Gay parole officers, yay pride, whee yay #itsthe90s
When your liberation means you can join your former oppressor…
Just a reminder that 166 Guantanamo Bay detainees have been on hunger strike for more than three months now, & 43 are being force-fed in what doctors have just called “a medical ethics-free zone.”
GITMO cartoon by Matt Bors
That lying, fake-ass liberal has no intention of shutting down Guantanamo or doing anything else that his corporate sponsors haven’t approved of. Every so often he sheds some crocodile tears to reassure those gullible souls who still believe he’s here for Hope and Change, and then the program of the rich and wealthy continues on without any interference from him whatsoever.
Everything Americans Think They Know About Drugs Is Wrong: A Scientist Explodes the Myths -
Columbia University scientist Carl Hart combines research and anecdotes from his life to explain how false assumptions have created a disastrous drug policy.[Kristen Gynne]:How does institutional racism affect policy? In your book, you talk about how crack, which is pharmacologically almost identical to cocaine, is punished with an 18-1 (and once 100-1) sentencing disparity because of racially coded language linking the “crack scourge” to bad behavior in poor, black communities. There was also a recent ACLU report, which found that blacks are an average of four times more likely to be arrested for pot than whites.
[Carl Hart]: ‘I often testify as an expert witness to help women who have used marijuana while pregnant to keep their children. Case after case is a black woman. Security in the court is all black; the judges are all white; and the lawyers are young and white, building careers. It’s just slavery all over again.
When you have a group that’s already identified as an “other,” or a villified group that is a minority, it’s easier to associate a behavior with them. But people don’t see black people as being fully human. That’s what happens in the US, although people won’t tell you that.
Because when we think about Trayvon Martin, when we think about Ramarley Graham, Sean Bell, these black kids who were killed at the hands of some security or law enforcement person—that almost never happens with white kids. If it did, it would be a national crises. But it’s not a national crises because we really don’t value black men and boys in the same way we value white boys and men. We don’t see them as being equal.
I look at how people behave, and it’s clear. As long as you view this group that way, you can continue to put large percentage of law enforcement resources in those communities, but not so much to make them better. If you want to make it better, you give people jobs. Instead, we put police in those communities to pretend that they care, to pretend that you’re doing something. But that’s not helping.
Whereas drug reactions are predictable, interactions with police are not and too often become deadly. As a parent of a black youth, I’d much rather my kids interact with drugs than law enforcement. White people don’t need to think about that. Police officers too often see young, black boys as less than human. It creates a mentality where black kids are supposed to “know your place,” and it affects your psyche. Indignities become part of who you are.’
^^^^^^^^^^^^ THIS whole entire thing!
Pentagon Bracing for Public Dissent Over Climate and Energy Shocks
NSA PRISM is motivated in part by fears that environmentally-linked disasters could spur…
U.S. Military ‘Power Grab’ Goes Into Effect: Pentagon Unilaterally Grants Itself Authority Over ‘Civil Disturbances’
May 14, 2013The manhunt for the Boston Marathon bombing suspects offered the nation a window into the stunning military-style capabilities of our local law enforcement agencies. For the past 30 years, police departments throughout the United States have benefitted from the government’s largesse in the form of military weaponry and training, incentives offered in the ongoing “War on Drugs.” For the average citizen watching events such as the intense pursuit of the Tsarnaev brothers on television, it would be difficult to discern between fully outfitted police SWAT teams and the military.
The lines blurred even further Monday as a new dynamic was introduced to the militarization of domestic law enforcement. By making a few subtle changes to a regulation in the U.S. Code titled“Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies” the military has quietly granted itself the ability to police the streets without obtaining prior local or state consent, upending a precedent that has been in place for more than two centuries.
Click here to read the new rule
The most objectionable aspect of the regulatory change is the inclusion of vague language that permits military intervention in the event of “civil disturbances.” According to the rule:
Federal military commanders have the authority, in extraordinary emergency circumstances where prior authorization by the President is impossible and duly constituted local authorities are unable to control the situation, to engage temporarily in activities that are necessary to quell large-scale, unexpected civil disturbances.
Bruce Afran, a civil liberties attorney and constitutional law professor at Rutgers University, calls the rule, “a wanton power grab by the military,” and says, “It’s quite shocking actually because it violates the long-standing presumption that the military is under civilian control.”
A defense official who declined to be named takes a different view of the rule, claiming, “The authorization has been around over 100 years; it’s not a new authority. It’s been there but it hasn’t been exercised. This is a carryover of domestic policy.” Moreover, he insists the Pentagon doesn’t “want to get involved in civilian law enforcement. It’s one of those red lines that the military hasn’t signed up for.” Nevertheless, he says, “every person in the military swears an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of the United States to defend that Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.”
One of the more disturbing aspects of the new procedures that govern military command on the ground in the event of a civil disturbance relates to authority. Not only does it fail to define what circumstances would be so severe that the president’s authorization is “impossible,” it grants full presidential authority to “Federal military commanders.” According to the defense official, a commander is defined as follows: “Somebody who’s in the position of command, has the title commander. And most of the time they are centrally selected by a board, they’ve gone through additional schooling to exercise command authority.”
As it is written, this “commander” has the same power to authorize military force as the president in the event the president is somehow unable to access a telephone. (The rule doesn’t address the statutory chain of authority that already exists in the event a sitting president is unavailable.) In doing so, this commander must exercise judgment in determining what constitutes, “wanton destruction of property,” “adequate protection for Federal property,” “domestic violence,” or “conspiracy that hinders the execution of State or Federal law,” as these are the circumstances that might be considered an “emergency.”
“These phrases don’t have any legal meaning,” says Afran. “It’s no different than the emergency powers clause in the Weimar constitution [of the German Reich]. It’s a grant of emergency power to the military to rule over parts of the country at their own discretion.”
Afran also expresses apprehension over the government’s authority “to engage temporarily in activities necessary to quell large-scale disturbances.”
“Governments never like to give up power when they get it,” says Afran. “They still think after twelve years they can get intelligence out of people in Guantanamo. Temporary is in the eye of the beholder. That’s why in statutes we have definitions. All of these statutes have one thing in common and that is that they have no definitions. How long is temporary? There’s none here. The definitions are absurdly broad.”
The U.S. military is prohibited from intervening in domestic affairs except where provided under Article IV of the Constitution in cases of domestic violence that threaten the government of a state or the application of federal law. This provision was further clarified both by the Insurrection Act of 1807 and a post-Reconstruction law known as the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 (PCA). The Insurrection Act specifies the circumstances under which the president may convene the armed forces to suppress an insurrection against any state or the federal government. Furthermore, where an individual state is concerned, consent of the governor must be obtained prior to the deployment of troops. The PCA—passed in response to federal troops that enforced local laws and oversaw elections during Reconstruction—made unauthorized employment of federal troops a punishable offense, thereby giving teeth to the Insurrection Act.
Together, these laws limit executive authority over domestic military action. Yet Monday’s official regulatory changes issued unilaterally by the Department of Defense is a game-changer.
Submitted by: http://dashielsheen.tumblr.com/
military intervention on US streets without government consent… now legal!
They are preparing for something, we ought to as well.
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‘Images are barely coming in as people leave the 3G/4G jammed zones. The rumor is that Turkish Police is using night sticks and heavy beatings instead of massive amounts of gas grenades so they don’t look bad to foreign media. Here is Turkey’s finest “passifying” a protester.’ - HybridSec
(via cultureofresistance)
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As we move forward opening and closing days will be a main focus for demonstrations. We have only just begun planning for Closing Day “2013” - but we can let you in on some of the focus.
The Closing Day Demonstrations will be themed “Festival for the Animals” a direct throwback to the 1984 Ark-II anti vivisection rally that brought 1,500 to Nathan Philips Square in Toronto. That demonstration, to our knowledge, stands as the largest animal advocacy demonstration in Canadian history. We want to honour that history, and also to top that mark.
We will also be incorporating many things from the past into this demonstration - including a Conference (Gadfly, 96’). We are planning for a full three days of events that will all lead to a massive demonstration on Sunday October 13th - closing day.
We wanted to get these initial plans up and posted so that folks can plan accordingly. We hope you will make it a priority - and we hope to make it the final closing day.
xo,
Marineland Animal Defense
(Source: christopherstreet, via cultureofresistance)
When we work together, there is nothing we can not do. Proof? When activists in England reached out to the wider community in the struggle against Hillgrove Cat Farm, their numbers reached a point where the government warned they were becoming “un-policeable” and the perimeter security at the farm was literally overrun. The government spent tens of millions to keep this breeder for the vivisection industry open, but in the end, our side won.
Cops Plead Guilty to Helping Plant Drugs on Woman Sexually Harassed by Judge -
A judge responded to an assault victim by demanding sex in exchange for ‘legal favors’ in her divorce. She filed a complaint, and he sent cops to plant meth in her car.
… “My client was set up and framed with methamphetamine drugs by Judge Bryant Cochran, whom she had accused of soliciting her for sex in exchange for legal favors in a case she had in Cochran’s court,” attorney McCracken Poston told the Chronicle.
Poston, a former Georgia state representative from nearby Ringgold with a reputation as a crack attorney, is representing Garmley in a civil lawsuit against Murray County. And Garmley isn’t alone. Since this scandal broke, three women who worked in Cochran’s court have filed a separate lawsuit against the judge and the county claiming Cochran sexually harassed them while county officials negligently failed to protect their rights.
There are no words for how much I hate the ruling class and their police.
“When the whales at SeaWorld were played a sound recording of a group of whales made at sea, they all stopped moving in their tanks. Then one of them, Corky, began shaking violently. The tape was playing sounds of her family. “I have no idea if this creature shares any feelings that we know as humans, but her reaction reminded me of the times I heard messages from my own family when I was a hostage in Lebanon. I would feel great relief at knowing they were well, but also much sorrow and a sharpened longing to be reunited with them. “What is clear is that Corky could recognize her family’s sounds after years of separation…Knowing only this much I believe it is pointless and cruel to keep these animals apart for commercial reasons - to exploit them for commercial entertainment.” -John McCarthy, journalist
(via xveganarchistx)