ANSWER Coalition Files FOIA Request on Pentagon spying of the antiwar movement.

The Partnership for Civil Justice, a civil rights litigation firm, today filed a Freedom of Information Request, on behalf of the antiwar group the ANSWER Coalition, and also on behalf of the National Lawyers Guild, after learning that the Department of Defense (DOD) is maintaining a database of identified "threats" that includes information on protests and political activists who oppose the war. Defense officials responded to reports of the database on Tuesday by saying that the Pentagon has a right to maintain information to help protect military installations. One of the database listings was a major anti-war protest on March 19, 2005 identified in the Pentagon’s records as taking place at Hollywood and Vine in Los Angeles.

This is getting just a teensy bit personal as I helped organize that anti-war protest. And come March 18, 2006, we’ll be doing it again, regardless of how much the Pentagon attempts to intimidate and stifle the anti-war movement. They tried the same thing in the 60’s and it didn’t work then either. Anti-war sentiment became mainstream and they lost their idiot war for empire. Just like now.

A confidential DOD document, according to NBC News, indicates in-depth domestic surveillance such as the specific monitoring of vehicles and specific individuals from one protest to another. The database lists 1,500 "suspicious incidents" around the country over a 10-month period, including four dozen anti-war meetings or protests.

The exposure of the "threat incident" database containing information on protests and political activists makes clear that the U.S. military is spying on civilians in the United States who oppose the war in Iraq and U.S. militarism. The Department of Defense’s assertion that it is keeping this list to protect military bases is belied by its collecting and maintaining information on the anti-war protest in downtown Los Angeles as well as activities on campuses and organizing meetings across the country. The "threat" that the Pentagon is protecting against is a powerful mass movement of opposition to the U.S. war drive, said Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, attorney and co-founder of the Partnership for Civil Justice and co-chair of the NLG Mass Defense Committee.

The FOIA request asks for information maintained by the Pentagon including in its Talon database system on protests and political activists. The request includes data and documents relating to the Hollywood and Vine demonstration, the ANSWER Coalition which organized the March 19, 2005 Los Angeles anti-war demonstration, and the National Lawyers Guild, a progressive bar association that has worked to defend the rights of protestors and to challenge illegal and unconstitutional police practices. "

The Pentagon and other government agencies are routinely violating the First Amendment rights of people in the United States who are coming together to demand an end to the criminal war and occupation in Iraq. No amount of government intimidation can stop the antiwar movement, now that opposition to the war has become a majority sentiment," stated Brian Becker, National Coordinator of the ANSWER Coalition.

3 Comments »

Holding anti-war signs at a Bush press conference or party convention would be punishable by a year in prison, if the new odious PATRIOT act revisions pass.

From a Green listserv forwarded by Ben Manski, former chair of the national Green Party.

Full text of the pending PATRIOT Act Renewal, with the Joint Explanatory Statement from the GOP members of the Conference Committee

Section 602 makes holding an un-authorised sign at a Democratic or Republican National Convention, a Presidential or VP appearance, and any other event designated by the Secret Service as a "national special security event" a felony punishable by a year imprisonment.

A not farfetched interpretation would have made felons of the entire Wisconsin Delegation to the 1968 Democratic Convention, when Mayor Daley ruled them out of order for moving to adjourn the Convention and reconvene outside Daley’s bailiwick.

Was that before or after Sen. Abe Ribicoff denounced "Gestapo tactics on the streets of Chicago" and Daley screamed "Fuck you, you Jew bastard" at him? Just wondering…

Section 603 makes a separate offense of entering the Convention with forged credentials, possessing such, or even perhaps the time-honored tradition of sharing one’s entry pass to a friend.

Sharing an entry pass is a clear indication of someone who loves the terrorists and hates freedom. Although any Congress that would pass this Orwellian piece of rubbish is no friend of freedom either. Abe Ribicoff would have denounced this bill in no uncertain terms. Where are senators like him now?

2 Comments »

A year ago, at a Quaker Meeting House in Lake Worth, Fla., a small group of activists met to plan a protest of military recruiting at local high schools. What they didn’t know was that their meeting had come to the attention of the U.S. military.

A secret 400-page Defense Department document obtained by NBC News lists the Lake Worth meeting as a "threat."

All of which would be comical, except that such Orwellian surveillance can frequently screw up someone’s life. If the Pentagon is watching Quakers, then how many other groups they are also watching? And why? And who are they passing on the information to? Freedom of assembly and dissent are constitutional rights, the military has no need and no right to monitor such peaceful meetings. Yet they’ll turn around and say the US invaded Iraq to guarantee those very same rights for Iraqis - as they trample on them here.

No Comments »

Bush admits mistakes but defends war

He accepts responsibility for acting on flawed intelligence but says the invasion was justified.

The intelligence wasn’t flawed. The neocons made up lies as justification for invasion, now Bush wants to pretend that the CIA gave him bad data. Nor is he apologizing for the war. This is just more spin and evasion.

No Comments »

From long-time activist Woody Hastings comes:

I’m sure many of you are already aware of this, but in case you are not, I am sending it to you so you do know about it and can share it.
 
In a nutshell, IWT is a concept for the first global independent television "network" that will be available via satellite, digital TV, the web and some public and nonprofit channels. In the U.S., IWT will be on Link TV, available in over 26 million homes.
 
I’m excited about the possibilities for something like this, and it looks like they’ve got a good plan.  Donate if you can, that’s the only way it will work. Go straight to http://www.iwtnews.com/

2 Comments »

The Pentagon has built a massive security database to help protect U.S. military bases and troops that includes unwarranted information on Iraq war opponents and peace activists in the United States, a defense official said on Wednesday.

The official said the database included police reports and law enforcement tips in a legitimate domestic security effort, but that it had mistakenly swept up and kept information on people who were not threats to launch terror attacks. 

Why I sure believe the Pentagon when they say, darn it, how did that "unwarranted information" about peace activists sneak into our files. Oh, wait a minute. That’s what they said in the 60’s too. And the 70’s, the 80’s, and the 90’s. Whoa, you don’t suppose they’re lying to us again, do you?

Like it was a mistake they video and photograph anti-war demos, monitor the email and Internet use of activists, then put all that information in a database - and expect us to believe that some little Xmas elf snuck the info in there. Not only are they liars, they are clumsy, inept liars.

Not to mention that they appear to be dimbulbs too.

Whitman declined to comment on specifics of the broadcast report, which quoted what NBC said was a secret briefing document as concluding: "We have noted increased communication between protest groups using the Internet," but not a "significant connection" between incidents.

Wow, you mean the Pentagon has finally determined that activists use the Internet. With mental dimness like that it’s no surprise they’re losing in Iraq. While they threaten Constitutional freedoms here at home.

No Comments »

I just started reading Eugene Deb’s "Wall and Bars", his book about being in prison, and how prison supports and is an inherent tool of repression of the capitalist system.

Debs was extraordinary. He was a socialist who was imprisoned on bogus charges for opposing US entry into World War I. In 1920 he ran for president as a socialist from prison and received over one million votes. Then-president Wilson, refused to pardon him, however Harding, the new president, did.

President Wilson, although he apparently loathed Debs, did eventally mirror Deb’s view on the war saying "Is there any man, woman, or child in America, let me repeat, is there any child in America - who does not know this was an industrial and commercial war?"

A quote by Debs from the dust jacket:

"Capitalism must have prisons to protect itself from the criminals it has created."

I’ll be blogging more on the book in the next several days.

No Comments »

Condi, of course, has a hissy fit

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice sharply criticized other nations Tuesday for failing to provide support for the trial of Saddam Hussein, saying that the world community’s "effective boycott of Saddam’s trial is only harming the Iraqi people."

Officials of other governments, including many in Europe, have said they would avoid a proceeding they feared could be seen as an American-run show trial. They also have been put off by the possible death penalty, which is legal in Iraq and the United States but banned in much of the world.

In other world, most of the nations of the world see the Saddam trial for what it is, a kangaroo court stage-managed by the US - and they want no part of it, no matter how many temper tantrums Condoleezza Rice has.

No Comments »

A friend passes on a letter from a California prison inmate who was transferred to a dreaded Special Housing Unit (SHU) where the rule is no human contact. Amnesty International has called such conditions "torture."

I just got a letter from him, the first since he arrived at the SHU. Thought you might be interested in some comments (slightly edited, mosly to remove the profanity–he says he hasn’t cursed this much in years)

"When I got here, I got my state issue, which consists of 2 blankets, 2 sheets, 1 pillow case, 1 towel, 1 shirt, 2 boxers, and 2 socks. That’s your linen. I also got 1 spoon, 1 cup, 1 toothbrush, 1/2 bar of soap, 1 roll of toilet paper, some tooth powder, 1 ink pen refill, 2 metered envelopes, and 2 sheets of paper. Am I rolling or what?
 
My mom sent me stamped envelopes and paper three times, but each time they got sent back. Come to find out I can’t receive writing paper, but I can receive stamps and envelopes. Stupidist thing I ever heard. If I can’t have paper to write on, what’s the point of getting stamped envelopes?
 
I had to send all of my personal property home– my TV, my radio, my CD player, my typewriter, my books, everything. I’m bouncing off the walls. I haven’t read a book in almost two months. They have no functioning library here. The bottom line is that if you don’t have money on your books or people on the street looking out for you, you’re screwed. I’ve been sitting here with nothing but my "state issue" for two months."

What is the point is locking someone up virtually 24/7 with no human contact and nothing to do except to deliberately drive them crazy? Someone who was in a SHU for a long time once told me, ‘when they let you out, you’re a walking time bomb.’

No Comments »

Austria feels betrayed by Schwarzenegger

Much of Europe paid little attention to the (Tookie Williams) death penalty case, but in Schwarzenegger’s homeland, his former admirers recoil.

6 Comments »

A bungling arsonist who allegedly tried three times to torch a hairdressing salon ended up setting himself ablaze, an Australian court heard Monday.

1 Comment »