs Conquered the World. Dr Clarke, who teaches investigative journalism at Sheffield Hallam University, said: "The documents show the police and security services were concerned about the export of some new religious movements concerning UFOs and aliens from the USA in the aftermath of the mass suicide by followers of the Heaven's Gate.
"It's no coincidence this occurred around 1997 – which was the 50th anniversary of the birth of UFOs and the Roswell incident – at a time when the net was buzzing with rumours about aliens and cover-ups.”
A Met spokesman said: "We have no knowledge of this."
HIGHLY ILLOGICAL...OR AS SAID IN GALAXY QUEST (A FILM PARODY OF STAR TREK) BY the character Guy Fleegman:
"Did you guys ever WATCH the show?"
AS IF FANDOM WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MENTALLY ILL OF THE WORLD....
May 18, 2015
from the well-that's-a-surprise dept
Here's a surprise ruling. For many years we've written about how troubling it is that Homeland Security agents are able to search the contents of electronic devices, such as computers and phones at the border, without any reason. The 4th Amendment only allows reasonable searches, usually with a warrant. But the general argument has long been that, when you're at the border, you're not in the country and the 4th Amendment doesn't apply. This rule has been stretched at times, including the ability to take your computer and devices into the country and search it there, while still considering it a "border search," for which the lower standards apply. Just about a month ago, we noted that Homeland Security saw no reason to change this policy. (MARCH 2013)
Well, now they might have to.
In a somewhat surprising 9th Circuit ruling (en banc, or in front of the entire set of judges), the court ruled that the 4th Amendment does apply at the border, that agents do need to recognize there's an expectation of privacy, and cannot do a search without reason. Furthermore, they noted that merely encrypting a file with a password is not enough to trigger suspicion. This is a huge ruling in favor of privacy rights. The ruling is pretty careful to strike the right balance on the issues. It notes that a cursory review at the border is reasonable:
But going deeper raises more questions. Looking stuff over, no problem. Performing a forensic analysis? That goes too far and triggers the 4th Amendment. They note that the location of the search is meaningless to this analysis (the actual search happened 170 miles inside the country after the laptop was sent by border agents to somewhere else for analysis). So it's still a border search, but that border search requires a 4th Amendment analysis, according to the court.
For years, we've repeated two key arguments for why border searches of laptops and other devices should be illegal.
You mostly store everything on your laptop. So, unlike a suitcase that you're bringing with you, it's the opposite. You might specifically choose what to exclude, but you don't really choose what to include.
The reason you bring the contents on your laptop over the border is because you're bringing your laptop over the border. If you wanted the content of your laptop to go over the border you'd just send it using the internet. There are no "border guards" on the internet itself, so content flows mostly freely across international boundaries. Thus if anyone wants to get certain content into a country via the internet, they're not doing it by entering that country through border control.
We'd never seen a court even seem to acknowledge that content on devices is different than contents in a suitcase... until now. One interesting tidbit, is that they specifically note that "secure in their papers" part of the 4th Amendment, while noting that what's on your device is often like your personal "papers."
NO KIDDING! MORE AT LINK
9th Circuit: 4th Amendment Applies At Border; Also: Password Protected Files Shouldn't Arouse Suspic
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130308/13380622263/9th-circuit-appeals-court-4th-amendment-applies-border-also-password-protected-files-shouldnt-arouse-suspicion.shtmlfrom the well-that's-a-surprise dept
Here's a surprise ruling. For many years we've written about how troubling it is that Homeland Security agents are able to search the contents of electronic devices, such as computers and phones at the border, without any reason. The 4th Amendment only allows reasonable searches, usually with a warrant. But the general argument has long been that, when you're at the border, you're not in the country and the 4th Amendment doesn't apply. This rule has been stretched at times, including the ability to take your computer and devices into the country and search it there, while still considering it a "border search," for which the lower standards apply. Just about a month ago, we noted that Homeland Security saw no reason to change this policy. (MARCH 2013)
Well, now they might have to.
In a somewhat surprising 9th Circuit ruling (en banc, or in front of the entire set of judges), the court ruled that the 4th Amendment does apply at the border, that agents do need to recognize there's an expectation of privacy, and cannot do a search without reason. Furthermore, they noted that merely encrypting a file with a password is not enough to trigger suspicion. This is a huge ruling in favor of privacy rights. The ruling is pretty careful to strike the right balance on the issues. It notes that a cursory review at the border is reasonable:
Officer Alvarado turned on the devices and opened and viewed image files while the Cottermans waited to enter the country. It was, in principle, akin to the search in Seljan, where we concluded that a suspicionless cursory scan of a package in international transit was not unreasonable.
But going deeper raises more questions. Looking stuff over, no problem. Performing a forensic analysis? That goes too far and triggers the 4th Amendment. They note that the location of the search is meaningless to this analysis (the actual search happened 170 miles inside the country after the laptop was sent by border agents to somewhere else for analysis). So it's still a border search, but that border search requires a 4th Amendment analysis, according to the court.
It is the comprehensive and intrusive nature of a forensic examination—not the location of the examination—that is the key factor triggering the requirement of reasonable suspicion here....
Notwithstanding a traveler’s diminished expectation of privacy at the border, the search is still measured against the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement, which considers the nature and scope of the search. Significantly, the Supreme Court has recognized that the “dignity and privacy interests of the person being searched” at the border will on occasion demand “some level of suspicion in the case of highly intrusive searches of the person.” Flores-Montano, 541 U.S. at 152. Likewise, the Court has explained that “some searches of property are so destructive,” “particularly offensive,” or overly intrusive in the manner in which they are carried out as to require particularized suspicion. Id. at 152, 154 n.2, 155–56; Montoya de Hernandez, 473 U.S. at 541. The Court has never defined the precise dimensions of a reasonable border search, instead pointing to the necessity of a case-by-case analysis....
Notwithstanding a traveler’s diminished expectation of privacy at the border, the search is still measured against the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement, which considers the nature and scope of the search. Significantly, the Supreme Court has recognized that the “dignity and privacy interests of the person being searched” at the border will on occasion demand “some level of suspicion in the case of highly intrusive searches of the person.” Flores-Montano, 541 U.S. at 152. Likewise, the Court has explained that “some searches of property are so destructive,” “particularly offensive,” or overly intrusive in the manner in which they are carried out as to require particularized suspicion. Id. at 152, 154 n.2, 155–56; Montoya de Hernandez, 473 U.S. at 541. The Court has never defined the precise dimensions of a reasonable border search, instead pointing to the necessity of a case-by-case analysis....
For years, we've repeated two key arguments for why border searches of laptops and other devices should be illegal.
We'd never seen a court even seem to acknowledge that content on devices is different than contents in a suitcase... until now. One interesting tidbit, is that they specifically note that "secure in their papers" part of the 4th Amendment, while noting that what's on your device is often like your personal "papers."
NO KIDDING! MORE AT LINK
May 17, 2015
According to Helaine Olen, the lion's share of financial advice served up by so-called experts is useless -- or worse. In her must-read new book, Pound Foolish: Exposing the Dark Side of the Personal Finance Industry, she reveals that to think about money solely in a personal sense causes us to miss the problem. I caught up with Olen to discuss her take on what we're missing, and how to think better and smarter about our financial lives.
Lynn Parramore: Why does America need a book on the personal finance industry? We're messed up about money, right? Don't we need help?
Helaine Olen: We need help, but not the way we think. In a society where salaries have stagnated and fallen, net worth has plunged, even as the costs of things like healthcare, housing and education have gone up at rates well beyond that of inflation, it’s not surprising most of us have financial problems. But most of us still don’t see that we have a societal problem. Instead, we listen to people and organizations that insist our problem is an individual one. As a result, we gobble up books and television programs that offer us the promise of the magical tip that will allow us to fix all our financial woes. Of course, that’s not really possible. So … enter Pound Foolish. You can think of it as the anti-personal finance advice personal finance advice book.
LP: What are the biggest factors that have contributed to our current retirement crisis?
HO:There are so many factors contributing to the retirement crisis it is hard to succinctly list them all. But once upon a time, a majority of us at least had the possibility of receiving a pension when we retired. That’s no longer the case. We’re now expected to do this on our own. And, frankly, most of us aren’t capable of this task, and we have 30 years of evidence – that is, the lifespan of the 401(k) – to prove this fact. We do everything wrong we possibly can. We are unable to save enough money and we don’t invest it well. At the same time, we lack the crucial ability to see the future. We don’t really know when we will retire and why that will occur. We don’t know if our investments will pan out. We don’t know how the greater economic environment will either play out or interact with our lives.
I was reporting on this stuff 15 years ago and I can tell you just about no one said anything like “oh, by the way, you’ll need more than $200,000 just for medical expenses in retirement.” It’s just unfair to expect people – who are not financial experts – to be able to pull this off. The fact is Social Security and other such schemes were created for a reason. There was no imagined past where people saved up for their old age. As the family farm gave way to urbanization and industrialization, old people had this distressing tendency to end up in workhouses – which were as Dickensian as they sound – if they couldn’t convince a relative to take them in. And many couldn’t. Yes, the rates of intergenerational living were higher than they are now, but it wasn’t all The Walton’s.
LP:How does the industry prey on our fears about our inability to save and plan for the future?
HO: We can’t articulate that for all too many of us our problem is not an inability to manage and invest money effectively; it’s that we’re expected to do more and more with less and less. So we think we are individually messing up, that we lack the financial skills and smarts to get ahead. The financial services industry presents itself as our savior. But by doing that, it has to confirm our cultural bias that we are alone responsible for our financial fates.
You see this dynamic especially in personal finance and investment initiatives aimed at women, which contain an almost odd mix of the language of empowerment and infantalization. They tell us we are women, we are so strong because we do so much more around the home and work than men, but yet we are financial illiterates who have no clue. In fact, both sexes have low financial knowledge. Men have more money than women for the most obvious of reasons: they earn more.
LP:You mention the work of economist Teresa Ghilarducci, "the most dangerous woman in America." Who is afraid of her and why?
HO: It became very clear to me while reporting this book that Teresa Ghilarducci had hit a nerve in the financial services sector that no one else had. The reason, to me, was obvious. Most other people discussing retirement reform schemes (Auto IRAs, Save More Tomorrow and the like) were talking about expanding the role – or at least the bottom line of -- the current dominant players on the retirement scene. I mean the retail brokerages, the 401(k) plan providers, the dominant mutual fund companies and the like. Ghilarducci’s Guaranteed Retirement Accounts calls BS on this model. First, she points out how much money the current retirement is making on what we think is our money. Second, her model would bring new players in and I mean new, powerful players – state pension funds, institutional investors, and hedge funds – into the game.
LP:Media figures like Suze Orman, David Bach and David Ramsey tell us, "Follow my advice and everything will be OK." Why is this promise a lie?
HO: All of these people are in the business of selling simplistic solutions to complex problems. Should we live below our means? Of course. Is it always possible to do so? No. It’s not easy to live within your means if your means are a $300-a-week unemployment check. As if that were not enough, some of the advice they are purveying is flat-out wrong. Our financial woes are not the result of spending our funds on lattes and other small luxuries, like David Bach says. You can’t choose not to participate in a recession, despite what Dave Ramsey thinks. Personal finance can’t do it all for us.
LP:You write about the financial literacy movement, which, on first glance, looks like a helpful educational crusade. How has it conspired to make us poorer? What does it mean that big banks like Capital One promote it?
HO: Financial literacy classes sure sound good. But students who take the classes don’t seem to retain much of the knowledge. And, when you think about it for a moment, that makes sense. The idea that taking a class on how finance works at the age of 17 can save someone from a predatory 100-page small-print mortgage when they are 40 is just preposterous. Don’t believe me? Tell me how the French and Indian War contributed to the American Revolution. See what I mean? I swear that was taught in your high school history class.
So you need to move on to the next part of the equation. Why is financial literacy being promoted when we know it doesn’t do much at all for consumers? Well, take a look at who is funding it. It’s the banks and the rest of the financial services sector. Now think about it for a moment. Wouldn’t it just be a heck of a lot easier to not offer certain products, or design them in such a way so that they are easily comprehended, than to take on the seemingly hopeless task of teaching a consumer what a structured product is? Of course. So why isn’t this happening? Well, a cynic might say that’s because financial literacy works quite well at what it was really designed to do and that’s head off legislative protection of consumers.
LP:How does the personal finance industry shape our views about government regulation, like rules that protect consumers?
HO: This is a mixed bag. There are many respectable personal finance journalists pushing for greater transparency and more legal protections for consumers. Ron Lieber at the New York Times, for example, was harping on the need for 401(k) fee disclosure for years before it became law. On the other hand, the financial services industry is always pushing the idea that we can do it, and that we can do it alone. How much that’s impacting our views? Hard to know. They keep telling us we can prepare for retirement ourselves, but the survey data shows that 80 percent of us are out-and-out petrified and want some form of pension back. Perhaps the right question to ask is not how the financial services sector shapes our views about government regulation to protect consumers, but how it shapes the views of the legislators whose campaign they contribute to.
LP:Has your research changed your own behavior and attitude toward personal finance?
HO: Yes, but not in the ways that you would think. I don’t spend any less money, but I am more conscious of spending it in ways that are meaningful. Take my Katie, our poodle. She dines on high-quality dog food (not to mention quite a bit of anything that can be begged), but her “bed” in my office is actually a 20-year-old blanket that I’d never put on a bed any longer but has somehow never gotten tossed. I mean, what does she care if she’s not sleeping on an official dog bed from the pet store versus a blanket that no longer has a color? On the other hand, the quality of the food she eats impacts her health and that I care about quite a bit.
LP:What's the best hope for our financial health? Are we completely screwed?
HO: Our best hope for our personal finances is to realize we aren’t in this alone. There is a powerful culture of shame around money in this country, and it is so powerful it actually seems to prevent us from stepping forward, saying things aren’t working out for us financially, and asking not for charity, but for substantive legislation designed to help us all.
Lynn Parramore is contributing editor at AlterNet. She is cofounder of Recessionwire, founding editor of New Deal 2.0, and author of "Reading the Sphinx: Ancient Egypt in Nineteenth-Century Literary Culture." She received her Ph.D. in English and cultural theory from NYU. Follow her on Twitter @LynnParramore.
Everything You've Been Told About Personal Finance Is Dead Wrong
http://www.alternet.org/economy/everything-youve-been-told-about-personal-finance-dead-wrong-heres-truthAccording to Helaine Olen, the lion's share of financial advice served up by so-called experts is useless -- or worse. In her must-read new book, Pound Foolish: Exposing the Dark Side of the Personal Finance Industry, she reveals that to think about money solely in a personal sense causes us to miss the problem. I caught up with Olen to discuss her take on what we're missing, and how to think better and smarter about our financial lives.
Lynn Parramore: Why does America need a book on the personal finance industry? We're messed up about money, right? Don't we need help?
Helaine Olen: We need help, but not the way we think. In a society where salaries have stagnated and fallen, net worth has plunged, even as the costs of things like healthcare, housing and education have gone up at rates well beyond that of inflation, it’s not surprising most of us have financial problems. But most of us still don’t see that we have a societal problem. Instead, we listen to people and organizations that insist our problem is an individual one. As a result, we gobble up books and television programs that offer us the promise of the magical tip that will allow us to fix all our financial woes. Of course, that’s not really possible. So … enter Pound Foolish. You can think of it as the anti-personal finance advice personal finance advice book.
LP: What are the biggest factors that have contributed to our current retirement crisis?
HO:There are so many factors contributing to the retirement crisis it is hard to succinctly list them all. But once upon a time, a majority of us at least had the possibility of receiving a pension when we retired. That’s no longer the case. We’re now expected to do this on our own. And, frankly, most of us aren’t capable of this task, and we have 30 years of evidence – that is, the lifespan of the 401(k) – to prove this fact. We do everything wrong we possibly can. We are unable to save enough money and we don’t invest it well. At the same time, we lack the crucial ability to see the future. We don’t really know when we will retire and why that will occur. We don’t know if our investments will pan out. We don’t know how the greater economic environment will either play out or interact with our lives.
I was reporting on this stuff 15 years ago and I can tell you just about no one said anything like “oh, by the way, you’ll need more than $200,000 just for medical expenses in retirement.” It’s just unfair to expect people – who are not financial experts – to be able to pull this off. The fact is Social Security and other such schemes were created for a reason. There was no imagined past where people saved up for their old age. As the family farm gave way to urbanization and industrialization, old people had this distressing tendency to end up in workhouses – which were as Dickensian as they sound – if they couldn’t convince a relative to take them in. And many couldn’t. Yes, the rates of intergenerational living were higher than they are now, but it wasn’t all The Walton’s.
LP:How does the industry prey on our fears about our inability to save and plan for the future?
HO: We can’t articulate that for all too many of us our problem is not an inability to manage and invest money effectively; it’s that we’re expected to do more and more with less and less. So we think we are individually messing up, that we lack the financial skills and smarts to get ahead. The financial services industry presents itself as our savior. But by doing that, it has to confirm our cultural bias that we are alone responsible for our financial fates.
You see this dynamic especially in personal finance and investment initiatives aimed at women, which contain an almost odd mix of the language of empowerment and infantalization. They tell us we are women, we are so strong because we do so much more around the home and work than men, but yet we are financial illiterates who have no clue. In fact, both sexes have low financial knowledge. Men have more money than women for the most obvious of reasons: they earn more.
LP:You mention the work of economist Teresa Ghilarducci, "the most dangerous woman in America." Who is afraid of her and why?
HO: It became very clear to me while reporting this book that Teresa Ghilarducci had hit a nerve in the financial services sector that no one else had. The reason, to me, was obvious. Most other people discussing retirement reform schemes (Auto IRAs, Save More Tomorrow and the like) were talking about expanding the role – or at least the bottom line of -- the current dominant players on the retirement scene. I mean the retail brokerages, the 401(k) plan providers, the dominant mutual fund companies and the like. Ghilarducci’s Guaranteed Retirement Accounts calls BS on this model. First, she points out how much money the current retirement is making on what we think is our money. Second, her model would bring new players in and I mean new, powerful players – state pension funds, institutional investors, and hedge funds – into the game.
LP:Media figures like Suze Orman, David Bach and David Ramsey tell us, "Follow my advice and everything will be OK." Why is this promise a lie?
HO: All of these people are in the business of selling simplistic solutions to complex problems. Should we live below our means? Of course. Is it always possible to do so? No. It’s not easy to live within your means if your means are a $300-a-week unemployment check. As if that were not enough, some of the advice they are purveying is flat-out wrong. Our financial woes are not the result of spending our funds on lattes and other small luxuries, like David Bach says. You can’t choose not to participate in a recession, despite what Dave Ramsey thinks. Personal finance can’t do it all for us.
LP:You write about the financial literacy movement, which, on first glance, looks like a helpful educational crusade. How has it conspired to make us poorer? What does it mean that big banks like Capital One promote it?
HO: Financial literacy classes sure sound good. But students who take the classes don’t seem to retain much of the knowledge. And, when you think about it for a moment, that makes sense. The idea that taking a class on how finance works at the age of 17 can save someone from a predatory 100-page small-print mortgage when they are 40 is just preposterous. Don’t believe me? Tell me how the French and Indian War contributed to the American Revolution. See what I mean? I swear that was taught in your high school history class.
So you need to move on to the next part of the equation. Why is financial literacy being promoted when we know it doesn’t do much at all for consumers? Well, take a look at who is funding it. It’s the banks and the rest of the financial services sector. Now think about it for a moment. Wouldn’t it just be a heck of a lot easier to not offer certain products, or design them in such a way so that they are easily comprehended, than to take on the seemingly hopeless task of teaching a consumer what a structured product is? Of course. So why isn’t this happening? Well, a cynic might say that’s because financial literacy works quite well at what it was really designed to do and that’s head off legislative protection of consumers.
LP:How does the personal finance industry shape our views about government regulation, like rules that protect consumers?
HO: This is a mixed bag. There are many respectable personal finance journalists pushing for greater transparency and more legal protections for consumers. Ron Lieber at the New York Times, for example, was harping on the need for 401(k) fee disclosure for years before it became law. On the other hand, the financial services industry is always pushing the idea that we can do it, and that we can do it alone. How much that’s impacting our views? Hard to know. They keep telling us we can prepare for retirement ourselves, but the survey data shows that 80 percent of us are out-and-out petrified and want some form of pension back. Perhaps the right question to ask is not how the financial services sector shapes our views about government regulation to protect consumers, but how it shapes the views of the legislators whose campaign they contribute to.
LP:Has your research changed your own behavior and attitude toward personal finance?
HO: Yes, but not in the ways that you would think. I don’t spend any less money, but I am more conscious of spending it in ways that are meaningful. Take my Katie, our poodle. She dines on high-quality dog food (not to mention quite a bit of anything that can be begged), but her “bed” in my office is actually a 20-year-old blanket that I’d never put on a bed any longer but has somehow never gotten tossed. I mean, what does she care if she’s not sleeping on an official dog bed from the pet store versus a blanket that no longer has a color? On the other hand, the quality of the food she eats impacts her health and that I care about quite a bit.
LP:What's the best hope for our financial health? Are we completely screwed?
HO: Our best hope for our personal finances is to realize we aren’t in this alone. There is a powerful culture of shame around money in this country, and it is so powerful it actually seems to prevent us from stepping forward, saying things aren’t working out for us financially, and asking not for charity, but for substantive legislation designed to help us all.
Lynn Parramore is contributing editor at AlterNet. She is cofounder of Recessionwire, founding editor of New Deal 2.0, and author of "Reading the Sphinx: Ancient Egypt in Nineteenth-Century Literary Culture." She received her Ph.D. in English and cultural theory from NYU. Follow her on Twitter @LynnParramore.
May 17, 2015
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/03/attorney-general-holder-prez-can-assassinate-americans-on-u-s-soil.htmlBecause America Is a Battlefield In The Eyes of the Government
Attorney general Eric Holder wrote the following to Senator Rand Paul yesterday:
There’s more to the following statement than appears at first blush:
Specifically, Holder did not say “we are legally constrained by the Constitution from depriving people of life, liberty or property without due process of law, and from using military force on U.S. soil”. Instead, he said that the Obama administration was so far abstaining from using a power it already has as a current “policy” decision.
John Glaser notes:
This is not entirely surprising. As we noted in December 2011, a top constitutional expert confirmed that Obama was claiming the authority to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil. We reported that month:
For more than a year and a half, the Obama administration has said it could target American citizens for assassination without any trial or due process.
But now, as shown by the debates surrounding indefinite detention, the government is saying that America itself is a battlefield.
AP notes today:
U.S. citizens are legitimate military targets when they take up arms with al-Qaida, top national security lawyers in the Obama administration said Thursday.
***
The government lawyers, CIA counsel Stephen Preston and Pentagon counsel Jeh Johnson … said U.S. citizens do not have immunity when they are at war with the United States.
Johnson said only the executive branch, not the courts, is equipped to make military battlefield targeting decisions about who qualifies as an enemy.
The courts in habeas cases, such as those involving whether a detainee should be released from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba, make the determination of who can be considered an enemy combatant.
We pointed out a year ago, the director of the FBI said he’d have to “check” to see if the president had the authority to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil. We reported last October that form Department of Justice lawyer John Yoo – the guy who wrote the memo justifying torture, even of children, which was used to justify torture of innocent people, including children – said that the president has the power to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil in times of war.
And Mother Jones notes:
In a Google+ Hangout last month, President Obama refused to say directly if he had the authority to use lethal force against US citizens. As Mother Jones reported at the time, the reason the president was being so coy is that the answer was likely yes. Now we know that’s exactly what was happening.
It is not very reassuring that the same unaccountable agency which decides who should be killed by drones also spies on all Americans.
Indeed:
You might assume – in a vacuum – that this might be okay (even though it trashes the Constitution, the separation of military and police actions, and the division between internal and external affairs).
But it is dangerous in a climate where you can be labeled as or suspected of being a terrorist simply for questioning war, protesting anything, asking questions about pollution or about Wall Street shenanigans, supporting Ron Paul, being a libertarian, holding gold, or stocking up on more than 7 days of food. And see this.
And it is problematic in a period in which FBI agents and CIA intelligence officials, constitutional law expert professor Jonathan Turley, Time Magazine, Keith Olbermann and the Washington Post have all said that U.S. government officials “were trying to create an atmosphere of fear in which the American people would give them more power”, and even former Secretary of Homeland Security – Tom Ridge – admitst hat he was pressured to raise terror alerts to help Bush win reelection.
And it is counter-productive in an age when the government – instead of doing the things which could actually make us safer – are doing things which increase the risk of terrorism.
And it is insane in a time of perpetual war. See this, this, this and this.
And when the “War on Terror” in the Middle East and North Africa which is being used to justify the attack on Americans was planned long before 9/11.
And when Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser told the Senate in 2007 that the war on terror is “a mythical historical narrative”. And 9/11 was entirely foreseeable, but wasn’t stopped. Indeed, no one in Washington even wants to hear how 9/11 happened, even though that is necessary to stop future terrorist attacks. And the military has bombed a bunch of oil-rich countries when it could have instead taken out Bin Laden years ago.
As I noted in [an analogous context]:
The government’s indefinite detention policy – stripped of it’s spin – is literally insane, and based on circular reasoning. Stripped of p.r., this is the actual policy:
If you are an enemy combatant or a threat to national security, we will detain you indefinitely until the war is over
It is a perpetual war, which will never be over
Neither you or your lawyers have a right to see the evidence against you, nor to face your accusers
But trust us, we know you are an enemy combatant and a threat to national security
We may torture you (and try to cover up the fact that you were tortured), because you are an enemy combatant, and so basic rights of a prisoner guaranteed by the Geneva Convention don’t apply to you
Since you admitted that you’re a bad guy (while trying to tell us whatever you think we want to hear to make the torture stop), it proves that we should hold you in indefinite detention
See how that works?
And – given that U.S. soldiers admit that if they accidentally kill innocent Iraqis and Afghanis, they then “drop” automatic weapons near their body so they can pretend they were militants – it is unlikely that the government would ever admit that an American citizen it assassinated was an innocent civilian who has nothing at all to do with terrorism.
Read this if you have any doubt as to how much liberty Americans have lost.
Senator Paul told MSNBC:
Attorney General Holder: Prez Can Assassinate Americans On U.S. Soil March 6, 2013
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/03/attorney-general-holder-prez-can-assassinate-americans-on-u-s-soil.htmlBecause America Is a Battlefield In The Eyes of the Government
Attorney general Eric Holder wrote the following to Senator Rand Paul yesterday:
On February 20, 2013, you wrote to John Brennan requesting additional information concerning the Administration’s views about whether “the President has the power to authorize lethal force, such as drone strike, against a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil, and without trial.”
As members of this administration have previously indicated, the US government has not carried out drone strikes in the United States and has no intention of doing so. As a policy matter moreover, we reject the use of military force where well-established law enforcement authorities in this country provide the best means for incapacitating a terrorist threat. We have a long history of using the criminal justice system to incapacitate individuals located in our country who pose a threat to the United States and its interests abroad. Hundreds of individuals have been arrested and convicted of terrorism-related offenses in our federal courts.
The question you have posed is therefore entirely hypothetical, unlikely to occur, and one we hope no president will ever have to confront. It is possible, I suppose, to imagine an extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate under the Constitution and applicable laws of the United States for the President to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the United States. For example, the president could conceivably have no choice but to authorize the military to use such force if necessary to protect the homeland in the circumstances like a catastrophic attack like the ones suffered on December 7, 1941, and September 11, 2001.
Were such an emergency to arise, I would examine the particular facts and circumstances before advising the President on the scope of his authority.
As members of this administration have previously indicated, the US government has not carried out drone strikes in the United States and has no intention of doing so. As a policy matter moreover, we reject the use of military force where well-established law enforcement authorities in this country provide the best means for incapacitating a terrorist threat. We have a long history of using the criminal justice system to incapacitate individuals located in our country who pose a threat to the United States and its interests abroad. Hundreds of individuals have been arrested and convicted of terrorism-related offenses in our federal courts.
The question you have posed is therefore entirely hypothetical, unlikely to occur, and one we hope no president will ever have to confront. It is possible, I suppose, to imagine an extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate under the Constitution and applicable laws of the United States for the President to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the United States. For example, the president could conceivably have no choice but to authorize the military to use such force if necessary to protect the homeland in the circumstances like a catastrophic attack like the ones suffered on December 7, 1941, and September 11, 2001.
Were such an emergency to arise, I would examine the particular facts and circumstances before advising the President on the scope of his authority.
There’s more to the following statement than appears at first blush:
As a policy matter moreover, we reject the use of military force where well-established law enforcement authorities in this country provide the best means for incapacitating a terrorist threat.
Specifically, Holder did not say “we are legally constrained by the Constitution from depriving people of life, liberty or property without due process of law, and from using military force on U.S. soil”. Instead, he said that the Obama administration was so far abstaining from using a power it already has as a current “policy” decision.
John Glaser notes:
The concluding legal opinion represents a radical betrayal of constitutional limits imposed on the state for depriving citizens of life, liberty and property. Officially now, Obama’s kingly authority to play Judge, Jury, and Executioner and deprive Americans of their life without due process of law applies not only to Americans abroad but to citizens that are inside the United States.
“The US Attorney General’s refusal to rule out the possibility of drone strikes on American citizens and on American soil is more than frightening – it is an affront the Constitutional due process rights of all Americans,” Sen. Paul said in a statement.
Holder, along with the Obama administration, is making it seem as if the President’s use of lethal force, as in the drone war, would only be used in circumstances like another impending 9/11 attack or something. Only when an attack is imminent.
But that categorical limitation on the President’s authority to kill depends upon their definition of “imminence,” which we learned from a leaked Justice Department white paper last month, is extremely broad.
The memo refers to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than what has traditionally been required, like actual intelligence of an ongoing plot against the US.
“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states, contradicting conventional international law.
Instead, so long as an “informed, high-level” US official claims the targeted American has been “recently” involved in “activities” that pose a threat and “there is no evidence suggesting that he has renounced or abandoned such activities,” then the President can order his assassination. The memo does not define “recently” or “activities.”
Holder also insists that in the case of such “extraordinary circumstances,” like another impending 9/11, he ”would examine the particular facts and circumstances before advising the president of the scope of his authority.”
Boy, do I feel comforted.
“The US Attorney General’s refusal to rule out the possibility of drone strikes on American citizens and on American soil is more than frightening – it is an affront the Constitutional due process rights of all Americans,” Sen. Paul said in a statement.
Holder, along with the Obama administration, is making it seem as if the President’s use of lethal force, as in the drone war, would only be used in circumstances like another impending 9/11 attack or something. Only when an attack is imminent.
But that categorical limitation on the President’s authority to kill depends upon their definition of “imminence,” which we learned from a leaked Justice Department white paper last month, is extremely broad.
The memo refers to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than what has traditionally been required, like actual intelligence of an ongoing plot against the US.
“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states, contradicting conventional international law.
Instead, so long as an “informed, high-level” US official claims the targeted American has been “recently” involved in “activities” that pose a threat and “there is no evidence suggesting that he has renounced or abandoned such activities,” then the President can order his assassination. The memo does not define “recently” or “activities.”
Holder also insists that in the case of such “extraordinary circumstances,” like another impending 9/11, he ”would examine the particular facts and circumstances before advising the president of the scope of his authority.”
Boy, do I feel comforted.
This is not entirely surprising. As we noted in December 2011, a top constitutional expert confirmed that Obama was claiming the authority to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil. We reported that month:
For more than a year and a half, the Obama administration has said it could target American citizens for assassination without any trial or due process.
But now, as shown by the debates surrounding indefinite detention, the government is saying that America itself is a battlefield.
AP notes today:
U.S. citizens are legitimate military targets when they take up arms with al-Qaida, top national security lawyers in the Obama administration said Thursday.
***
The government lawyers, CIA counsel Stephen Preston and Pentagon counsel Jeh Johnson … said U.S. citizens do not have immunity when they are at war with the United States.
Johnson said only the executive branch, not the courts, is equipped to make military battlefield targeting decisions about who qualifies as an enemy.
The courts in habeas cases, such as those involving whether a detainee should be released from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba, make the determination of who can be considered an enemy combatant.
We pointed out a year ago, the director of the FBI said he’d have to “check” to see if the president had the authority to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil. We reported last October that form Department of Justice lawyer John Yoo – the guy who wrote the memo justifying torture, even of children, which was used to justify torture of innocent people, including children – said that the president has the power to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil in times of war.
And Mother Jones notes:
In a Google+ Hangout last month, President Obama refused to say directly if he had the authority to use lethal force against US citizens. As Mother Jones reported at the time, the reason the president was being so coy is that the answer was likely yes. Now we know that’s exactly what was happening.
It is not very reassuring that the same unaccountable agency which decides who should be killed by drones also spies on all Americans.
Indeed:
You might assume – in a vacuum – that this might be okay (even though it trashes the Constitution, the separation of military and police actions, and the division between internal and external affairs).
But it is dangerous in a climate where you can be labeled as or suspected of being a terrorist simply for questioning war, protesting anything, asking questions about pollution or about Wall Street shenanigans, supporting Ron Paul, being a libertarian, holding gold, or stocking up on more than 7 days of food. And see this.
And it is problematic in a period in which FBI agents and CIA intelligence officials, constitutional law expert professor Jonathan Turley, Time Magazine, Keith Olbermann and the Washington Post have all said that U.S. government officials “were trying to create an atmosphere of fear in which the American people would give them more power”, and even former Secretary of Homeland Security – Tom Ridge – admitst hat he was pressured to raise terror alerts to help Bush win reelection.
And it is counter-productive in an age when the government – instead of doing the things which could actually make us safer – are doing things which increase the risk of terrorism.
And it is insane in a time of perpetual war. See this, this, this and this.
And when the “War on Terror” in the Middle East and North Africa which is being used to justify the attack on Americans was planned long before 9/11.
And when Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser told the Senate in 2007 that the war on terror is “a mythical historical narrative”. And 9/11 was entirely foreseeable, but wasn’t stopped. Indeed, no one in Washington even wants to hear how 9/11 happened, even though that is necessary to stop future terrorist attacks. And the military has bombed a bunch of oil-rich countries when it could have instead taken out Bin Laden years ago.
As I noted in [an analogous context]:
The government’s indefinite detention policy – stripped of it’s spin – is literally insane, and based on circular reasoning. Stripped of p.r., this is the actual policy:
If you are an enemy combatant or a threat to national security, we will detain you indefinitely until the war is over
It is a perpetual war, which will never be over
Neither you or your lawyers have a right to see the evidence against you, nor to face your accusers
But trust us, we know you are an enemy combatant and a threat to national security
We may torture you (and try to cover up the fact that you were tortured), because you are an enemy combatant, and so basic rights of a prisoner guaranteed by the Geneva Convention don’t apply to you
Since you admitted that you’re a bad guy (while trying to tell us whatever you think we want to hear to make the torture stop), it proves that we should hold you in indefinite detention
See how that works?
And – given that U.S. soldiers admit that if they accidentally kill innocent Iraqis and Afghanis, they then “drop” automatic weapons near their body so they can pretend they were militants – it is unlikely that the government would ever admit that an American citizen it assassinated was an innocent civilian who has nothing at all to do with terrorism.
Read this if you have any doubt as to how much liberty Americans have lost.
Senator Paul told MSNBC:
The response by Holder could lead to a situation where “an Arab-American in Dearborn (Mich.) is walking down the street emailing with a friend in the Mideast and all of a sudden we drop a drone” on him. He said it was “really shocking” that President Barack Obama, a former constitutional law professor, would leave the door open to such a possibility.
May 16, 2015
In her quarrel with President Barack Obama over trade legislation, Elizabeth Warren has got the law on her side. The Massachusetts senator has warned fellow Democrats that a fast-track trade bill now in Congress could undo U.S. laws such as the Dodd-Frank banking regulations later. A number of constitutional scholars and other legal experts say she’s right. The reason: An arcane trade-bill provision that would make it easier for a future president and Congress to undercut existing statutes, even ones with little to do with trade.
The risk to Dodd-Frank is “real and meaningful and worth worrying about,” said Michael Barr, Obama’s former assistant Treasury secretary for financial institutions and an architect of the financial law. Barr said a hostile president might weaken the law through other means, such as a legislative assault or regulatory maneuvers.
The fight pits two of the most popular Democrats in the country against one another. Obama’s support of fast-track trade authority and regional free-trade deals under negotiation with Pacific Rim and European nations places him sharply at odds with most of his party.
Simple Majority
Warren says she’s concerned that Republicans could include provisions in a future trade deal undercutting Dodd-Frank. They could then pass it with a simple majority in the U.S. Senate because the fast-track bill would prevent Democrats from blocking the legislation through a filibuster. Normally, it takes 60 votes to break a filibuster.
Obama called Warren’s contention “absolutely wrong” in an interview with Yahoo News, and said he’d “have to be pretty stupid” to agree to a trade deal that would undermine the Dodd-Frank law he signed himself....
NO COMMENT
Bloomberg: Why Obama Is Wrong And Elizabeth Warren Is Right On Trade Bill Dispute
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-05-15/warren-claim-that-trade-bill-could-undermine-dodd-frank-is-rightIn her quarrel with President Barack Obama over trade legislation, Elizabeth Warren has got the law on her side. The Massachusetts senator has warned fellow Democrats that a fast-track trade bill now in Congress could undo U.S. laws such as the Dodd-Frank banking regulations later. A number of constitutional scholars and other legal experts say she’s right. The reason: An arcane trade-bill provision that would make it easier for a future president and Congress to undercut existing statutes, even ones with little to do with trade.
The risk to Dodd-Frank is “real and meaningful and worth worrying about,” said Michael Barr, Obama’s former assistant Treasury secretary for financial institutions and an architect of the financial law. Barr said a hostile president might weaken the law through other means, such as a legislative assault or regulatory maneuvers.
The fight pits two of the most popular Democrats in the country against one another. Obama’s support of fast-track trade authority and regional free-trade deals under negotiation with Pacific Rim and European nations places him sharply at odds with most of his party.
Simple Majority
Warren says she’s concerned that Republicans could include provisions in a future trade deal undercutting Dodd-Frank. They could then pass it with a simple majority in the U.S. Senate because the fast-track bill would prevent Democrats from blocking the legislation through a filibuster. Normally, it takes 60 votes to break a filibuster.
“In the next few weeks, Congress will decide whether to give the president fast-track authority,” she said in a May 5 speech to the Institute for New Economic Thinking in Washington. “If fast-track passes, a Republican president could easily use a future trade deal to override our domestic financial rules.”
Obama called Warren’s contention “absolutely wrong” in an interview with Yahoo News, and said he’d “have to be pretty stupid” to agree to a trade deal that would undermine the Dodd-Frank law he signed himself....
NO COMMENT
May 16, 2015
Study suggests amantadine may gently awaken patients in vegetative, minimally conscious states -- A drug that's typically used to treat the flu and Parkinson's disease appears to speed recovery in traumatic brain injury patients, a new study indicates. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) victims who weren't fully conscious and were discharged to rehabilitation facilities after hospitalization were given amantadine hydrochloride. The drug is already given "off-label" to such patients, but if and how much it helps has remained unclear. While taking the drug, the patients given amantadine scored better on behavioral tests that measure how well the brain is functioning compared to a group of patients given a placebo, researchers report in the March 1 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.
Study co-author Dr. John Whyte, director of the Moss Rehabilitation Research Institute at Albert Einstein Healthcare Network, in the Philadelphia area, said previous observational studies had suggested amantadine improved the rate of recovery. While the medicine is already commonly prescribed off-label to treat people suffering from prolonged disorders of consciousness, he said this is the first placebo-controlled trial of the drug in patients who were either in a vegetative state (wakeful but not aware) or a minimally conscious state (able to track with their eyes).
For the study, 184 patients from 11 medical centers in three countries were enrolled. They had all suffered a TBI within the previous one to four months. Half received amantadine while the other half were given a placebo for the first four weeks of the six-week study. Both groups were followed up for two additional weeks, Whyte said. The researchers used the Disability Rating Scale (DRS) to monitor patients' progress during the treatment and follow-up period. The test measures eye opening, verbal ability and motor response, among other functions, Giacino said.
MORE
Drug Seems to Speed Recovery After Traumatic Brain Injury
http://www.wunderground.com/DisplayHealthDay.asp?id=662275Study suggests amantadine may gently awaken patients in vegetative, minimally conscious states -- A drug that's typically used to treat the flu and Parkinson's disease appears to speed recovery in traumatic brain injury patients, a new study indicates. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) victims who weren't fully conscious and were discharged to rehabilitation facilities after hospitalization were given amantadine hydrochloride. The drug is already given "off-label" to such patients, but if and how much it helps has remained unclear. While taking the drug, the patients given amantadine scored better on behavioral tests that measure how well the brain is functioning compared to a group of patients given a placebo, researchers report in the March 1 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.
"Amantadine appeared to increase the rate of recovery compared to placebo. Patients got better faster while they were on the drug," said study co-author Joseph Giacino, director of rehabilitation neuropsychology at the Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, in Boston, and an associate professor in the department of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Harvard Medical School.
Study co-author Dr. John Whyte, director of the Moss Rehabilitation Research Institute at Albert Einstein Healthcare Network, in the Philadelphia area, said previous observational studies had suggested amantadine improved the rate of recovery. While the medicine is already commonly prescribed off-label to treat people suffering from prolonged disorders of consciousness, he said this is the first placebo-controlled trial of the drug in patients who were either in a vegetative state (wakeful but not aware) or a minimally conscious state (able to track with their eyes).
"There were many hypotheses out there about what this drug should do, but there was very little data to support or refute those hypotheses," Whyte explained.
For the study, 184 patients from 11 medical centers in three countries were enrolled. They had all suffered a TBI within the previous one to four months. Half received amantadine while the other half were given a placebo for the first four weeks of the six-week study. Both groups were followed up for two additional weeks, Whyte said. The researchers used the Disability Rating Scale (DRS) to monitor patients' progress during the treatment and follow-up period. The test measures eye opening, verbal ability and motor response, among other functions, Giacino said.
"During the four-week treatment period, recovery was significantly faster in the amantadine group than the placebo group," said Giacino.
MORE
May 15, 2015
See that sad little, forgotten island in the Greater Antilles on the far right? That's where we are going this Weekend...
Puerto Ricans often call the island Borinquen - a derivation of Borikén, its indigenous Taíno name, which means "Land of the Valiant Lord". The terms boricua and borincano derive from Borikén and Borinquen respectively, and are commonly used to identify someone of Puerto Rican heritage. The island is also popularly known in Spanish as la isla del encanto, meaning "the island of enchantment".
Columbus named the island San Juan Bautista, in honor of the Catholic Saint John the Baptist, while the capital city was named Ciudad de Puerto Rico (English: Rich Port City). Eventually traders and other maritime visitors came to refer to the entire island as Puerto Rico, while San Juan became the name used for the main trading/shipping port and the capital city.
Weekend Economists Visit Borinquen, La Isla del Encanto May 15-17, 2015
FUN FACT: Today is a numerical palindrome 5/15/15/ or 51515
See that sad little, forgotten island in the Greater Antilles on the far right? That's where we are going this Weekend...
Puerto Ricans often call the island Borinquen - a derivation of Borikén, its indigenous Taíno name, which means "Land of the Valiant Lord". The terms boricua and borincano derive from Borikén and Borinquen respectively, and are commonly used to identify someone of Puerto Rican heritage. The island is also popularly known in Spanish as la isla del encanto, meaning "the island of enchantment".
Columbus named the island San Juan Bautista, in honor of the Catholic Saint John the Baptist, while the capital city was named Ciudad de Puerto Rico (English: Rich Port City). Eventually traders and other maritime visitors came to refer to the entire island as Puerto Rico, while San Juan became the name used for the main trading/shipping port and the capital city.
May 14, 2015
After a rare show of spine yesterday, Senate Democrats blocked the Administration plan to bring the Fast Track authorization (FTA), which would effectively secure passage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTiP), to a debate. This was a bloody nose to Obama. Knowing that the House had the potential to be a battleground for the bill, the Adminstration chose to originate it in the Senate, with the idea that they’d get swift passage with a comfortable majority which would help persuade fence-sitters and weak opponents. Instead, the fight in the Senate went much better than the trade deal’s opponents dared hoped, tuning into a high-profile drama and showing how deep-seated opposition to the bill is.
Today, Obama got ten Democratic senators to flip their votes without giving them the concession that they had wanted, that of passing a set of other trade-related provisions along with Fast Track authorization. As we indicated yesterday, one of the changes they had wanted, putting more stringent sanctions in place against foreign government currency manipulation, was anathema to the Administration. So after what appears to have been no more than a dressing down, ten Democratic party senators relented, giving Obama a clear path to moving Fast Track authorization to a vote in the Senate.
Now do not forget that the key vote was and remains in the House. As Lori Wallach of Public Citizen, which has done impressive, sustained work on trade deals over the years, said on Democracy Now yesterday morning, before Obama won over his Judases:
It is important to let the ten turncoat Senators know that their constituents tell them that they are supposed to represent their interest, and not carry water for the President. As Lambert noted in comments yesterday :
Therefore, in addition to calling your Representative (contact information here) be SURE to call your Senators if they are one of the traitors whose sellout was critical to Obama expecting to pass Fast Track later today. As reader Ulysses wrote:
MORE AT LINK
And again, thanks for your efforts so far in this important fight, and keep the pressure on!
Give the Democratic Trade Turncoats Hell Over Fast Track Vote
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/05/give-the-democratic-trade-turncoats-hell-over-fast-track-vote.html#comment-2443890After a rare show of spine yesterday, Senate Democrats blocked the Administration plan to bring the Fast Track authorization (FTA), which would effectively secure passage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTiP), to a debate. This was a bloody nose to Obama. Knowing that the House had the potential to be a battleground for the bill, the Adminstration chose to originate it in the Senate, with the idea that they’d get swift passage with a comfortable majority which would help persuade fence-sitters and weak opponents. Instead, the fight in the Senate went much better than the trade deal’s opponents dared hoped, tuning into a high-profile drama and showing how deep-seated opposition to the bill is.
Today, Obama got ten Democratic senators to flip their votes without giving them the concession that they had wanted, that of passing a set of other trade-related provisions along with Fast Track authorization. As we indicated yesterday, one of the changes they had wanted, putting more stringent sanctions in place against foreign government currency manipulation, was anathema to the Administration. So after what appears to have been no more than a dressing down, ten Democratic party senators relented, giving Obama a clear path to moving Fast Track authorization to a vote in the Senate.
Now do not forget that the key vote was and remains in the House. As Lori Wallach of Public Citizen, which has done impressive, sustained work on trade deals over the years, said on Democracy Now yesterday morning, before Obama won over his Judases:
But it’s not over. It’s going to come back up for another repackaging. It was a very important signal, because the whole point in going to the Senate was to show, oh, fast track has momentum, because in the House it’s in real, honest-to-God trouble. In the Senate, it’s more like skirmishes, that show how extremely well the public has done in making their senators, as well as their House members, wary of doing this trade vote. But in the Senate, eventually they will get the vote. In the House, different piece of business. And so, folks who don’t want to see fast track, the House is the place to focus. But for the next couple of weeks, call your senators, because it’s an interesting food fight.
It is important to let the ten turncoat Senators know that their constituents tell them that they are supposed to represent their interest, and not carry water for the President. As Lambert noted in comments yesterday :
One of signs that the Roman Republic was in terminal decay was that the Senate stopped insisting on its institutional prerogatives. Ceasar Augustus, being very smart, stabilized the imperial system by restoring the forms of their institutional power, but never the substance.
So if the Senate wants to stay the Senate, they need to whack Obama on this, hard. That’s why Warren pointing out the absurdity of (substantively) passing the bill by approving Fast Track, and then (formally) passing it without the power to amend it, is such a powerful argument.
So if the Senate wants to stay the Senate, they need to whack Obama on this, hard. That’s why Warren pointing out the absurdity of (substantively) passing the bill by approving Fast Track, and then (formally) passing it without the power to amend it, is such a powerful argument.
Therefore, in addition to calling your Representative (contact information here) be SURE to call your Senators if they are one of the traitors whose sellout was critical to Obama expecting to pass Fast Track later today. As reader Ulysses wrote:
These are the ten Senate Dems who were in a White House meeting, earlier today, and enlisted to assist the GOP with giving President Obama fast-track approval tomorrow:
Tom Carper (Del),
Michael Bennet (Colo.),
Maria Cantwell (Wash.),
Ben Cardin (Md.),
Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.),
Tim Kaine (Va.),
Patty Murray (Wash.),
Bill Nelson (Fla.),
Mark Warner (Va.) and
Ron Wyden (Ore.).
SENATE CONTACT DETAILS
I appeal to anyone who lives in any of these Senators’ states to contact them and urge them not to give fast-track authority tomorrow!! Carper and Wyden are probably lost causes, but the rest of them may be susceptible to constituent pressure. THANK YOUR SENATOR WHO OPPOSED FAST TRACK!
Tom Carper (Del),
Michael Bennet (Colo.),
Maria Cantwell (Wash.),
Ben Cardin (Md.),
Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.),
Tim Kaine (Va.),
Patty Murray (Wash.),
Bill Nelson (Fla.),
Mark Warner (Va.) and
Ron Wyden (Ore.).
SENATE CONTACT DETAILS
I appeal to anyone who lives in any of these Senators’ states to contact them and urge them not to give fast-track authority tomorrow!! Carper and Wyden are probably lost causes, but the rest of them may be susceptible to constituent pressure. THANK YOUR SENATOR WHO OPPOSED FAST TRACK!
MORE AT LINK
And again, thanks for your efforts so far in this important fight, and keep the pressure on!
May 13, 2015
A totalitarian state is only as strong as its informants. And the United States has a lot of them. They read our emails. They listen to, download and store our phone calls. They photograph us on street corners, on subway platforms, in stores, on highways and in public and private buildings. They track us through our electronic devices. They infiltrate our organizations. They entice and facilitate “acts of terrorism” by Muslims, radical environmentalists, activists and Black Bloc anarchists, framing these hapless dissidents and sending them off to prison for years. They have amassed detailed profiles of our habits, our tastes, our peculiar proclivities, our medical and financial records, our sexual orientations, our employment histories, our shopping habits and our criminal records. They store this information in government computers. It sits there, waiting like a time bomb, for the moment when the state decides to criminalize us.
Totalitarian states record even the most banal of our activities so that when it comes time to lock us up they can invest these activities with subversive or criminal intent. And citizens who know, because of the courage of Edward Snowden, that they are being watched but naively believe they “have done nothing wrong” do not grasp this dark and terrifying logic.
Tyranny is always welded together by subterranean networks of informants. These informants keep a populace in a state of fear. They perpetuate constant anxiety and enforce isolation through distrust. The state uses wholesale surveillance and spying to break down trust and deny us the privacy to think and speak freely.
A state security and surveillance apparatus, at the same time, conditions all citizens to become informants. In airports and train, subway and bus stations the recruitment campaign is relentless. We are fed lurid government videos and other messages warning us to be vigilant and report anything suspicious. The videos, on endless loops broadcast through mounted television screens, have the prerequisite ominous music, the shady-looking criminal types, the alert citizen calling the authorities and in some cases the apprehended evildoer being led away in handcuffs. The message to be hypervigilant and help the state ferret out dangerous internal enemies is at the same time disseminated throughout government agencies, the mass media, the press and the entertainment industry.
“If you see something say something,” goes the chorus...
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A Nation of Snitches By Chris Hedges
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/a_nation_of_snitches_20150510A totalitarian state is only as strong as its informants. And the United States has a lot of them. They read our emails. They listen to, download and store our phone calls. They photograph us on street corners, on subway platforms, in stores, on highways and in public and private buildings. They track us through our electronic devices. They infiltrate our organizations. They entice and facilitate “acts of terrorism” by Muslims, radical environmentalists, activists and Black Bloc anarchists, framing these hapless dissidents and sending them off to prison for years. They have amassed detailed profiles of our habits, our tastes, our peculiar proclivities, our medical and financial records, our sexual orientations, our employment histories, our shopping habits and our criminal records. They store this information in government computers. It sits there, waiting like a time bomb, for the moment when the state decides to criminalize us.
Totalitarian states record even the most banal of our activities so that when it comes time to lock us up they can invest these activities with subversive or criminal intent. And citizens who know, because of the courage of Edward Snowden, that they are being watched but naively believe they “have done nothing wrong” do not grasp this dark and terrifying logic.
Tyranny is always welded together by subterranean networks of informants. These informants keep a populace in a state of fear. They perpetuate constant anxiety and enforce isolation through distrust. The state uses wholesale surveillance and spying to break down trust and deny us the privacy to think and speak freely.
A state security and surveillance apparatus, at the same time, conditions all citizens to become informants. In airports and train, subway and bus stations the recruitment campaign is relentless. We are fed lurid government videos and other messages warning us to be vigilant and report anything suspicious. The videos, on endless loops broadcast through mounted television screens, have the prerequisite ominous music, the shady-looking criminal types, the alert citizen calling the authorities and in some cases the apprehended evildoer being led away in handcuffs. The message to be hypervigilant and help the state ferret out dangerous internal enemies is at the same time disseminated throughout government agencies, the mass media, the press and the entertainment industry.
“If you see something say something,” goes the chorus...
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May 13, 2015
... a particularly disturbing element of the government’s successful case against CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling, namely, that it was weak and depended almost entirely on circumstantial metadata evidence. That should give consumers pause about their casual attitude towards the government’s data hoovering: “Oh, there’s nothing they can see that is of interest.” As this story indicates, the officialdom was able to use inconclusive information as the basis of a narrative that worked in court.
If you think this will never happen to you think twice. Consider the story a few days ago in the New York Times about a Chinese employee of the National Weather Service who had her life turned upside down, and probably ruined. She was arrested, accused of being a Chinese spy, and had her case suddenly dropped a week before it was scheduled to go to trial. Merely knowing or meeting with the wrong people can get you caught in the surveillance state dragnet.
TRANSCRIPT AT LINK
CIA Whistleblower Sentenced to 42 Months Based on Metadata
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/05/cia-whistleblower-sentenced-to-42-months-based-on-metadata.html... a particularly disturbing element of the government’s successful case against CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling, namely, that it was weak and depended almost entirely on circumstantial metadata evidence. That should give consumers pause about their casual attitude towards the government’s data hoovering: “Oh, there’s nothing they can see that is of interest.” As this story indicates, the officialdom was able to use inconclusive information as the basis of a narrative that worked in court.
If you think this will never happen to you think twice. Consider the story a few days ago in the New York Times about a Chinese employee of the National Weather Service who had her life turned upside down, and probably ruined. She was arrested, accused of being a Chinese spy, and had her case suddenly dropped a week before it was scheduled to go to trial. Merely knowing or meeting with the wrong people can get you caught in the surveillance state dragnet.
TRANSCRIPT AT LINK
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