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Solstice.
UK: Hippies, witches and druids revel at Stonehenge summer solstice
This is Clare Daly, an elected member of the Dáil in Ireland (not Northern Ireland, where the G20 was held) speaking to Enda Kenny, during the Leader Question time in the Dáil (lower house of Irish legislature). These are "questions proposed by opposition leaders in parliament to the Taoiseach". Taoiseach (sounds like "teesha") is the prime minister, Enda Kenny. This is a clipped version. If you want to see more of his responses to her, much of it mansplaining, scorning and patriotic, here is a
longer version. Also, one of the things he does is to try to invoke the support of tens of millions of Irish Americans.
Leaders Questions on the G8 and the visit of the Obamas to Ireland (Home?)
YouTube: Published on Jun 19, 2013
Clare asks about all the slobbering over the American President and his family by Irish Government officials on the recent visit by the Obamas after the G8 summit held in Co. Fermanagh.
HuffPo: "Irish politician Clare Daly slammed President Barack Obama as a "war criminal" and "hypocrite of the century" in a blistering speech before Parliament Wednesday, following the conclusion of the G8 summit in Northern Ireland.
Daly, an independent member of Parliament (ID) representing Dublin North, chastised Irish Prime Minister (Taoiseach) Enda Kenny for embracing Obama, telling the Taoiseach he had "turned a blind eye" to the U.S. policy toward Syria and the use of targeted drone strikes."
On Thursday, one million.
A million people across Brazil say "it's not about 20 cents"
More than a million people demonstrate in a hundred cities across Brazil, and raise new demands.
One, the abolition of PEC37, a legislation that will give immunity to congressmen and elected officials from local police departments and any other instance, with the exception of the Federal Police, controlled by the executive, which will wage the exclusive power to investigate government functionaries. Many fear this project will eventually nullify an ongoing investigation of public officials involved in broad corruption scandals, and is regarded as a massive corruption coverup.
Two, the immediate resignation of Renan Calheiros, chairman of the Brazilian Congress.
Three, an immediate investigation and eventual sanction for officials in the Public Ministry and the national police, believed to have illegally benefited from public contracts for the soccer World Cup and the Olympic Games.
Four, a law making corruption in Congress a heinous crime.
Five, the end of the immunity privilege for congressman.
Via a tool called "Guardian witness", a type of social media tool I've never seen before until I noticed it in a Friday article on their site. Anyway, don't miss reading this, particularly if you, like many of us, feel overwhelmed and, at times, defeated. What this woman is describing is familiar to me. The Occupy movement summoned similar feelings within me.
Solidarity among all social strata
I was just one more among the thousands who were tear-gassed in front of the Bandeirantes Palace, last night. When I saw the first gas can drop a few meters away from me, my first thought was of running away, but I just could not do it: everybody was helping each-other in every possible way. College students were handling vinegar to help neutralize the effects of tear-gas; medical students were bandaging the wounded; the owners of the posh mansions of the Morumbi neighborhood were in front of their villas, handling water and vinegar to passersby; Anonymous Brazil hacked several websites and Twitter accounts in order to motivate people to take the streets and even Gloria Kalil, Brazil's topmost fashion guru, dedicated an entry on her weblog on how to dress properly for the riots, in order to be better protected from tear-gas and rubber bullets. Every-one was utterly compromised and I, too, needed to make a stand for my city, my people and my country. For the first time in my life I felt that solidarity and trust were way stronger than fear and repression and, as I stood my ground in midst of the smoke I could no longer tell if my tears were chemically induced or if they were inspired by the beauty of people engaged in a noble cause. What I was sure of was: there was no going back.
More from Guardian Witness about Brazil, from a citizen whose voice can come through unfiltered using social media tools and via the good reporting by the Guardian (though he did not need the Guardian to get his message out to the world). This is the reason why we can't allow our governments to subvert and destroy the internet.
The reason behind the protest
The reason behind the protest
I would like to share with you some information about the protests in Brazil.
First of all, I'd like to write a few words about the reason behind the protests. The media in Brazil tells us everyday that this protest has no cause, that we have no clear objectives nor real demands. But that, my friends, is a pitiful attempt to cover the real facts, as our cause is really straightforward - we will not tolerate irrational use of our money. The claims against the excessive spendings in the World Cup is nothing but a facet of this indignation.
Our generation has watched with disgust as the political class started to actually believe the lies that they told themselves - that they are the owners of our country and that their acts of corruption and waste of the public funds would go unnoticed forever.
There will be, from now on, someone watching them and reclaming rights, as that is our duty as citizens. As a consequence of our ideal of rationality we despise violence and destruction of public property, as it's a destruction of what is ours. Those following such paths are being rejected by the large majority of the protesters and do not represent us. We do not have a rigid leadership - participants have come due to their own reasoning. We follow ideas, not leaders, and that is, perhaps, the reason why the government cannot understand what is happening
Last but not least, I'm grateful for the support of the citizens of the U.K, as seen in Facebook and Twitter, and hope that this clarifies some points regarding the events that are taking place.
No, I'm not going to the world cup.
The flashing lights catches on in Brazil Friday night -- a new type of protest where people at home can join in while remaining safe from police in night protests.
Barra da Tijuca revoltada com a Dilma 21/06
Some translations from the various videos from Google translate:
"Barra da Tijuca angry with Dilma 21/06."
"Reaction of villagers after the pronouncement of Dilma on tv."
"Buildings in Barra da Tijuca boo Rousseff during a speech"
"Manifestation of Barra da Tijuca, without violence!"
"Protest Barra da Tijuca - RJ - Blink! Flashes! - 21.06.13"
This has gone viral with a million and a half views in a few days, and last night, #CalaABocaDilma was trending on Twitter, which means "Shut up, Dilma" (their president) after a speech that did not go over well. I believe the "5 causas" translates to 5 causes or 5 demands.
"Nós somos Anonymous. Nós somos Legião. Nós não perdoamos. Nós não esquecemos. Esperem por nós."
I thought this was shocking and found the documentary film makers and witnesses to be very credible. It will view on a premium channel that I am not familiar with, Epic? Epix? on July 17th. From DemocracyNow!
Did U.S. Gov't Lie About TWA Flight 800? Ex-Investigators Seek Probe as New Evidence Emerges.
This Thom Hartman article is pretty good but he gets one big thing wrong. TransCanada is not a "foreign corporation". It's structured in a complex way and it is both a Canadian and an American company.
Clear Evidence That Corporate America Wants the Govt. to Treat Protesters as 'Terrorists'
Major company behind the Keystone XL pipeline wants American police to treat people sitting in trees like Mohammad Atta.
Corporations are trying to use the PATRIOT Act in ways that have nothing to do with Osama Bin Laden because the PATRIOT Act gives transnational corporations the power to snuff out the activism of all those who oppose them.
[...]
So what makes TransCanada think it can get the American police to treat people sitting in trees like Mohammad Atta? The PATRIOT Act. The U.S. Legal Code definition of terrorism was expanded to include a new meaning of “domestic terrorism” by Congress in 2001. This new definition considers domestic terrorism as:
“…activities that involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State; appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States"
According to the ACLU, “this definition is broad enough to encompass the activities of…prominent activists, campaigns and organizations.” Given the right lawyer, TransCanada could convince a federal judge that monkey-wrenching and tying oneself to a construction vehicle is “dangerous to human life” or intended to “intimidate a civilian population.”
A round up by Micah Zenko.
You Might Have Missed: Syrian Intervention, Drone Transparency, and Surveillance Programs
“State of the Union with Candy Crowley, Interview with Mike Rogers, Robert Menendez,” CNN, June 16, 2013.
Robert Menendez:…And the reality is we need to tip the scales, not simply to nudge them. And the president’s moving in the right direction. And to a large degree, this is about whether or not we exert American leadership with our allies abroad, both in the gulf region and in Europe. A lot of what we want to see done can be done through our allies if we direct them and tell them this is where we want to head. If Assad continues to have unlimited air power and artillery, that’s a hard battle to win against, you know, simple arms.
[...]
Anita Jumar, “Secrets piling up faster than government can declassify some,” McClatchy, June 19, 2013.
In fiscal year 2011, about 2,400 employees classified documents and only hundreds declassified them, according to the most recent statistics available – which exclude the backlog – from the Information Security Oversight Office. They classified information 92 million times and declassified it only 27 million times. They spent more than $11 billion to classify documents at 41 agencies – more than double the amount a decade ago – and only $53 million on declassification.
Everything's cool. We trust Obama!
Liberal activists: Obama as Bush Lite? 'No way in hell'
But the prevailing sentiment among rank-and-file activists here was much more pragmatic. They said that while they may be disappointed in some things, they still support the president, because he agrees with them on a majority of issues -- from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the discontinuation of “torture” tactics, as well as passage of the health-care law, the push for immigration reform and support for same-sex marriage.
[...]
Kerry Jones added, “All these people put their whole lives on Facebook. People volunteer more information out there, so it’s not private anyway. The bottom line is it’s trust. And we trust Obama.”
[...]
Moulitsas summed up the differing views among liberals after the revelations of the NSA surveillance program.
“There are those who think Obama can do no wrong and those who think he’s a sellout,” Moulitsas said. “It’s either – ‘I trust Obama’ or ‘I told you Obama is terrible.’ I don’t think it changed anybody’s opinion about it. … The notion that it’s one or the other is hyper simplistic.”
And he likened the hardest-line liberals to the Tea Party.
“There are some people who won’t ever be happy,” Moulitsas said. “Dennis Kucinich could be elected, and they won’t be happy. Their perception of what should happen isn’t realistic. Those people are aligned with – have an ideological rigidity very similar to the Tea Party movement.”
If you're interested in the president's video presentation to Netroots Nation, it starts at the 01:22:00 mark. Howard Dean's speech begins at 00:21:40 mark. I watched about an hour of the whole keynote session and the NSA files were not mentioned once. Elizabeth Warren introducing Jeff Merkley are later in the program, somewhere around the 2 hour mark. I did not finish listening to all of it.
Netroots Nation Opening Keynote, Thursday, Part 1
Nurses, Environmentalists Lead Keystone XL Protest in San Francisco
DYAN RUIZ, PRODUCER: Over 1,000 people protested on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco against the Keystone XL pipeline.
The proposed 1,700 new miles of pipeline would connect Oklahoma to oil refineries in the Texas Gulf Coast and the Alberta tar sands to Kansas, because part of the pipeline would stretch across the Canadian-U.S. border. Ultimately the decision lies with President Barack Obama.
KATHRYN DONAHUE, CALIFORNIA NURSES ASSOCIATION: We have probably over 1,000 people here marching the bridge today to protest and to ask President Obama to please honor his campaign promises to stop the Keystone pipeline. It's a dirty fossil fuel. It will do nothing but pollute the environment more. It's the dirtiest fossil fuel. And we need to be changing things that will help the climate, like wind energy, solar energy, things that will actually improve the climate for the people of this country.
JESS DERVIN-ACKERMAN, SIERRA CLUB, SAN FRANCISCO BAY CHAPTER: We're in California, which is Obama's base. We're the supporters. We're his supporters. And we're here to remind him that he has a big decision before him and ask him to reject the Keystone XL.
RUIZ: Protesters say that when it comes to the Keystone XL pipeline, there is a false choice being presented between jobs and the environment.
NSA Files
GCHQ taps fibre-optic cables for secret access to world's communications
Exclusive: British spy agency collects and stores vast quantities of global email messages, Facebook posts, internet histories and calls, and shares them with NSA, latest documents from Edward Snowden reveal
Britain's spy agency GCHQ has secretly gained access to the network of cables which carry the world's phone calls and internet traffic and has started to process vast streams of sensitive personal information which it is sharing with its American partner, the National Security Agency (NSA).
The sheer scale of the agency's ambition is reflected in the titles of its two principal components: Mastering the Internet and Global Telecoms Exploitation, aimed at scooping up as much online and telephone traffic as possible. This is all being carried out without any form of public acknowledgement or debate.
If the complaint is sealed and the Justice Dept. spokesperson declined to comment, how did the WaPo find out what the charges were? Was that a leak of classified information?
U.S. charges Edward Snowden with espionage in leaks about NSA surveillance programs
Federal prosecutors have filed a sealed criminal complaint against Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked a trove of documents about top-secret surveillance programs, and the United States has asked Hong Kong to detain him on a provisional arrest warrant, according to U.S. officials.
Snowden was charged with espionage, theft and conversion of government property, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the case.
The complaint was filed in the Eastern District of Virginia, a jurisdiction where Snowden’s former employer, Booz Allen Hamilton, is headquartered and a district with a long track record of prosecuting cases with national security implications.
[...]
This White House is responsible for bringing six of the nine total indictments ever brought under the 1917 Espionage Act. Snowden will be the seventh individual when he is formally indicted.
By filing a criminal complaint, prosecutors have a legal basis to make the request of the authorities in Hong Kong. Prosecutors now have 60 days to file an indictment, probably also under seal, and can then move to have Snowden extradited from Hong Kong for trial in the United States.
[...]
A businessman in Iceland has offered to fly Snowden on a chartered jet to his country if he is granted asylum there.
Glenn Greenwald this morning.
On the Espionage Act charges against Edward Snowden
Who is actually bringing 'injury to America': those who are secretly building a massive surveillance system or those who inform citizens that it's being done?
The US government has charged Edward Snowden with three felonies, including two under the Espionage Act, the 1917 statute enacted to criminalize dissent against World War I. My priority at the moment is working on our next set of stories, so I just want to briefly note a few points about this.
[...]
The irony is obvious: the same people who are building a ubiquitous surveillance system to spy on everyone in the world, including their own citizens, are now accusing the person who exposed it of "espionage". It seems clear that the people who are actually bringing "injury to the United States" are those who are waging war on basic tenets of transparency and secretly constructing a mass and often illegal and unconstitutional surveillance apparatus aimed at American citizens - and those who are lying to the American people and its Congress about what they're doing - rather than those who are devoted to informing the American people that this is being done.
The Obama administration leaks classified information continuously. They do it to glorify the President, or manipulate public opinion, or even to help produce a pre-election propaganda film about the Osama bin Laden raid. The Obama administration does not hate unauthorized leaks of classified information. They are more responsible for such leaks than anyone.
What they hate are leaks that embarrass them or expose their wrongdoing. Those are the only kinds of leaks that are prosecuted. It's a completely one-sided and manipulative abuse of secrecy laws. It's all designed to ensure that the only information we as citizens can learn is what they want us to learn because it makes them look good. The only leaks they're interested in severely punishing are those that undermine them politically. The "enemy" they're seeking to keep ignorant with selective and excessive leak prosecutions are not The Terrorists or The Chinese Communists. It's the American people.
[...]
And that is precisely why the US government is so furious and will bring its full weight to bear against these disclosures. What has been "harmed" is not the national security of the US but the ability of its political leaders to work against their own citizens and citizens around the world in the dark, with zero transparency or real accountability. If anything is a crime, it's that secret, unaccountable and deceitful behavior: not the shining of light on it.
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Action
Stop Watching Us.
The revelations about the National Security Agency's surveillance apparatus, if true, represent a stunning abuse of our basic rights. We demand the U.S. Congress reveal the full extent of the NSA's spying programs.
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