Hosted by Dr.G., Minister of Information of the Northbay MDS. Tune in Thursdays 4 to 5pm (PST), at 89.5FM in the northeast San Pablo Bay Area, or on a Smart Phone [link], Desktop U-stream [link], Live Mp3 (.pls) stream [link], Netbook [link].
Be a Community Journalist with our Community Journalist's Notebook [link]. Send news & info to [NorthbayMDS@) gmail.com]! Northbay Uprising News scripts [link]. Archived webpages at (archive.org) and at (archive.today) are available even if the original is taken down. News links are provided for educational purposes only, and do not constitute an endorsement of political tendencies, or, of foreign governments.
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ACTION HEADLINES!
Stories are reviewed and provided by Northbay MDS Committees and Affiliates
BAY AREA SOLIDARITY
Updates on campaigns for Peace, Justice, & Freedom across the greater Bay Area, Norcal, and Socal
* "Giant Steps for Kind Bean Stalking Humans, Jack!; Twenty Years of Food Not Bombs in Fresno! January 10th, 2016 Fresno Food not Bombs celebrates at the Full Circle Brewery" (2015-12-06, by Kelly Borkert, via Indybay.org newswire) [archive.is/3VUz8]
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* "A letter to Chancellor Blumenthal in solidarity with Palestinian and Black Liberation" (2015-12-07, UCSC Students for Justice in Palestine, via Indybay.org newswire) [archive.is/4eDEu]
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* "Marching in Solidarity with the Bolivarian Revolution" (2015-12-07, by Milton Lindsay) [archive.is/eFfLq]
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* "Over 3,000 people march for climate justice in Oakland" (2015-12-06, by Dan Bacher, Indybay.org) [archive.is/EiAaM]
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BAY AREA SOLIDARITY: Updates on campaigns across the Nation!
* Popular Resistance Newsletter: "Heroes In The War At Home" (2015-12-06) [archive.is/5iAzi]
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* "Announcing the Report Back from the Rojava Revolution Tour; Paul Z Simons discusses the Rojava Revolution, an ongoing social experiment in communal direct democracy in the autonomous Kurdish regions of Northern Syria" (2015-12-04) [archive.is/iPTOc]: Paul Z. Simons will speak on their series of recent dispatches from the liberated territories of Rojava in Northern Syria, a region besieged by war yet is also in the midst of one of the most far reaching social experiments of the 21st Century: the 'Rojava Revolution.' The liberated territories of Rojava are a thriving example of stateless democracy and of a people who are overturning traditional institutions such as patriarchy and social hierarchies. All events will be by donation and free copies of Paul's dispatches will be on hand along.
Simons talks about his experiences including crossing international boundaries under false pretenses, attending commune meetings in Kobane, high-velocity detours around ISIS sympathetic villages, and the camaraderie of the YPG militias. Simons had full access to the various revolutionary organizations and militias and will discuss their mandates and implementation issues associated with realizing a stateless society. Weaving together ideas of anti-authoritarianism, feminism, ecology, and a rejection of the state, Paul Z. Simons' report, which is part adventure and part political journalism on the the Rojava Revolution, is not to be missed by anyone working for sweeping social transformation in the current age.
- Friday, December 11th, 7pm, Berkeley at the The Long Haul, 3124 Shattuck Ave
- Saturday, December 12th, 7pm, Oakland at the OMNI Commons, 4799 Shattuck Ave
- Sunday, December 13th, 7pm, San Francisco at Station 40, 16th Street 3030 B (Near Mission Street). Note, Station 40 is up two flights of stairs.
Sponsored by: Modern Slavery, FireWorks, Ruins of Capital Distro, Industrial Workers of the World/Solidarity Network San Jose, Direct Action Monterey Network (DAMN), SubRosa Infoshop, The Long Haul, OMNI Commons, and Station 40.
Check out Alt Weekly Coverage of the Tour Here (2015-12-03, montereycountyweekly.com) [archive.is/9Q2yZ]
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SOLIDARITY WITH THE NEW AFRICAN NATION!Black Power! Revive the Community! Defend the Nation!
* "On December 4th, Remember The Life Of Fred Hampton" (2015-12-04, by Bill Simpich) [archive.is/kDMFl]
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* "Racism at Berkeley Unified “Has Been Tolerated for Too Long,” Say Community Leaders" (2015-11-12, by Kevin Epstein, postnewsgroup.com) [archive.is/5qtaF]
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* "6 Black Churches in Saint Louis Area Have Burned in Last 10 Days" (2015-10-20, by Ben Forstenzer, US Uncut) [archive.is/MbAC6]
* "Muslims Raised Over $100,000 To Help Rebuild Black Churches In The South" (2015-07-21, huffingtonpost.com) [archive.is/jU0ZQ]
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* "Separate and impoverished" (2015-10-19, by Rev. Jesse Jackson, for chicago.suntimes.com) [archive.is/q1DkS] [begin excerpt]: Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Democratic candidate for president, shocked people when he noted that 51 percent of African-Americans aged 17 through 20 who have graduated high school or dropped out of high school are unemployed.
PolitiFact.com confirmed the statement as “mostly true,” suggesting that the numbers might even be worse than Sanders suggested.
This level of unemployment is a death sentence for a generation — representing for too many the dying of hope, of potential and even, in an age of mass incarceration, of freedom.
The figure is shocking, but the reality cannot be denied. For all the progress we have made on race in this country, there is still a stark difference between black and white poverty. As Emily Badger reports in the Washington Post, “The poverty that poor African-Americans experience is often different from the poverty of poor whites.” A poor black family is much more likely to live in an impoverished neighborhood. The concentrated poverty, as Badger writes, “extends out the door of a family’s home and occupies the entire neighborhood around it, touching the streets, the schools, the grocery stores.”
A new report on the “Architecture of Segregation” [http://is.gd/dBWUyt] by Paul Jargowsky for the New Century Foundation details the stark differences that exist in cities across the country. In metropolitan Chicago, for example, more than one in three poor African-Americans live in what are called high-poverty census tracts (neighborhoods where the poverty rate is above 40 percent). That is 10 times the rate for poor whites. And it has gotten worse, not better, in cities across the country over the course of this century.
Separate and impoverished. We know the effects. Infants suffer bad nutrition, grow up surrounded by lead paint. Children navigate mean streets to go to impoverished schools. They lack after-school and summer programs. Families break apart. Guns and drugs come in; jobs go out. There’s no affordable transportation to get to where the jobs are. Houses are abandoned. Hospitals close. Decent grocery stores are nowhere to be found.
As Jargowsky says, this isn’t really an accident. It is the product of systemic discrimination, of zoning laws that shield off wealthy areas from the poor, of public housing that is concentrated in a few neighborhoods. Isolation in poor neighborhoods is an imposition, not a choice. [end excerpt]
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* "Rahm Emmanuel, Laquan McDonald and Black Rebellion in Chicago" (2015-12-04, counterpunch.org) [archive.is/NQiYL] [begin excerpt]: Beneath a carefully constructed pretense of concern for racial justice, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel has long been a dedicated corporatist “law and order” enemy of Black America. During his time as a top political operative in the arch-neoliberal Bill Clinton White House, the notorious bully Emmanuel (later to be nicknamed “Rahmbo”) was a driving force behind the 1994 federal “three strikes” Clinton crime bill.
That draconian measure helped make Bill Clinton “the incarceration president” and contributed to a significant increase in the monumental hyper-imprisonment and criminal marking of Black Americans. Among other terrible things, the law put 100,000 more officers on the streets, allocated $10 billion for new prison construction, and eliminated Pell Grant funding for inmates pursuing college degrees while in prison.
Prior to that outrage, Emmanuel joined up with Bill Daley to lead Clinton’s passage of the North American Free Trade Act (NAFTA) – a critical investor rights measure that helped capital drain millions of jobs away from industrial regions where impoverished Black populations desperately needed paid employment.
NAFTA-encouraged deindustrialization notwithstanding, Emmanuel was a leading force behind Clinton’s vicious 1996 “welfare reform.” The “Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act’s” elimination of poor families’ former entitlement to basic family cash assistance has wreaked havoc on Black families stuck in jobless ghettoes ever since.
As Barack Obama’s original White House chief of staff, Emmanuel consistently steered policy rightward, towards the interests of the nation’s predominantly white 1% and contrary to those of America’s disproportionately nonwhite lower and working class.
As Mayor of Chicago, Emmanuel moved quickly to shutter 54 public schools in low-income Black and Latino neighborhoods in the largest deliberate mass school closure in history. Emmanuel’s schools chief provided principals with a guide on “how to handle civil disobedience and to report the names of any teachers and students involved in protests.” The schools closure program has always been a big taxpayer money grab for wealthy Emmanuel allies seeking to build private charter schools in the wreckage left by public school closings.
Emmanuel has stonewalled on numerous abusive and criminal practices on the part of his city’s police force. He flatly denied the Chicago Police Department’s operation of an illegal “black site” detention facility (Homan Square) where thousands of mostly Black and Latino suspects have been “disappeared” and forced into false confessions. The Black Site hellhole was exposed by The Guardian earlier this year. Its existence was well known across Black and Latino Chicago.
Sadly enough, Emanuel has won solid majorities of the Black Chicago vote in both of his Chicago mayoral election victories to date (in April 2011 and April 2015). As the left Black commentator Bruce Dixon noted last spring, “Rahm Emanuel’s biggest asset was the overwhelming support of Chicago’s well-established black political class of preachers, business types, ‘community leaders’ and public officials….Nearly every prominent black elected official in town, Democrats all, came out for Rahm, for privatization, for gentrification, for austerity, for more of the same. This is the state of black politics in 2015, and the reason that Rahm Emanuel carried every single one of Chicago’s majority black wards.” [end excerpt]
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STUDENT POWER!
information collected by the Committee to Defend Public Education!
* "UC Berkeley Students Occupy Chancellor’s Office to Demand Justice for UC Workers" (2015-12-03, Student / Labor Committee, via Indybay.org newswire) [archive.is/5Ivxa]
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WORKER'S POWER!
information collected by the Worker's Defense Committee [http://is.gd/VOkmLr]
* Listen to the latest report about the DRISCOLL'S BOYCOTT and the National Convention on November 28th in Tijuana of the FIRST MEXICAN INDEPENDENT FARMWORKERS UNION.
#Sisepuede [soundcloud.com/workweek-radio/ww12-1-15-chicago-labor-and-black-friday-and-mexican-agricultural-union-formed]
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* "Privatizing Labor and the Fight to End it at UC Berkeley" (2015-12-02, by John Anthony, socialistorganizer.org) [archive.is/koMHW]
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* "Locked Out Steelworkers Resist Company Wish List" (2015-12-01, labornotes.org) [archive.is/Fu0Td] [begin excerpt]: Twenty-two hundred Steelworkers, locked out since August 15, are refusing demands for major concessions on health care, retiree benefits, and subcontracting. [...]
Union activists say the number and tenor of ATI’s 144 demands showed that it wasn’t serious about bargaining from the beginning.
“A lot of the things they were asking for were conditions in a non-union shop,” said Marvin Dunklin, former president of Steelworkers Local 7139-05 in Washington, Pennsylvania.
ATI had been planning the lockout for months, using forced overtime to build up a reserve stockpile of products.
“A lot of us feel like we were taken advantage of,” said Alan Braden of Local 1138 in Bagdad, Pennsylvania. “There were crews working 60, 70 hours a week, if not more, to stock these warehouses, to stock this steel.”
Health care is a major issue. ATI’s final offer would for the first time force employees to pay premiums of up to $215 a month, with a $1,000 deductible and a $6,000 out-of-pocket maximum.
Workers with family coverage who hit the maximum would pay $10,000 apiece for a year’s health care.
“They absolutely gutted the health care,” said Josh Hall, president of Local 7150 in Albany, Oregon, where they make titanium and alloys for jet engines and helicopter blades. “It’s almost turning into little more than major medical.”
New employees would be forced onto a “consumer-driven health plan” with even higher costs and worse coverage.
“Some of the things available on the Internet are cheaper than what the company is proposing,” Dunklin said.
Pensions, retiree health benefits, and life insurance would also be eliminated for new employees. Instead, ATI would contribute to a 401(k) and pay workers 50 cents an hour extra to help cover the future cost of their health care.
“After 50 years of fighting, you can’t vote for what they’re asking for,” said Dunklin, “or else you might as well find an entry-level job at Walmart. For the conditions and the skills that are required to do this job, it’s an insult.”
Workers in the mills get years of training to run the machines, and learn to withstand scorching heat. “When you open and close those furnace doors, the materials’ll be coming out of a furnace that’s 2,000 degrees,” Dunklin said. [end excerpt]
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HANDS OFF OUR HOMES![HandsOffHomes.blogspot.com]
* "Court rules L.A. Housing Authority illegally cut Section 8 housing subsidies" (2015-12-01, by Lynda Carson) [http://is.gd/2PnkQV]
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SUPPORT THE MIDTOWN RENT STRIKE!
NO Rent Hikes! NO Evictions!
NO displacement for Black Seniors, Immigrants, Working-class San Franciscans, and long-term Fillmore Western Addition residents!
[savemidtown.org] [info@)savemidtown.org] [@savemidtown]
* "The Way Forward In The Fight Against Gentrification in San Francisco" (2015-12-05, by Mícheál Madden, socialistorganizer.org) [archive.is/LVed6]
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information collected by the Committee to
DEFEND THOSE WITHOUT HOMES!
* "Santa Cruz Police Block Individuals Documenting Arrest at Freedom Sleepers Protest" (2015-12-01, by Alex Darocy, Indybay.org newswire) [http://is.gd/XnhC8R] [begin excerpt]: The Freedom Sleepers encountered the first real rain of the season at their latest community sleepout held at Santa Cruz City Hall on November 24. Since July 4, a group of unhoused and housed activists, many of whom call themselves "Freedom Sleepers" have slept at Santa Cruz City hall every week to protest local laws that criminalize homelessness and the act of sleep. The next sleepout is planned for tonight, December 1, again at Santa Cruz City Hall. [Top photo: SCPD arrests a person sleeping at City Hall. Scroll down for videos of police blocking individuals from documenting the arrest, and more photos of the sleepout.] [end excerpt] Videos are available only as downloads at the archived page.
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* "Protesting Monterey's Sit-Lie Law" (2015-12-08, by Alex Darocy, Indybay.org) [archive.is/EBje8]: On December 4, Direct Action Monterey Network (DAMN) organized its eleventh sit-in protest in downtown Monterey. Since February, community members have been gathering monthly on the sidewalk of Alvarado Street to defy the city's sit-lie ordinance, which has been in effect for just over a year now. Sec. 32-6.2 of the Monterey municipal code bans sitting or lying on most commercial sidewalks in Monterey between the hours of 7am and 9pm. Based on their outreach with Monterey's homeless community, DAMN believes the sit-lie ordinance is discriminatory and has been selectively enforced by police.
There was quite a bit of support for the sitters at the December 4 protest. Several unsolicited donations were made by individuals passing by. After speaking with members of the group, one individual opened their wallet and gave the demonstrators a generous cash donation. Another person brought them packages of cookies.The protests bring together a wide variety of community members from the Monterey Peninsula. Both housed and unhoused individuals participated in the sit-in.
The decision to participate in the protest was not taken lightly by some. To issue a citation under the sit-lie ordinance, police officers must first warn an individual they are violating the ordinance. Regardless, at least one homeless individual decided to participate in the by remaining upright while others sat.
"I can't risk it," the person said.
"I get camping tickets all the time."
For much of the demonstration, individuals decorated protest signs inscribed with messages such as "Homelessness is Not a Crime" and "I'll Sit Where I Want."
At one point in the evening a person walking by joined the group briefly to help decorate the posters. The individual described how she had been homeless in Colorado Springs several years prior, and that city had also been going through a phase of creating laws that targeted homeless people, she said.
For more information about Direct Action Monterey Network, see:
[solidaritymonterey.wordpress.com]
[facebook.com/DirectActionMontereyNetwork]
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COMMUNITY FASCISM WATCH
The following documents how municipalities are beholden to the dictates of private creditor agencies.
* "City manager, Councilmember Pimplé, clash on city finances" (2015-12-08, radiofreerichmond.com) [archive.is/CmZrk] [begin excerpt]: In a meeting where Richmond City Manager Bill Lindsay and the City’s finance director Belinda Warner along with Councilmember Vinay Pimplé were invited to explain the city’s current financial situation, Lindsay and Warner presented an image of Richmond where finances are on track for steady improvement, while Councilmember Pimplé cited numerous reasons for concern that countered the rhetoric from the city officials.
“The fiscal year 2014-15 showed improvements in all financial metrics,”Lindsay argued before the neighborhood council. “[The City] ended with a surplus of slightly more than $2 million.”
The improved financial situation came from a number of city positions being terminated or consolidated, a move which has reduced the city’s workforce by about 20 percent over the past five years.
“Budget choices are hard choices,” the City Manager explained. Cutting city staff inevitably results in a reduction of city services and results in overtime for current employees, Lindsay explained, “and those are some of the hard policy decisions the City Council has to make.”
Lindsay and the finance department are currently wrapping up an audit of the City’s 2014-15 budget, and they anticipate a report that shows a budget that came back from a deficit and into a surplus with an ending cash balance of $7.2 million for the city’s General Fund.
This is an improvement, the City Manager explained, but there are significant challenges facing the city, the most glaring of which are the city’s pension obligations along with low fiscal liquidity, both of which Lindsay cited as reasons for the recent credit downgrades from Moody’s Investor Services and Standard & Poors.
“Cash is king, and we want it in the bank, not in loans,” Lindsay explained. [end excerpt]
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* "Novato as a Microcosm of Voter Apathy & Anti Establishment Sentiment" (2015-11-16, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/1wM60]
* "Fryday’s Super PAC Pollutes Novato’s City Council Election" (2015-10-26, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/GN2GL]
* "Steyer’s Political “Death Star” versus Novato Locals" (2015-10-29, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/idnh6]
* "Agents of Change – Down the Stretch" (2015-11-02, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/Y8J1g]
* "Did the Novato City Council Election Break the Chamber’s Hammerlock?" (2015-11-13, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/0bo1X]
* "Council Exhibits Breathtaking Audacity and Lack of Understanding" (2015-11-22, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/OH7Uk]
* "Hang On – The New Novato City Council Is In For a Rough Ride" (2015-12-07, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/lvBAU] [begin excerpt]: We all know that the past City Council has been not only disappointing but also emblematic of how to trivialize the bedrock of democracy, i.e. local government. Previously, it was dominated by a Chamber of Commerce influenced rubber-stamping voting bloc known as the KLAM Bakers (Kellner, Lucan, Athas, MacLeamy). It was also very out of touch with the “middle majority”, which placed it in conflict with the preferences of many of its constituents who expressed their frustration by voting in the recent election to put two new faces (Drew, Fryday) on the Council.
Incredibly, the previous Council, with a straight face, maintained that it was fiscally conservative despite moving from a balanced budget to a $2 million structural deficit. Confirming the entrenched lack of fiscal backbone, the lame duck Council foolishly approved a needlessly expensive over-the-top compensation package for the Assistant City Manager to stand in as the interim City Manager adding further to the operating deficit. [...]
A serious failure of the past Council was its consistently turning a deaf ear to the preferences of its constituents, particularly when those preferences conflicted with State and County social engineering mandates that would significantly change the ambiance of the Novato suburban lifestyle. Two examples are the resident uprising against City Staff proposed Priority Development Areas for “affordable housing” and the approval of an unjustified “Mass Transit Facility” bus stop rammed through to appease County planners who use such designations to promote “affordable housing” development and to get exemptions for developers from local zoning and building codes.
The greatest failure of the past Council was to allow the soon-to-depart City Manager Michael Frank to run the City as a County of Marin viceroy without fear of the Council contravening his political and operational preferences. City Manager Frank turned the City Council into a “coronation Council” resulting in Mr. Frank’s proposals rarely, if ever, being refused or substantially altered. It appeared to be total capitulation. With the exception of Councilmember Pat Eklund, cross examination by the Council of Staff-proffered civic projects was perfunctory and ankle deep.
Michael-Frank 2Manager Frank was also allowed to formulate City policies and procedures that enabled him to use a “dark pool” management modus operandi that kept out of public view the internal policy making process. Lengthy supporting Staff reports were typically submitted to the Council late Thursday or Friday for Council approval at the following Tuesday Council meeting, leaving little opportunity for significant public input or debate, i.e. “The die was already cast” on the previous Thursday.
The Council’s abdication of responsibility was almost total. At times it appeared to be operating in a vacuum. Controversial projects were shellacked over using “eye candy” charrettes for inconsequential public input. The public’s participation was deliberately interpreted in the Staff’s final proposals in such a way as to make it appear a majority of the participants were supporting the proposed projects, when in fact they were not. In the end it was a reworked version of the original City’s Staff’s proposal that was enacted. It was all a charade.
With the forthcoming departure of the ignominious City Manager Michael Frank and the KLAM Bakers rubber-stamping voting bloc, what measures can the new Council take to avoid merely “rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic”? Here are some suggestions to consider.
The culture at City Hall must be changed and returned to one characterized by receptiveness to public input during the conceptual planning process of city projects, and the establishment of City policies. [...]
The possibility of any conduct of business style change by the new Council remains unclear. The outlook is not good. New Council Member Josh Fryday, an outsider political operative, is the pivotal vote. Pat Eklund and Pam Drew are expected to face off on many issues with incumbents Eric Lucan and Denise Athas. Fryday will often have the deciding vote.
Fryday, as the COO of a national Super PAC that funds over $75 million to selected Democrat candidates, had the total support of the State, County, and local Democrat political machinery. That machine got him elected without any prior local political experience and little knowledge of Novato issues.
Fryday is politically tied to the Democrat establishment and is expected to do their bidding. He will possibly become a political acolyte of the soon-to-depart County Supervisor Steve Kinsey, which is bad news for any independent-in-thought local government. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen. [end excerpt]
* "Transit Union Local 1575 President Says Center Platform Design for Novato Bus Hub Is Dangerous for Pedestrians, Passengers and Buses" (2015-11-03, novato.marin.exposed) [archive.is/bXpdW]
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Documenting human-rights abuse by domestic security agencies
NORTHBAY COPWATCH
[NorthbayCopwatch.blogspot.com] [copblock.org] [wecopwatch.org] [filmingcops.com]
Watch the videos:(1) (.mp4) [http://is.gd/mhkH77]
(2) (.mp4) [http://is.gd/absSWI]
(3) Slow-motion (.avi) [http://is.gd/ZTLKmE]
* "Thoughts on an Execution: The Death of Mario Woods" (2015-12-09, by JP Massar , via Indybay.org Newswire) [archive.is/WKlnF] [begin excerpt]:
We saw ten or so officers surround an obviously confused and frightened individual, all pointing their drawn weapons at him, all obviously ready in a hairsbreath to pull a trigger at any provocation - imagined or not.
We saw a firing squad, with no one in command (in fact, if not in structure). We saw men with a license to kill with no plan other than to shout and reshout at someone huddled up against a wall.
We hear one officer fire, and then we heard the others, almost certainly reflexively, create a fusillade, continuing their hail of bullets even after Woods lies on the sidewalk, dying.
[end excerpt]
* "SFPD executes Mario Woods; Officer pumps Mario Woods full of bullets at close range while covered by the rest, seen in slow motion" (2015-12-07, by David Roknich, IndyRadio) [http://is.gd/8EFB4o]: After this execution, the San Francisco police told ABC news that they were going through the video frame by frame (a video they did not plan to have) and looking for a reason to have used lethal force. They had to find something that would provide an excuse for this murder, after the fact. Now, they will tell us what this video means, by using their control of the media, and we are supposed to believe that black is white, if that's their conclusion. The cops incriminate themselves with their own statements, and expect continued impunity. Get all the documents, and let the firings begin. In Chicago, NONE of the news organizations tried to get the dashcam video of Laquan McDonald's execution, though they knew it existed. It took a 13 month FOIA lawsuit by an independent reporter to pry loose the evidence - and it's more than just a video. It is a system of impunity and terror: shock troops of the class war.
* "Suhr claims video shows Mario Woods with raised knife; community in disbelief" (2015-12-04, sfexaminer.com) [archive.is/5omxz]
* "Video Evidence Appears to Contradict SFPD Account of Mario Woods Killing" (2015-12-07, kqed.org) [archive.is/4lHwS]
* "Man Executed by Police Firing Squad Today in San Francisco (Update: Additional Videos)" (2015-12-02, dailykos.com) [http://is.gd/aYBCss]
* "ACLU of Northern California Statement on the SFPD’s Fatal Shooting of Mario Woods" (2015-12-04, ACLU of Northern California ) [http://is.gd/omudR5]
* "SF Police Execute Again: Community And Labor Speak Out On Mario Woods Murder" (2015-12-05, by Labor Video Project, laborvideo.org) [archive.is/ba0IN] [begin excerpt]: San Francisco police murdered another African American in Bayview Hunters Point on December 2, 2015. Seven to ten police surrounded Woods and then shot him over ten times killing him. Community and labor people spoke out at a meeting on Friday December 4th against the epidemic of police killings of African Americans and also the corruption of SF police chief Greg Shur who people demanded be fired.Watch the video at [https://youtu.be/EJVEC0ROSuc]. Former Black Panther leader Elaine Brown spoke at the meeting. Many called for the firing of SF police chief Greg Suhr and also talked about his cover-up of a domestic violence case which cost the city millions of dollars and was covered up by San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee.
Clarence Thomas of ILWU Local 10 spoke about the police murder and the action of the ILWU against police terror and the role of the San Francisco Police Officers Association in attacking the ILWU for protesting on May 1 against police terror. Bayview Hunters Point residents and people from other communities protested the reign of terror against the African American community and impunity of the police.
Additional Media:
- "San Francisco Police Execution Squad-- Are Americans Being Conditioined to Accept Police Slaying Unarmed People?" (2015-12-04, by Samuel Vargo) page 1 [http://is.gd/7pSzqR] page 2 [http://is.gd/v6YoRQ]
- [youtube.com/watch?v=ZG9FJtiK5n4]
- [youtube.com/watch?v=RZwdgZRyBbQ]
- [youtube.com/watch?v=rB8YzLy8uP8]
- [soundcloud.com/workweek-radio/ww4-7-15-sf-racism-courts-smart-phone-tech-labor]
[comment]: The local warlord of the Democratic Party, police chief Greg Suhr, makes $321,577 a year plus benefits that may total the same figure. His pension is at least 90% of his salary, perhaps more. See Matier & Ross, 8/25/12, San Francisco Chronicle at [archive.is/W0Xq4].
The most effective way of ending Nazi USA's terrorism at home and abroad is with a general strike. It does not have to be prolonged; one day is a good start, and it does not have to be every single worker in this country on strike, but it does have to be done, not just on May Day, but sooner. Every labor union in San Francisco needs to come up with a date real soon, preferably in December. I thought Clarence Williams of the ILWU said Dec 10 would be a general strike date, but I am not sure. It is good the ILWU is always there for shutting down the port in solidarity, but it must be more than the ILWU. In San Francisco, perhaps the biggest union is UNITE-HERE, the hotel and restaurant workers' union which provides for the existence of the tourist industry, a major moneymaker for the city. The City & County of San Francisco employees unions combined must be a close second. San Francisco had a major city workers' strike of 38 days in 1976, with the bus drivers shutting down the bus system in support, and it shook the capitalist class to the bone.
[end excerpt]
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NORTHBAY COPWATCH: Domestic Security Agencies and private-sector partners
* "Does mass surveillance change the way we behave?" (2015-12-01, whowhatwhy.org) [archive.is/yRJuX]
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* "Top NSA Whistleblower: 'Every Time There Is a Terrorist Attack, What We Really Need to Do Is Demand that They CUT the Budgets of All the Intelligence Agencies' " (2015-12-03, washingtonsblog.com) [archive.is/JA4Gf]
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* "CIA Mission: Destroy the Whistleblower and Perfume the Stench of ‘Operation Merlin’ " (2015-02-04, exposefacts.org) [archive.is/0aejp]
More articles about this court-trial listed at [https://exposefacts.org/blog/special-coverage], page 1 [archive.is/qoMkL], page 2 [archive.is/2O0tH], page 3 [archive.is/sTxK2]
* "No More Excuses: A Roadmap to Justice for CIA Torture" (2015-12-01, hrw.org) [http://is.gd/NI8nBA]
* "US: CIA Torture is Unfinished Business; Year After Senate Report, Still No Criminal Inquiry, Redress Provided" (2015-12-01, hrw.org) [http://is.gd/q87l93]
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* "FBI admits using Stingrays, hacking computers and software" (2015-12-09, rt.com) [archive.is/oiDAo]
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* "Here’s How One Activist Convinced the FBI to Leave Him Alone" (2015-12-07, by Will Potter, greenisthenewred.com) [archive.is/MWXyw], attached video [https://youtu.be/rI8INgw0xq0]
* "FBI asked for tracking of Pickering mail in 2012" (2014-05-26, buffalonews.com) [archive.is/dU7Ek]
---
* "Paris, Planned Parenthood, and Our Struggle to Define Terrorism" (2015-11-30, ivn.us) [archive.is/0NrY4]
* "5 Reasons Why the FBI’s Most Wanted Domestic Terrorists List Should Have You Outraged" (2015-06-03, by Will Potter, greenisthenewred.com) [archive.is/gonVT]: If you want a clear idea of the FBI’s upside-down terrorism priorities, look no further than the bureau’s Most Wanted Domestic Terrorists lists [http://is.gd/I68I8D] (archived 2015-12-08).
CNN recently ran a fluff story on the FBI’s list that could have been written by the bureau itself (“The FBI’s goal, of course, is to prevent ‘homegrown attacks’ before they happen,” CNN reminds us) [archive.is/PmdIL]. While CNN and the FBI are proudly commemorating the 65th anniversary of the government’s most wanted fugitives program [archive.is/DAdwM], here’s what you should really know about the FBI’s lists:
1) Two of the most wanted “domestic terrorists” are environmentalists who never harmed anyone.
Joseph Dibee and Josephine Overaker are wanted in connected with crimes by the Earth Liberation Front in the name of defending the environment. They are accused of property destruction, but no physical violence is alleged. In fact, in the history of underground groups like the ELF, no human being has ever been injured.
2) One of the “Most Wanted Terrorists” is an animal rights activist. Daniel Andreas San Diego is accused of serious property crimes, and was listed alongside Osama bin Laden on the FBI’s website [archive.is/X8IGi]. the fact that the FBI thinks there is any comparison whatsoever speaks volumes.
3) The FBI makes no mention of hate crimes. None. In 2013, there were 5,928 reported hate crimes, according to the FBI [http://is.gd/pfQ2yt]. About 49 percent were racially motivated, and 21 percent related to the victim’s sexual orientation.
4) All of the other “domestic terrorists” are leftists from the 1970s and 1980s [http://is.gd/I68I8D] . Don’t you feel safer knowing the FBI is focused on members of the Black Panthers and communist groups, accused of crimes 35+ years ago?
5) The FBI doesn’t include right-wing fugitives. There’s not a single right-wing criminal on the list, including people wanted for violent crimes. For instance, David Burgert is a former leader of the anti-government militia Project 7 [archive.is/snT0p]. He once plotted to assassinate local officials in Montana, and pleaded guilty to charges of possessing a machine gun. In 2011, he led cops on a police chase, then jumped out of his Jeep, shot at police, and ran into the woods. He’s still a fugitive. But police say his case is “on the back burner for now.”
When we see stories today about the FBI spying on Keystone pipeline protesters [archive.is/gBTOq], or the FBI entrapping environmentalists in faux terrorism plots [archive.is/S3Tqs], we need to remember that they aren’t isolated instances. These misplaced priorities are coming from the top down. It’s time for a full investigation and overhaul of the FBI’s domestic terrorism priorities. The FBI needs to be held accountable for focusing on environmentalists and animal rights groups, and leftists from decades ago, while more serious threats go unaddressed.
* THIS is the number one FBI Most Wanted "domestic terrorist" in the USA [archive.is/PmdIL]:
Wanted: Donna Joan Borup – Donna Joan Borup allegedly threw a caustic substance in the eyes of a Port Authority police officer in 1981. There's a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to her arrest.
---
* Are you willing to spy on the families of people who were murdered in police custody? Are you willing to spend decades spying on trade unionists to get them blacklisted and destroy the income of said workers families? Are you willing to go undercover and have children with climate change activists only to leave them when the mission is over?
---
* " 'Angst' Against Encryption: National Security and the Surveillance State. The Global Crackdown" (2015-12-07, by Binoy Kampmark, globalresearch.ca) [archive.is/GqYDd]
Thanks to the USA Navy for the creation of Tor as a communication method to infiltrate EEU member states and other targeted governments, now many assets of clandestine agencies have a perfect method of raising funds and organizing campaigns, including "anonymous, safe, secure, crowdfunded assassinations" [http://assmkedzgorodn7o.onion], and "Rent-A-Hacker" at [http://2ogmrlfzdthnwkez.onion].
The .onion addresses are visible using Tor, which comes bundled in a browser specifically for accessing not only .onion addresses but other "Dark Web" networks otherwise not accessible in various jurisdictions in the homeland and accross the world. The Tor browser is downloadable at [https://www.torproject.org/download/download.html.en], and uses Firefox as it's browser program (unsurprisingly insecure) as shown in the following Tor browser screengrab:
* "How to access Onion sites?" (deepdotweb.com) [archive.is/IPQrW]
* "This .Onion Farmer Is Squatting on 40 Million Dark Web Domains" (2015-09-14, motherboard.vice.com) [archive.is/IME3B]
* "List of Dark Net markets (Tor & I2P)" (updated 2015-12-05, deepdotweb.com) [archive.is/8taRi]
* "The Hidden Wiki: Tor .onion urls directories" (updated 2015-08-21, thehiddenwiki.org) [archive.is/srZlc]
* "The Hidden Wiki: The ORIGINAL source for the most up to date .onion tor deep web links collection" (updated 2015-02-01, the-hidden-wiki.com) [archive.is/lhP3Y]
* TorBox [http://torbox3uiot6wchz.onion/]: This is a hidden mailbox service only accessible from TOR. There is no connection between TorBox and the public internet: All the messages are sent and received within TorBox. Just sign up for a new TorBox and start sending and receiving email within TOR.
* TORCH: Tor Search Engine [http://xmh57jrzrnw6insl.onion/], screenshot showing paid advertisers for this .onion website (retrieved 2015-12-07):
* "TorLinks: .onion Link List" [http://torlinkbgs6aabns.onion/]: TorLinks is a moderated replacement for The Hidden Wiki, and serves as a link or url list of Tor hidden services. Feel free to copy this deep web link list directory to your website to make others aware of the darknet. We regularly update the tor onion sites on this site. [end homepage description]
Screenshot showing the TorLinks homepage shown here. More screenshots from the homepage showing a listing for 'criminal activity' [archive.is/kAQfq], and listings for 'political activity' [archive.is/lDvf7], which includes the following:
- "Texas Takedown Thursday: Chinga La Migra IV": AntiSec messes with Texas, attacks dozens of police systems and chief emails
- "Fuck FBI Friday: IACIS Cybercrime Investigator Communications": email dump including IACIS internal email list archives
- "BuggedPlanet.Info": Information on Telecommunication Interception Companies + Installations
- "PURE EUROPE": Cleanse Europe of the dirt!
- "Keep Internet Open!" Small unofficial AnonOps site, currently instructing how to DDoS MasterCard and other WikiLeaks opponents
- "HBGary Federal Attachment Dump": The HBGary email archive leaked by Anonymous"
The darkweb is dominated by neo-reactionairies and fascists, a political characteristic of the economic class that has given rise to individuals with access to intormation technology and capable of becoming hackers, whose combined ideology may be described as "individualistic" and influenced by the USA clandestine agencies, such as the CIA and DIA, which historically have given refuge to fascists who survived World War 2. An example is of the following .onion website which serves a variety of information which, in various jurisdictions, are classified as illegal.
* "ParaZite": Collection of forbidden files and howto's (pdf, txt, etc.) [http://kpynyvym6xqi7wz2.onion/files.html] [begin excerpt]: FREE ALL DRUG POLITICAL PRISONERS FROM CANNABIS GROWERS TO HEROIN WHOLESALERS!!! AGE REGULATIONS FOR PURCHASE OF DRUGS: CAFFEINE - all ages . CANNABIS JA MAGIC MUSHROOMS - only for 12 year olds and over . ALCOHOL, NICOTINE, COCAINE, ECSTASY, AMPHETAMINES, LSD - only for 14 year olds and over . HEROIN - only for 16 year olds and over
[end excerpt] Screenshot showing this website's neo-Nazi materials [archive.is/LgPFt]., and the same website's homage to former European Union Leader Adolph Hitler [http://kpynyvym6xqi7wz2.onion/nsdap/hitler/]
This same website offers an archived page of the following presented here in it's entirety:
* "The Tor Guide for Hidden Services V. 4.0" (2013-06-03) [archive.is/ziOJF] which includes a listing for the "Aryan Nation SS - Neo-nazi propoganda campaign" and the following [begin excerpt]:
Drugs/Marketplaces: Places where you can buy stuff! Or research a particular illegal subject (ahem, drugs).
StExo's Lair - Reputable vendor on Silk Road who hosts static pages for many vendors on Silk Road as well as contact information. Made in the growing concern of SR's seizure: http://5uvrgtrgtwkkxsgw.onion/
Silk Road - Infamous on the news. Excellent products and (mostly) reliable sellers. This is the REAL AND ONLY LINK!!!: http://silkroadvb5piz3r.onion/index.php/silkroad/home
Black Market Reloaded - Excellent products, smaller than Silk Road. Doesn't require a fee to be a seller: http://5onwnspjvuk7cwvk.onion/
BMR Forums - BMR-related iscussions: http://fec33nz6mhzd54zj.onion/
Silk Road Forums - SR-related discussions: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php
TorDrugResource - Chemistry, pharmacology, cultivation, and lots of other information on different types of illicit substances. Mostly PDFs: http://y47ylcppnh3afqk4.onion/
[end excerpt]
---
* "Countering Online Redicalization in America" (2012-12-05) [begin excerpt]:
The Limits of Online Censorship -
Constitutional free speech protections in the United States are extensive, which means that the vast majority of the content that qualifies as extremist or radicalizing would be protected under the First Amendment. For a statement to be illegal, it needs to "[contain] a direct, credible 'true' threat against an identifiable individual, organization or institution; [meet] the legal test for harassment; or [constitute] incitement to imminent lawless action likely to occur." … As a result, promoting the aims and methods of a terrorist organization is not illegal, nor is it forbidden to incite lawbreaking or violence as long as doing so will not result in "imminent lawless action." … Federal courts have consistently erred on the side of free speech, including in cases where public order was under threat and the exercise of free speech was likely to cause significant emotional distress.
Prosecutions -
An entirely different approach is to target, not the content, but its producers by bringing prosecutions against extremist Internet entrepreneurs-such as Samir Khan or Don Black, the founder of the white supremacist forum Stormfront- based on the idea that their online activism is crucial to the production and dissemination of violent extremist content. This approach suffers from severe limitations. First, it requires that people are located within the United States, which means that foreign-based propagandists such as Awlaki (who lived in Yemen at the time of his greatest online reach and influence) are unaffected. Second, for prosecutions to be successful, individuals need to have broken the law. As mentioned earlier, the free-speech protections within U.S. law are so extensive that only a tiny percentage of extremist online content is likely to be classified as illegal. Indeed, to be prosecutable, it is not sufficient for content to be offensive, degrading, or in support of illegal or violent organizations: It needs to contain threats or acts of incitement that are directed at specific individuals and are likely to be carried out as a direct result of the statements made. … In cyberspace, the legal threshold is even higher: Because "speaker and listener are separated and often do not even know each other," courts have repeatedly rejected the argument that online threats ever qualify as true or that Internet-based "call[s] to arms … would result in immediate violence." [end excerpt]
---
* "Do Not Be Impressed by Mark Zuckerberg's Phony Generosity" (2015-12-03, by Ted Rall) [archive.is/vm7QD]
* "Dear Mark Zuckerberg: Let’s Have a Heart to Heart" (2015-12-03, by Jessie Spector) [archive.is/LTsK0]
* "Zuckerberg's Facebook Giveaway: 'Charity' or Tax-Dodging Scheme? Massive 'gift' merely reshuffles $45 billion into limited liability company controlled by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan" (2015-12-03, by Sarah Lazare, commondreams.org) [archive.is/MV7LH]
---
* "Another mass killing, more hate" (2015-12-07, jordantimes.com) [archive.is/5S6lK]
* "Obama’s San Bernardino Speech and the Rightward Lurch of US Politics" (2015-12-08, by Barry Grey) [archive.is/UpPd7]
* "Obama: 'This was an act of terrorism' " (2015-12-07, edition.cnn.com) [archive.is/Zztkg], originally posted with the following: (CNN) 8:04 p.m. ET update: President Obama says "this was an act of terrorism designed to kill innocent people." 8:07 p.m. ET update: Obama says the "threat from terror is real but we will overcome it." He pledges to "destroy ISIL and any other organization that tries to harm us." 8:08 p.m. ET update: Obama pledges to review visa waiver program. He urges Congress to reassess gun laws, saying people on the no-fly list shouldn't be able to obtain a gun. 8:10 p.m. ET update: Obama says U.S. should not engage in a "long and costly ground war." He argues that ISIL "does not speak for Islam." Original story: President Barack Obama is poised to deliver a rare prime-time address from the Oval Office on Sunday to reassure anxious Americans that his administration will protect them from the threat posed by ISIS
* " 'It doesn't seem plausible to us': Family of US Muslim who killed 14 says they don't believe official account of the massacre and even suggest the Sandy Hook slaying didn't take place" (2015-12-04, dailymail.co.uk) [archive.is/6tovK]
* "Official: Neighbor Purportedly Bought 'Assault-Style' Weapons Used in San Bernardino Rampage" (2015-12-05, abcnews.go.com) [archive.is/58asM]
* "Eyewitness to San Bernardino Terror Attack Still Says ‘three tall white men did it’ " (2015-12-07, Counter Current News) [archive.is/6bPp6]
* San Bernardino Suspects: 'Three White Males, Dressed in Military Gear' (Craft International, again?) (2015-12-06, Fox 11 Los Angeles) [archive.is/fOQDn]
* "'She said she thought it was a drill:' Starting last year, center's staff began completing active shooter drills" (2015-12-07, legitgov.org) [archive.is/lGrF2]
* "Crime Scene Becomes Media Circus as Journalists Rifle Through Shooters' Home ; 'Everyone responsible for this should feel deeply ashamed,' said independent journalist Allison Kilkenny in reaction to bizarre episode" (2015-12-04, commondreams.org) [archive.is/BkmQr]
===*===*===
from the Committee to
FREE 'EM ALL!
[PoliticalPrisonersUSA.blogspot.com] End the Drug War! Stop Jim Crow! Close the Torture Chambers!
Become a Human Rights Pen Pal! [link]. [solitarywatch.com] [facebook.com/incarceratedworkers] [supportprisonerresistance.noblogs.org] [denverabc.wordpress.com] [prisonlegalnews.org] [prisonbooks.info] [nycabc.wordpress.com] [powmedicaljustice.com] [sacprisonersupport.wordpress.com]
* "Locked in Solitary Confinement, Prisoners Lead Fight for Racial Unity" (2015-09-10, by Troy Williams, postnewsgroup.com) [archive.is/IOpsR]
---
* "#FREEDOMGIVING Hunger Strike supporters push candidates to respond; As Detainees Enter 8th Day of #Freedomgiving Hunger Strike, Protests Prompt Candidate Response, ICE Continues Retaliation; O’Malley Calls for End to Detention, Sanders Issues Support, Clinton Pivots to Beltway Talking Points" (2015-12-04, notonemoredeportation.com) [archive.is/ewioO]
* "Hunger Strikers in Critical Condition - ICE Using Torture Techniques and Threats" (2015-12-07, Political Prisoner News):
Contact: Fahd Ahmed, DRUM, [fahd@)drumnyc.org], B. Loewe, #Not1More [bloewe@)onpoint.pro]
Seven Hunger Strikers Sent to Medical Unit as ICE Uses Sleep Deprivation and Attempts to Deport Participants. As Situation Escalates, Former Hunger Striker to Appear on Sanders Livestream Event at 3:00pm. Watch here [go.berniesanders.com/page/s/families-first-with-bernie-sanders]
Updates:
* Theo Lacy suspends strike after reaching agreement for release from ICE
* Otay hunger strikers resume eating after 11 days (including one man who continued for three days even after heart surgery)
* Adelanto and Etowah detainees report sleep deprivation with guards waking them every 15 minutes
* Etowah detainees report threats of force feeding
* 7 Etowah detainees sent to medical unit now on 12th day of strike
* At least four of the original El Paso hunger strikers were put on planes for removal and then returned to their cells this weekend
* Krome, Etowah, and Aurora cut off calls to known supporters, trying to sever communication.
As the #Freedomgiving hunger strike reaches its 12th day, ICE is responding with varying approaches and candidates are taking notice.
At the Theo Lacy facility [archive.is/rRHRb], 37 detainees suspended their hunger strike after reaching an agreement with ICE on Friday for release and parole within the next two weeks.
Authorities in other facilities have taken the opposite approach; locking down detainees at the Aurora facility, enacting sleep deprivation measures in Adelanto and Etowah, and threatening force feeding for Etowah detainees who are nearing two weeks without food.
"The fact that people escaping violence are being met with torture inside US facilities should raise alarms and cause urgent intervention," explains Fahd Ahmed, director of DRUM ? Desis Rising Up and Moving. "This is a life and death situation."
The hunger strikes that have come to be known as #Freedomgiving because they were initiated the night before Thanksgiving are the latest in a wave of more than 10 facilities and 1,000 detainees refusing meals and demanding their freedom. Candidates took notice and were pushed to issue statements after DRUM rallied at the Clinton headquarters last week.
Following that, one of the released strikers will appear on the Family First livestream event with Sen. Sanders this afternoon at 3:00pm to bring further attention to the on-going strike and push for the participants' immediate release.
---
* Message from Daniel on the 10 year anniversary of his arrest (2015-12-07, via Political Prisoner News): Ten years ago today, I was finishing up stuffing holiday cards for my employer when 2 beefy men asked me if i was indeed, Daniel McGowan. Once I was handcuffed and being frog-marched through the office, I knew what it was about.
At the same time, 6 of my codefendants were getting arrested at the same time. Others were receiving grand jury subpoenas as well. Sadly, all the people arrested that day became cooperating witnesses save for William Rodgers, who I knew as 'Avalon', who took his life in a county jail on the Winter Solstice, two weeks after we were arrested.
Of course, other arrests followed in the months after that, with a handful of codefendants refusing to play the game. We came together in solidarity to fight the charges and reduce the potential sentence as much as possible. For that, I will always have gratitude to Jonathan Paul, Nathan Block and Joyanna Zacher (though it would be disingenuous for me to not point out the latter two peoples' identification with esoteric fascist movements currently).
I was bonded out of jail, fought my case on house arrest for a year and months after that, worked out a plea that did not involve naming names or becoming a witness against anyone. It had repercussions for me including more time and no protection from grand juries (and surely, two years later, i was called before one as a witness and put on civil contempt of court). That said, I cannot have seen it going any other way. My regrets with the case is that more of my co-defendants did not stick with us and move forward together-something that had been the idea when worst case scenarios had been discussed years prior. 10 years later, its obvious to me every time i go to any activist event that many younger activists do not know this history. I suppose it is the struggle we all face-how to remember and memorialize, but not live in the past and nostalgia. I can tell people to watch If a Tree Falls or read Green is the New Red (thanks, Marshall Curry [https://www.facebook.com/marshall.curry.1], Sam Cullman & Will Potter [https://www.facebook.com/potter.will]) but that is an incomplete
picture. How then, do we, move forward in our fight for justice and pass on to others what we learned? Its a longer question.
I use the word "I" often in this post and perhaps others as I am talking about the past but at no point have I ever felt alone and not connected to others. Without these stalwart, loyal and amazing people in my life, I know with certainty that things would have gone a totally different way: Jenny Malone [https://www.facebook.com/tortueviolette]- my former partner and best friend. The rock. The Wizard of Oz behind every aspect of the support campaign and the 'trying to keep me sane' campaign.
G.O.A.T. EXES 4EVAH!
My family especially my sister Lisa who funded my legal defense, let me live with her while on house arrest and did not waver or flinch one time. These people taught me loyalty.
Family and Friends of Daniel McGowan better known as FAF.
This small group worked their asses off, put on so many shows, sold a zillon t-shirts, made my court dates, wrote articles, supported me mentally, emotionally and financially, put their lives on hold for some time to make sure I would have a life to come home too. So much gratitude to all of them. I am not even in touch with all of them, which to be honest, saddens me but I have nothing but lifelong gratitude for all of them.
This article may be the best article I have seen on the topic though its quite dated. Check it out.
(pdf file, 22mbs) [http://is.gd/VBvUc1].
---
* "From Solitary Confinement at Pelican Bay, Jesse Perez Sues Guards for Retaliation, Wins $25,000" (2015-12-02, prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com) [archive.is/hLbWb]
===*===*===
articles recommended by the
SAN PABLO BAY ECOLOGICAL PRESERVATION ASSOCIATION
Campaigns, info, and more [SanPabloBayEPA.blogspot.com]. Science [discardstudies.com]
* "Monsanto in the Dock! “Crimes against Nature and Humanity”. Rolling Back the Destructive Influence of the Global Agribusiness Cartel" (2015-12-04, by Colin Todhunter) [archive.is/vbAhW]
===*===*===
SAN PABLO BAY EPA: Health and the Human Ecology
Monopolists enforce a regime that does not recognize the natural right to health and life. Info [detoxproject.org].
* "Monsanto-hired panel disputes WHO report on ‘carcinogenic’ herbicide" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/Vo1sf]
* "EFSA and Member States vs. IARC on Glyphosate: Has Science Won?" (2015-11-25, corporateeurope.org) [archive.is/clziY] [begin excerpt]: Monsanto and the pesticide industry breathed a collective sigh of relief on 12 November 2015. The findings of an investigation into the toxicity of glyphosate by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and EU Member States were in stark contradiction to the March 2015 conclusion by the International Agency for Research against Cancer (IARC), a body of the World Health Organization (WHO), that this agricultural herbicide was probably causing cancer to humans. If validated, this conclusion could cause a partial ban of glyphosate in the EU. [end excerpt]
---
* "New Study on Child-Harming Pesticides Should Spur State, National Action" (2015-12-03, panna.org) [archive.is/KQNKj]
---
* "Scientist Known for Research Linking GM Feed with Cancerous Growth in Rats Wins Defamation and Forgery Court Cases" (2015-12-01, by Christina Sarich) [archive.is/yp0Eb]
===*===*===
SAN PABLO BAY EPA: Save The Birds [link]! and the Bees [link]!
A campaign to preserve and expand the habitat and populations of pollinators in the San Pablo Bay Area.
* "Home Depot to Phase Out Bee-Killing Pesticides Coalition presses for all retailers to make commitment to protect bees" (2015-12-03, foe.org) [archive.is/mf8lE]
===*===*===
articles recommended by the
NO NUKES! campaign
[StopNuclearDeath.blogspot.com] [nuclear-news.net] [nukeresister.org] [nukefree.org]
* " 'Fukushima Fingerprint': Highest-Yet Radiation Levels Found Off US Coast; 'The changing values underscore the need to more closely monitor contamination levels across the Pacific' " (2015-12-04, commondreams.org) [archive.is/ovHDL]
* "Radioactive Contamination of Our Shores: Fukushima Cesium Detected Off US West Coast" (2015-12-03, by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution) [archive.is/U2eMV]
===*===*===
articles recommended by the
SAN PABLO BAY SOVEREIGNTY Think-tank
[SovereignSanPabloBay.blogspot.com]
* "Mendocino County, CA. Makes History and Passes Law Establishing Local Self-Governance" (2014-11-05, tabublog.com) [archive.is/mip5C]
* "California County Quietly Votes For Independence From State And Federal Laws" (2014-11-05, activistpost.com) [archive.is/uHS7k]
===*===*===
articles recommended by the Committee for
ANIMAL RIGHTS
Protect Earth's Sentient Life!
* "Scientists create 3D image of how dolphins see humans using sound" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/dR1ts]
* " 'Pink' dolphins in jeopardy from Hong Kong airport expansion & Macau bridge" (2015-12-06, rt.com) [archive.is/haeIq]
---
* "Turtle liberator saves endangered species from soup bowl" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/UXDtl]
===*===*===
UNITED STATES FASCISM WATCH
[UnitedStatesFascism.blogspot.com] Documenting the process of fascism and for whom it benefits.
* "Koch Brothers twisting criminal justice reform to help corporate criminals" (2015-11-25, shadowproof.com) [archive.is/WwDkn]---
* "Our Own Private Disaster; Terrible Schools Are Great for Business" (2015-11-19, bostonreview.net) [archive.is/nUfu3] [begin excerpt]: In August 2015 Kristen McQueary published an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune wishing that a Hurricane Katrina would wash away Chicago’s teachers unions and public housing: "That’s what it took to hit the reset button in New Orleans. . . . A new mayor slashed the city budget, forced unpaid furloughs, cut positions, detonated labor contracts. . . . An underperforming public school system saw a complete makeover. A new schools chief, Paul Vallas, designed a school system with the flexibility of an entrepreneur. No restrictive mandates from the city or the state. No demands from teacher unions to abide. Instead, he created the nation’s first free-market education system."
McQueary later apologized, but she was only repeating the beliefs of many of the country’s elite, who wish to do away with teachers unions and dispossess the long-term residents of American cities who trenchantly resist efforts to privatize social services. Former Tulane University president Scott Cowen’s new book, The Inevitable City, demonstrates how one member of the white New Orleans elite took it upon himself to subject his city to disaster capitalism post-Katrina, which he sees as model leadership to guide others seeking to do the same in their cities.
In Cowen’s thinking, Hurricane Katrina presented a golden opportunity to remake New Orleans as a privatized, corporatized playground for white tourists and tech companies—liberated from the troublesome teachers unions, housing projects, and neighborhood interests that he believes held the city back for decades. African Americans remain a part of this technocratic city, but they primarily appear as iconic touchstones—musicians, chefs, Mardi Gras Indians—whose purpose is to bring local color to new New Orleans. He states that Katrina “was the crisis that forced new ideas,” ideas he himself claims he led. He fails to provide a moral calculus for finding these opportunities on the backs of the city’s 1,800 dead.
In fact, in the past decade New Orleans has been quite utterly transformed by the displacement of the largely impoverished African American population and by the privatization of the city’s social services. Prison corporations took over the city’s jails while charter school evangelists wrested control of education, making it the nation’s first all-charter school system. The city tore down thousands of units of public housing. The New Orleans school system fired 7,500 unionized teachers—mostly African Americans—and replaced them with Teach for America workers, sending untrained and idealistic young volunteers into impoverished schools. The public housing projects of pre-Katrina New Orleans had more than their share of problems and probably needed to be torn down. But the new mixed-income projects have pushed poor residents who serve as the labor force for the French Quarter out into distant New Orleans East, where they have no access to public transportation. Sixteen thousand New Orleans residents are currently on a waitlist for subsidized housing. Wealthy whites have increasingly gentrified large swaths of the city, engineering a carnival of food, drink, and culture without the messiness of poverty and racial strife that has underpinned the city for two hundred years. Meanwhile, rapid gentrification led by politicians and corporations retains the city’s famed culture as amenities for the consumption of wealthy whites instead of as the culture of everyday people. [end excerpt]
---
* "Head oil regulator resigns amid latest Brown administration scandal" (2015-12-02, by Dan Bacher, Indybay.org newswire) [archive.is/ZTKkZ]
---
* "US Exports & Manufacturing Debacle Covered up by Oil" (2015-12-07, zerohedge.com) [http://is.gd/WUQfX6]
---
* "Rahm Emanuel, a Lout with Clout: Breakfasting with Chicago's sociopathic mayor" (2015-12-02, washingtonspectator.org) [archive.is/WCNWi] [begin excerpt]: Poor Rahm Emanuel: how could he have guessed that the interview would fall the morning after he received Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy’s resignation, following the release of video evidence of a nearly execution-style shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, then the apparent erasure of the evidence of the crime gathered by security cameras at a nearby Burger King—this all coming out 400 days after the death and the erasure occurred. The tape was only released when a judge ruled against the city on a Freedom of Information Act Request. The talk here is of cover-up at the highest levels, old-school Chicago style. “First public remarks about it, right?” says one man in an expensive suit. “Maybe he’ll leverage it,” says another. [end excerpt]
---
* " 'Wives must submit to their husbands' – US Pastor blames feminism for destroying America" (2015-12-07, rt.com) [archive.is/Ckobp]
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* "What President Obama Didn’t Address: Who’s Funding the Hate Campaign Against Muslims?" (2015-12-07, wallstreetonparade.com) [archive.is/VN7jh]
* "Muslim anti-radicalization advocate detained in Texas over ‘suspicious’ appearance" (2015-12-09, rt.com) [archive.is/FAFUc]
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USA FASCISM: Military State
* "Pentagon spent $150 million on luxury villas for employees in Afghanistan" (2015-12-03, rt.com) [archive.is/7phIg]
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* " ‘Embarrassing to defend’: US general blasts Raytheon’s GPS control system a ‘disaster’ " (2015-12-09, rt.com) [archive.is/iMBsz]
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USA FASCISM: Two Party Dictatorship
* "The Wedging of America: How Party-Focused Elections Suppress The Real Majority" (2015-12-01, ivn.us) [archive.is/ZKMYn]
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* "Top 10 Political War Chests Being Fueled by ‘Big Oil’ " (2015-12-02, ivn.us) [archive.is/czsa3]
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* "Private GOP Memo Reveals Trump Victory Would Only Mark the Beginning; 'Understand the populist points Trump makes and ride that wave,' memo states" (2015-12-03, commondreams.org) [archive.is/F6s1V]
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The definition of "terrorist" may refer to militant Christian dominionists and racial supremacists among the Republican Party, of course.
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USA FASCISM: State Media Watch
[mediamatters.org]
* "War Propaganda. “Planting Stories” in the News Chain" (2015-12-05, by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky, globalresearch.ca) [archive.is/IbceU]
* "DOD’s Inspector General Investigating Administration Propaganda Again" (2015-09-02, exposefacts.org) [archive.is/e7vWX]
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* "Readers' choice Sanders left out of TIME Person of the Year running while Trump is in" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/oT5I6]
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* "Fox News tells children to charge and disarm active shooters" (2015-12-09, rt.com) [archive.is/DvlSO]
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* "Prayer Comes Under Fire in Wake of San Bernardino Shootings" (2015-12-03, wallstreetonparade.com) [archive.is/mgpJS] [begin excerpt]: It’s not every day that you wake up to an American newspaper cover like the one shown here from the New York Daily News today. The 96-year old newspaper is expressing its outrage at conservative Republicans who repeatedly invoke God and prayer following mass shootings instead of standing up to the National Rifle Association (NRA) and outlawing assault rifles and high-capacity magazines like the ones used yesterday at a county facility in San Bernardino, California where 14 people were killed and 17 injured. [...]We do want to offer a cautionary word, however. Americans who have only lived in urban or suburban areas where police can respond to a 911 call in a matter of minutes need to understand how different it is for people living in rural areas. Typically, there is no local police in rural areas and it can take state or county police 30 minutes to an hour to get to a farmhouse on a long, unlighted dirt road. Owning a gun can mean the difference between protecting your family from an intruder or allowing some deranged stranger to murder, maim or kidnap your helpless family.
Thus, we certainly do not advocate outlawing guns. But having lived in both suburban and rural areas, we don’t believe Americans need assault weapons and high capacity magazines.
As many commenters noted under the various on-line articles that ran yesterday on the San Bernardino shootings, a growing number of Americans are now avoiding shopping malls, theatres, and large public events out of fear that it will be the site of the next gun massacre.
This is no way for a civilized society to live and it is creating economic ripples that the country can ill afford as it attempts to climb out of the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression.
[end excerpt]
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WORLD FASCISM WATCH
Documenting the global economic dictatorship
* " 'Free Market' Capitalism: An Ideology is a Lie Which Will not Die" (2015-12-02, by John Kozy, globalresearch.ca) [archive.is/YENcf]
* " 'Capitalism at Work': Good-Bye To Western Living Standards" (2015-11-02, by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts) [archive.is/uQOJ7]
* "This WTO Ruling Is Perfect Example of How Big Trade Deals Trump Democracy; NAFTA partners can sue the U.S. for a combined $1 billion annually in retaliatory tariffs over Country of Origin Labels for meat" (2015-12-07, commondreams.org) [archive.is/jfpmI]
* "WTO Authorizes Over $1 Billion in Sanctions Unless U.S. Guts Popular Country-of-Origin Meat Labels, Disproving Obama Claim That Trade Pacts Can’t Undermine Public Interest Policies; Ruling Further Complicates Prospect for Controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership" (2015-12-07, citizen.org) [archive.is/WiQ7s]
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* "Truthdigger of the Week: Offshore-Banking Whistleblower Hervé Falciani" (2015-11-29, truthdig.com) [http://is.gd/ToY1nq] [begin excerpt]: In Switzerland on Friday, a federal tribunal handed down a five-year sentence against whistleblower Hervé Falciani, whom some have dubbed the “Edward Snowden of banking.”
After Falciani, then an IT expert at HSBC’s Swiss bank, hacked into the bank’s customer files in late 2007 he triggered a major scandal, exposing stunning corruption within an industry built in the shadows. How the offshore banking industry shelters money and hides secrets has enormous implications across the globe: Experts conservatively estimate that $7.6 trillion is held in overseas tax havens, costing government treasuries at least $200 billion a year. As the information leaked by Falciani confirmed, Swiss banks have long been a cash-hoarding haven for those involved in illicit activities like drug running, political corruption and money laundering. [...]The cache of files lifts the lid on a stunning litany of wrongdoing: HSBC routinely allowed clients to withdraw large amounts of cash, often in foreign currencies of little use in Switzerland; they aggressively marketed schemes likely to enable wealthy clients to avoid European taxes; colluded with some clients to conceal undeclared “black” accounts from domestic tax authorities; and provided accounts to international criminals, corrupt businessmen and others who posed a high risk. [...]
The documents show that HSBC’s Swiss subsidiary provided banking services to relatives of dictators, people implicated in African corruption scandals and arms industry figures. [...]
“I’m not a white knight, but there is something beautiful and exhilarating about establishing the truth. It carries you through the bad times,” Falciani said in a 2014 interview with French newspaper Le Monde. “I don’t have to worry about a retirement that I won’t have. I don’t have the risk of tomorrow. I can concern myself with something more: we are useful.”
For bringing to light corruption at the heart of the notoriously secretive Swiss banking system, Hervé Falciani is our Truthdigger of the Week.
[end excerpt]
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WORLD FASCISM WATCH: Weapons for a New World Order
* "New Law Establishes Ownership Rights For Space Minerals; IAA Study Provides "How to Guide" on SMR; Outlines Economic, Societal Benefits" (2015-12-01, prnewswire.com) [http://is.gd/GIF1yY]
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WORLD FASCISM WATCH: #OPDeathEaters [WorldFascists.blogspot.com]
* "10 years inside the international child porn industry with our confidential source" (2009-02-26, wikileaks.org) [archive.is/5QuUm]
* "Busted: US expat arrested in Peru for allegedly running child sex ring" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/6JDFk]
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information collected by the
SOLANO PEACE, JUSTICE, AND FREEDOM COALITION
[SolanoPeaceJustice.blogspot.com], for justice, dignity and human rights, and an end to the USA's endless wars, in harmony with Principle 1 & 6 of International Law [archive.is/tmncz], the 5 protocols of the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) [archive.is/LhUTj], and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [archive.is/U1Ota].
* "Killer Drone News Blackout Continues As Mainstream Media Ignore 4 Whistleblowers" (2015-12-03, exposefacts.org) [archive.is/PbG3O]
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* " 'We're in the Business of Killing Terrorists and Business is Good' ; Statements by US Air Force officials indicate service is dropping so many bombs in war on ISIS that it's scrambling to find more" (2015-12-04, commondreams.org) [archive.is/gs8Cz]
* " ‘An intangible lift’: Defense contractors assure investors of Middle Eastern wars’ profitability" (2015-12-08, rt.com) [archive.is/TjHqR]
* "The Entire “War on Terror” Has Been a Lie – And These Charts Prove It" (2015-11-28, by Rebecca Sumner) [archive.is/jOKut]
* "Is "War on Terror" Fueling Terror?" (2015-12-07, accuracy.org) [archive.is/Vgb6L]
* "New World Order Agenda: Obama’s Reckless Roadmap to World War III?" (2015-12-05, by Joachim Hagopian, globalresearch.ca) [archive.is/CVjFl]
* "Former US Defense Secretary Warns of 'Possible Nuclear War with Russia' " (2015-12-04, by Stephen Lendman) [archive.is/WBo4T]
* "America’s Creeping War in Syria" (2015-12-07, journal-neo.org) [archive.is/KqpZa]
* "The Second Cold War. The US Might Come Out on the Losing Side…" (2015-12-08, by Steffen A. Woll) [archive.is/KI83w]
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* "The Division of Eurasia: Threats of Nuclear War and the Korean Peninsula" (2015-12-06, by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, globalresearch.ca) [archive.is/72UJq]
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The Northbay MDS asks that all member organizations rally in solidarity with the people threatened by the fascist Republic of Turkey, a NATO member state which tolerates and uses ISIS-affiliated militias to conduct social cleansing, with the tacit approval of the USA.
"ISIS members threaten Alevis in Antep; The neighborhood of Düztepe in Antep, which houses a large Alevi population as well as Hacı Bektaş Veli Association of Solidarity and Cemevi (Alevi place of worship), is under the threat of ISIS gangs" (2015-12-02, anfenglish.com) [http://is.gd/iS5x9x]
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* (2015-12-05, Joe Lombardo): Last week I returned from Cuba where I attended an international peace conference on foreign military bases. There were US delegations from UNAC, Code Pink, Witness Against Torture and the US Peace Council as well as delegations from many other countries. The conference was held at Guantanamo. I was able to make a presentation at the conference on US foreign military bases. The presentation can be found "U.S. Military Bases, a Force for War" (by Joe Lombardo, UNAC co-coordinator) [archive.is/I5Ygn]
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* "Refugee camps are the "cities of tomorrow", says humanitarian-aid expert" (2015-11-23, dezeen.com) [archive.is/hYCBf] [begin excerpt]: Governments should stop thinking about refugee camps as temporary places, says Kilian Kleinschmidt, one of the world's leading authorities on humanitarian aid (+ interview).
"These are the cities of tomorrow," said Kleinschmidt of Europe's rapidly expanding refugee camps. "The average stay today in a camp is 17 years. That's a generation."
"In the Middle East, we were building camps: storage facilities for people. But the refugees were building a city," he told Dezeen.
Kleinschmidt said a lack of willingness to recognise that camps had become a permanent fixture around the world and a failure to provide proper infrastructure was leading to unnecessarily poor conditions and leaving residents vulnerable to "crooks".
"I think we have reached the dead end almost where the humanitarian agencies cannot cope with the crisis," he said. "We're doing humanitarian aid as we did 70 years ago after the second world war. Nothing has changed."
Kleinschmidt, 53, worked for 25 years for the United Nations and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees in various camps and operations worldwide. He was most recently stationed in Zaatari in Jordan, the world's second largest refugee camp – before leaving to start his own aid consultancy, Switxboard. [end excerpt]
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* "Are we being misguided about precision strike?" (2015-12-04, dronewars.net) [archive.is/7OwEg], an article about the UKGB's RAF attacking the Arab Republic of Syria under the so-called "anti-ISIS" coalition, and how the bombings are not presented to the UKGB public in a realistic manner.
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