Peace Now and J Street should join the battle against tax breaks for the West Bank colonists

In a sign that the discourse is changing and taboo subjects are coming inside, The Atlantic considers the case for ending the special relationship of US and Israel, and picks up an important piece in the Guardian by Andrew Kadi and Aaron Levitt about the U.S. tax subsidies extended to the Hebron colonists. Kadi and Levitt focus on the Hebron Fund’s fundraiser at the Mets ballpark last month:

"Until the public, advocacy groups, media and the US government scrutinise and rein in settlement non-profits like the Hebron Fund, policy statements about peace in the Middle East will do nothing to stop the daily violence and dispossession suffered by Palestinians."

My question: Where are Jeremy Ben-Ami of J Street and Michael Walzer of Americans for Peace Now? This is actually an issue we can all do business on. Ben-Ami says that he is trying to end the colonization of the West Bank. Well, focusing on the Hebron Fund and its tax break is one real and significant way to apply pressure. Earlier this year my old professor, Walzer, wrote bravely that the United States must put heavy pressure on Israel to defeat the settler movement (and save the 2-state solution)! Walzer is on the board of Americans for Peace Now. So are Dan Fleshler and Richard Dreyfuss.

Shouldn’t they all speak out? Do they agree with Daniel Levy (the muse of J Street) and Jeffrey Goldberg? Goldberg, last month: "Citi Field is hosting N.Y. Mets Go to Bat for Hebron Jews, a fundraiser for Hebron’s Jewish community. I can think of better causes."

Or here’s Daniel Levy of the Century Foundation on C-Span, Nov. 10. At 98:52, Levy says:

"I would say that one takes as a point of departure…. US support for Israel should draw the red line at the Green Line and one would come with as watertight a policy as possible.

"Including when the New York Mets facility is being used to host a fundraiser for the Hebron Fund, that kind of thing, those kinds of organizations, should not be allowed to raise money on a tax-deductable charitable basis, in the United States."

Or as Levy said on this site:

[M]aking donations to settler activities beyond the Green Line non-tax deductible (not charitable gifts) is not a boycott-it is simply that such activities should not benefit from a charitable gift status.

Peace Now gets this issue. Ori Nir of Peace Now made this strong statement last spring:

"I don’t know how many people, including in the U.S. government, realize the extent of private American funding to settlements. . . . Every dollar that goes to settlements makes Middle East peace that much harder to reach."

I asked Nir why Peace Now isn’t specifically going after the tax breaks to the Hebron Fund. He wrote:

"We are on record opposing any kind of material or non-material assistance to West Bank settlements. When the settlers launched a campaign to encourage American Jews to buy homes in the West Bank in 2007, we were the only Jewish group that made noise about it. …When it comes to the situation in Hebron, we have been more outspoken than any group in denouncing the unacceptable conditions there. I wrote a blog posting from Hebron when I was there in the spring. In the past, we have written about Hebron extensively.

"So, while it is true that we did not react to the Hebron Fund event in NY – just because we were swamped with other issues – I don’t think that anyone has any doubt about our position. We strongly oppose any support of Israeli settlement in the West Bank. We think it’s wrong. We think it damages efforts to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace, and we think that supporting the settlement enterprise is a disservice to peace."

Isaac Luria of J Street says, "We spoke out on this stuff during the Nadia Matar uproar and with an action to Malcolm Hoenlein at the end of last year." He points out that a recent statement on Jerusalem also blasted "fundraisers."

But J Street’s statements have all been to deplore American support without going any further. It seems to me that campaigns have to be targeted to be real and effective. J Street and Peace Now both avoided the issue that the Guardian focused on: The Mets hosting Hebron Fund and the U.S. gov’t giving them a tax break. And no one besides Daniel Levy and Jeff Goldberg actually spoke out at the time and joined their voices publicly to the 11 israeli, US, and Palestinian groups who called on the Mets to cancel it.

I’m not trying to shame Peace Now and J Street; I’m sure a lot of their members agree. I sense that the organizations themselves are leery of any hint of BDS. When actually this is an area where the radicals and the liberals can join forces to good effect.

Here is another specific organization that needs to be targeted: Task Force to Save the Nation and the Land, which Coteret says has given Israeli soldiers money for killing Palestinian "terrorists" in the occupied territories. Tax breaks for this criminality? We have consensus. Let’s go after them.

Source: Mondoweiss

The Growing Movement to Nullify National Health Care | Tenth Amendment Center

In response to what some opponents see as a Congress that doesn’t represent their interests, State Legislators are looking to the nearly forgotten American political tradition of nullification as a way to reject any potential national health care program that may be coming from Washington.

In 2010, residents of Arizona will be voting on a State Constitutional Amendment that would let them effectively opt out of any proposed national health care plan. Legislatures in Florida, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania are also considering similar State Constitutional Amendments.

And now, Missouri is joining them. According to a report in The Missourian, “Rep. Cynthia Davis, R-O’Fallon, pre-filed a bill Dec. 1 that, if approved by voters, would effectively put a halt on any national health care legislation. Davis said her intent was to give voters a way to protect themselves.”

FREEDOM TO PARTICIPATE

The bill, HJR48, “Proposes a constitutional amendment which would prohibit compelling a person to participate in any health care system.”

It states:

“To preserve the freedom of citizens of this state to provide for their health care, no law or rule shall compel, directly or indirectly or through penalties or fines, any person, employer, or health care provider to participate in any health care system. A person or employer may pay directly for lawful health care services and shall not be required to pay penalties or fines for paying directly for lawful health care services. A health care provider may accept direct payment for lawful health care services and shall not be required to pay penalties or fines for accepting direct payment from a person or employer for lawful health care services. Subject to reasonable and necessary rules that do not substantially limit a person’s options, the purchase or sale of health insurance in private health care systems shall not be prohibited by law or rule.”

NULLIFICATION: A HISTORY LESSON

The principle behind such legislation is nullification, which has a long history in the American tradition. When a state ‘nullifies’ a federal law, it is proclaiming that the law in question is void and inoperative, or ‘non-effective,’ within the boundaries of that state; or, in other words, not a law as far as the state is concerned.

Early nullification movements began with the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of 1798. These resolutions, secretly authored by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, asserted that the people of the states, as sovereign entities, could judge for themselves whether the federal government had overstepped its constitutional bounds – to the point of ignoring federal laws.

Virginia and Kentucky passed the resolutions in response to the federal Alien and Sedition Acts, which provided, in part, for the prosecution of anyone who criticized Congress or the President of the United States.

Nullification was regularly called upon by states all over the country in response to everything from higher taxes to the fugitive slave law of 1850.

A MODERN NULLIFICATION MOVEMENT

Besides the Health Care legislation in Arizona, activists and state-legislators are pushing forward with nullification efforts all across the country – and it spans the political spectrum.

Thirteen states now have some form of medical marijuana laws – in direct contravention to federal laws which state that the plant is illegal in all circumstances. Massive state nullification of the 2005 Real ID Act has rendered the law nearly void. And, two states, Montana and Tennessee, have already passed laws nullifying federal gun laws and regulations within their states.

HOWEVER WE CHOOSE

“We (Missourians) don’t like it when people try to take away our freedom,” Davis told The Missoulian. “We will maintain the right to purchase health care however we chose. This national health care debate is not about health care as much as it is about redistribution of the wealth. This resolution allows voters to say don’t redistribute our wealth here in Missouri.”

George Senate Majority Leader Chip Rogers, in an interview with the Atlanta Business Chronicle said, “Proposals to deny or limit access to the purchase of private health care are simply unacceptable. Our basic freedoms are at risk with the government-run health care proposals coming out of Washington.” Legislators from Georgia recently announced that they would be introducing a similar resolution in 2010.

REAL ID AS THE BLUEPRINT?

Supporters of modern nullification efforts look to the successful rebellion by states against the Bush-era Real ID Act.

In early 2007, Maine and then Utah passed resolutions refusing to implement the federal Real ID act on grounds that the law was unconstitutional. Well-over a dozen other states followed suit in passing legislation opposing Real ID.

Instead of attempting to force the law to implementation, the federal government delayed implementation not once, but twice. And in June of this year, the Obama administration, recognizing the insurmountable task of enforcing a law in the face of such broad resistance, announced that it was looking to “repeal and replace” the controversial law.

Supporters see this as a blueprint to resist various federal laws that they see as outside the scope of the Constitution. Some say that each successful state-level resistance to federal programs will only embolden others to try the same – resulting in an eventual shift of power from the federal government to the States and the People themselves.

by Michael Boldin

Michael Boldin is the founder of the Tenth Amendment Center

Source: Tenth Amendment Center

A Wolfowitz in Sheep’s Clothing

Paul Wolfowitz, the chief architect of the Iraq War, now wants the United States to help refugees. No, not the estimated 4.8 million Iraqis forced to flee their homes in a war he and other pro-Israeli neoconservatives planned as far back as 1992. Instead, the unlikely humanitarian, having brought “democracy” to the Iraqi people in 2003, has turned his attention this year to “the plight of North Korean refugees in China.”

In a June 16 Wall Street Journal op-ed entitled “How to Help North Korea’s Refugees,”¹ the visiting scholar at the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute expresses his hope that President Obama and South Korean President Lee, who were meeting that day, would find the time to address “this purely humanitarian issue.”

While it’s hard to imagine any U.S. administration taking anything Wolfowitz says seriously after the Iraq debacle, Americans should still take note. Whenever a Zionist poses as a humanitarian, it can be taken as axiomatic that Israel stands to benefit somehow – often, if not always, at the expense of U.S. interests.

But how, it may be reasonably asked, could Israel possibly gain from Wolfowitz’s championing of North Korean refugees?

One obvious benefit is that it diverts the spotlight from Israeli crimes in Palestine. The best known example of this strategy is the Save Darfur coalition, which, as the Jerusalem Post once bragged, “was actually begun exclusively as an initiative of the American Jewish community.” Eliot Engel’s attempt to deflect international criticism of Israel’s apartheid wall exemplifies this ploy. “Now millions of African people face genocide,” the Democrat Congressman from New York protested, “and the UN’s top priority is condemning the Israeli security fence that saves lives on both sides of the security barrier.”²

Not surprisingly, we also find that those in the forefront of advocacy for North Korean refugees are pro-Israelis. In his op-ed, Wolfowitz specifically commends Senators Sam Brownback and Dianne Feinstein and Representatives Ed Royce and Gary Ackerman for “pressing the issue.” While it would be difficult to find more than a handful of members of Congress who do not at least publicly support Israel, those singled out for praise are among its staunchest apologists on Capitol Hill. So, unless Zionists actually care more about the world’s refugees (provided they are not Palestinian), something is amiss here.

Weaponizing Human Rights

In explaining the reasons for “inaction” on the North Korean refugee issue, Wolfowitz provides a hint as to a less transparent benefit for Israel. “Unfortunately,” he writes, “many U.S. government officials seem … reluctant to do anything that might jeopardize negotiations with North Korea.”

This oblique criticism refers to the intense struggle between the State Department and the neocons for control of Korean policy, which was particularly pronounced during the Bush administration. While the career diplomats at Foggy Bottom had, in the words of chief U.S. negotiator Christopher Hill, “no interest in weaponizing human rights,” this was precisely the approach taken by the neocons.

The controversial North Korea Human Rights Act of 2004, sponsored by Christian Zionist Sam Brownback, created the post of special envoy for human rights. Jay Lefkowitz, the Orthodox Jewish appointee, couldn’t have been more provocative in his dealings with Pyongyang. As Suzy Kim and John Feffer wrote in Foreign Policy in Focus, “Lefkowitz deliberately overstepped his bounds to undermine the nuclear talks by linking them to human rights.”³

Predictably, the end result of this and other neocon provocations⁴ was a nuclear-armed North Korea.

A diplomatic disaster for Washington, a nuclear Pyongyang is a geostrategic boon to Tel Aviv, however. In their relentless campaign to induce the United States to attack Iran,

pro-Israelis invariably hype the North Korean nuclear threat. It serves as an associative warning⁵ of the danger of not preventing the “mad Mullahs” in Tehran from also acquiring nuclear weapons.

But what about Wolfowitz’s professed concern for the “probably between 100,000 to 400,000” North Korean refugees?

In addition to the nearly 5 million Iraqis displaced by Wolfowitz’s War for Israel, some 3.9 million Palestinian refugees have been generated by that state’s expansionist ideology.

If Paul Wolfowitz really gave a damn about refugees, he would renounce Zionism.

1. Paul Wolfowitz, “How to Help North Korea’s Refugees,” Wall Street Journal, June 16, 2009. [↩]
2. Ned Goldstein, “Save Darfur: Zionist Conspiracy?” World War 4 Report, October 1, 2006. [↩]
3. Suzy Kim and John Feffer, “Hardliners Target Détente with North Korea,” Foreign Policy in Focus, February 11, 2008. [↩]
4. Maidhc Ó Cathail, “The Crisis Provocateurs,” Dissident Voice, September 1, 2009. [↩]
5. Jeff Gates, “Crisis in North Korea – What a Surprise…” Criminal State, June 30, 2009. [↩]

by Maidhc Ó Cathail

Source: Dissident Voice

Homeland Security Embarks on Big Brother Programs to Read Our Minds and Emotions

Half-baked Homeland Security is spending millions to develop sensors capable of detecting a person’s level of ‘malintent’ as a counterterrorism tool.

In the sci-fi thriller Minority Report, Tom Cruise plays a D.C. police detective, circa 2054, in the department of “pre-crime,” an experimental law enforcement unit whose mission — to hunt down criminals before they strike — relies on the psychic visions of mutant “pre-cogs” (short for precognition) who can see the future. It may be futuristic Hollywood fantasy, but the underlying premise — that we can predict (if not see) a person’s sinister plans before they follow through — is already here.

This past February, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) awarded a one-year, $2.6 million grant to the Cambridge, MA.-based Charles Stark Draper Laboratory to develop computerized sensors capable of detecting a person’s level of “malintent” — or intention to do harm.

Read The Rest Here

The failures of hate-crime laws

Ian Curwen, charged with two counts of robbery and bias-motivated conduct, is perplexed by "how this thing"he means a LoDo crime spree by bands of black teens and young adults — "became a racial thing." After all, Curwen told Denver Post reporter Kirk Mitchell, "kids being kids" will sometimes use racial slurs without really meaning them.

It's tempting to mock Curwen's claim, delivered from the Denver jail, as transparently self-serving. Which it most certainly is. Yet it may also contain a kernel of truth for some who participated over the summer and fall in a series of assaults on white and Latino men that were accompanied by racial taunts.

Maybe the name-calling for some of the thugs was, just as Curwen suggests, a meaningless expression of bravado. Maybe the "white boy" and other epithets weren't signs of bias in some cases so much as convenient insults to hurl at an outnumbered and terrified prey.

The distinction wouldn't matter if those charged with the assaults and robberies weren't also being charged under Colorado's bias-motivated statute — aka, hate-crime law — which is supposed to punish and deter dangerous bigots. What if some of those who committed the LoDo crimes are nothing more than violent predators? Does that make them a better brand of criminal than their associates who do hate whites?

I don't think so — and it speaks to the reason I've always been suspicious of hate-crime laws, which punish some illegal acts more severely than other, identical acts purely because of motive.

The victims of the LoDo assaults, Mitchell reported in The Sunday Post, "suffered permanent facial damage, broken bones and cracked skulls." Those injuries would be just as crippling and painful no matter what the motive: bias, greed, group entertainment or a knuckle-dragging form of sadism.

And remember: A criminal's bias can be just as virulent in the absence of racial taunting. If the same 35 people now charged in the attacks had simply kept their mouths shut, they could have beaten solitary white guys to their hearts' content, and for the very same motives, without facing a bias charge. In a very real sense, they're being prosecuted under that statute for their speech and beliefs.

Proponents of hate-crime laws argue that such crimes inflict special emotional impact on their victims, spread fear and alarm through entire communities and polarize society. These are serious arguments, but they're not quite the clinchers that many believe.

To begin with, in 21st century America, it's not clear that hate crimes polarize society so much as unite it against the perpetrators, who represent an increasingly isolated point of view. Nor are hate crimes unique in spreading fear. A few random carjackings or forcible break-ins can set off neighborhood panic, too. So can a child kidnapping from a parking lot or a couple of rapes near a college campus.

To be sure, authorities should let the public know when hate crimes are occurring so potential targets can decide for themselves how to respond — for example, by avoiding the attack zone. There is no excuse for the way Denver failed to issue a public warning at the time of the downtown assaults that acknowledged their racial component.

Does anyone seriously doubt that such warnings would have been issued had the targets, say, been blacks or gays (and that the story would have gained national prominence)? Why the reluctance, then, in this instance?

Still, warning the public is one thing. Punishing some criminals more than others based upon what they say before or during an assault is quite another. I don't particularly care whether punks outside a nightclub detest me because of how I look. I just want them to keep their hands and fists to themselves — and to know that if they don't, the sentence for assault will put them away for a very long time.

Source: The Denver Post

Boston-area church cancels Noam Chomsky Gaza talk

On Sunday, the last day of his 81st year, Noam Chomsky gave a speech on Gaza in Watertown, Mass., at the behest of Newton Dialogues on Peace and War. They raised alot of money for the Gaza Freedom March. I heard a rumor that the original venue for the speech, Eliot Church in Newton, had dropped the speech under pressure, saying that the speech was “controversial” and had not gone through the appropriate processes for church events. I emailed Newton Dialogues. Dave Ascher responded. If you read between the lines of his response below, it is clear that the Eliot Church came under pressure because of the political nature of the Chomsky speech.

As you read this, remember one thing: This suppression of free speech took place in the heart of abolitionist territory. 150 years ago, Boston-area churches helped lead the movement that forced politicians to come out against slavery. Those churches asserted that All [Americans] are created equal. That same principle is being defiled by scared Bostonians today. Why? Because of the Israel lobby, because of the construction of Jewish identity around Israel, because of fears of persecution that have caused an empowered group to overlook the persecution of others. Dave Ascher:

I have been asked to reply to your inquiry about the Chomsky/Gaza fundraiser that our group, Newton Dialogues on Peace and War, had planned to have in Newton this past Sunday. As an active member of the group, I have been one of the central figures involved in organizing the event and have been privy to virtually all the emails and phone conversations that went on involving the change of venue.
I can confirm that the venue was indeed changed and on fairly short notice. At the new venue we had a turnout of about 200 people, which was considerably more than the capacity of the new space and the event raised significantly more money for the Gaza Freedom March than we’d anticipated.
The change of venue was due in large part to a failure on our part, as the sponsors of the event, to communicate and coordinate our plans well enough with the original venue. This might not have been a reason for cancellation in itself, but there was also a set of circumstances (pastor on vacation, short notice, Thanksgiving holiday) that conspired to make things difficult to straighten out.
We have heard that the church received phone calls after our notices were sent out. We do not really know the substance of those calls nor whether they came from nervous parishioners who recalled the hysteria in Newton when Chomsky came to speak to a club at one of the high schools or from people who wanted to alert the relatively-inexperienced assistant pastor of the possibility of this event being different from the used book sale to raise money for the homeless or from people in the community who have attempted to disrupt other events in Newton over the past several years that included speakers who are critical of the Government of Israel’s actions toward the Palestinians and its neighbors (like Lebanon).
After a lot of last minute phone calls and emails a venue was located at a church in neighboring Watertown, about 1-1/2 miles from the original venue. We were told that there were demonstrators from “The David Project” outside the church on Sunday morning, protesting the event, but nobody showed up in the evening to disrupt or demonstrate and all went smoothly.
We plan to re-schedule Chomsky to speak at the original venue, in the City of Newton, about Israel’s actions and policies toward the Palestinians as soon as we can arrange it after the New Year.

Source: Jewish Voice For Peace

Berkeley Daily Planet’s free speech battle goes national

Since March of this year, The Berkeley Daily Planet (BDP) has been struggling against a campaign by three long-time critics to scare away advertisers and shut the paper down, based on accusations that its publication of letters to the editor and op-eds critical of Israel constitute an anti-semitic bias.

On November 27th, the local controversy came to national attention when the New York Times published an article in its Business Section – “In a Home to Free Speech, a Paper is Accused of Anti-Semitism”

Jim Sinkinson, who has led the campaign against the BDP, is quoted as saying: “We think that [publisher Becky O’Malley] is addicted to anti-Israel expression…If she wants to serve and please the East Bay Jewish community, she would be safe avoiding the subject entirely.” Ms. O’Malley denies any personal or editorial bias, and says “I think that is unusual to say the least that anybody would think that they could dictate a whole area of the world that is simply off limits for discussion….” She points out that the Planet has always had an open-forum policy of printing all letters from local readers that are not obscene or defamatory.

Not covered in the New York Times article was the community response to the censorship campaign. Although many advertisers have been frightened away, readers have spoken out to protect free speech in their town and to keep the BDP alive. Scores of people have weighed in with supportive letters to the editor, and many Jewish residents signed petitions letting it be known that Mr. Sinkinson and his two allies in no way speak for the Jewish community. In addition, a coalition of local peace and justice groups — including Jewish Voice for Peace-Bay Area — took out a series of ads to expose the facts of Palestinian life under Occupation, to support the BDP free-speech policy, and to provide desperately needed advertising revenue to the paper.

–www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/pdfs/07-02-09.pdf: See Jewish Voice for Peace ad in page 14
–www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/pdfs/07-09-09.pdf: See statement of Jews who support the Daily Planet in page 28
–www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/pdfs/07-30-09.pdf: See Bay Area Friends of Sabeel ad in page 28

Now, in immediate response to publication of the New York Times article, people from around the country have been moved to write to the BDP. Of some 20 letters to the BDP editor generated by the article, all but two supported the Planet and deplored the cynical use of charges of anti-semitism as a censorship tactic.

Notwithstanding reader support, BDP advertising revenue has been drastically reduced as a result of the campaign against it, together with the impact of the economic recession. To support the BDP’s commitment to free speech, you can write to the editor at opinion at berkeleydailyplanet.com. Consider also contributing to the paper’s Fund for Local Reporting.

– Carol Sanders

Source: Jewish Voice For Peace

Report Shows 70% of California Public Universities Violate Free Speech Laws

Yee: Report Highlights Need to Continue Efforts to Protect Student Speech Rights

California State Senator Leland Yee, Ph.D

While California may lead the nation in providing legal protections for student speech rights, a report released today showed nearly 70 percent of our public universities are violating state law or the US Constitution through policies restricting free expression.

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) conducted a rigorous study of restrictions on speech at America's colleges and universities. Within California, ten California State University campuses and five University of California campuses received a "red light" rating, meaning the schools have at least one policy that clearly and substantially restricts freedom of speech in violation of law.

"It is certainly disheartening that rather than serving as public forums of free expression, many of our public universities are restricting speech and violating state law and the Constitution," said Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco). "This report clearly highlights the need to continue our efforts in protecting student speech rights and prohibiting retaliation against students, faculty and workers."

"Shockingly, FIRE's research demonstrates that a majority of California's public universities are restricting student speech protected by both the Constitution and state law," said Will Creeley, FIRE's Director of Legal and Public Advocacy. "If challenged in court, these policies will fall. The fifteen UC and CSU campuses earning a 'red light' rating from FIRE should consider themselves on notice."

Yee has authored two laws to protect such rights at California campuses. AB 2581 (2006) made California the first state in the nation to specifically prohibit censorship of college student press and explicitly granted free speech rights to students. SB 1370 (2008) further protects school employees from retaliation for assisting students in exercising such speech rights.

One of the more egregious violations has taken place at Southwestern College, a community college in Chula Vista. Campus administrators deemed the entire public campus a censorship zone except for a narrowly defined area referred to by FIRE as a "free speech patio." FIRE has referred to the policy as "utterly indefensible."

San Francisco State University also had policies that attempted to restrict student speech activity to narrowly defined "public forum areas," as well as prohibited distribution of literature to the "Student Union Plaza behind the blue lines marked on the pavement" and required students to "obtain authorization from the Student Activities Office."

Earlier this year, a student club at UC Berkeley faced a $3,200 security fee to host a controversial speech about the Arab-Israeli conflict. In clear violation of a Supreme Court decision, students were told that uniformed officers would be required for the event because of the subject matter of the presentation. As a result of public criticism and possible legal action, university officials withdrew the unlawful security fee.

To read the full report titled "Spotlight on Speech Codes 2010: The State of Free Speech on Our Nation's Campuses," visit www.thefire.org. FIRE works to protect fundamental rights on campus including the freedom of speech and expression; religious liberty and freedom of association; freedom of conscience; and due process and legal equality.

For his efforts to protect student speech rights, Senator Yee has been honored with several awards including the Freedom of Information Award by the California Newspaper Publishers Association; Distinguished Service to Journalism Education Award by the Journalism Association of Community Colleges; Champion of Journalism Education Award by the California Journalism Education Coalition; Beacon Award by the First Amendment Coalition; and the Friend of Scholastic Journalism Award by the Journalism Education Association

Source: FIRE

Kent State Dean Criticizes Campus Speech Policies: 'Your First Amendment Rights End Where Somebody Else's Sensitivity Begins

In the enactment, enforcement, and defense of unconstitutional and illiberal campus policies, the dirty work often falls to the various deans of academic and student affairs. Depressingly, FIRE all too often sees administrators who hold disciplinary influence over their students acting on the mistaken idea that students have the right not to be offended or have their views challenged. Too often, administrators simply condone the false sense of entitlement this idea breeds, protecting feelings instead of protecting serious argument and incisive parody.

Mark Weber, Dean of Library and Media Services at Kent State University in Ohio, is a notable exception. He takes aim at the sacred cows of "sensitivity" and "civility" in a recent newsletter article, "None Dare Call It Censorship." In the article he also discusses the various ways FIRE has been combating campus ills since 1999.

In particular, Weber focuses on how a culture of censorship is often encouraged by universities' harassment policies, which "pay lip service to academic freedom and the right of the individual to free speech" but restrict speech anyway in the name of "civility" or "sensitivity." Moreover, the policies often "establish the alleged victim's sensitivity as the standard to determine if the tenets of the policies' restrictions on freedom of speech have been violated." In other words, these policies often rely on a subjective standard alone, not an objective standard, to determine whether harassment really occurred. Torch readers can read the rest of Weber's article here.

FIRE is always pleased to see an academic leader who won't stand for such restrictive policies. We are here to support administrators who are ready to defend free speech and remedy the deficiencies in their own schools' policies. We encourage administrators to examine our new, short handbook, Correcting Common Mistakes in Campus Speech Policies, free online in HTML and PDF form.

Source: FIRE

WHAT THEY REALLY THINK

We want to draw attention to a section of a post over at Xymphora's great blog:

The members of the Council on Foreign Relations think Israel is a shitty little country (Barry Chamish will say 'I told you so').

Xymph links to an article by Jeffrey Blankfort at Counterpunch, that refers to a recent Pew poll of Council on Foreign Relations members, it reveals surprising views about Israel and America's position on supporting Israel:Pew Research Center survey on America's Place in the World, taken of 642 CFR members between October 2 and November 16. The Pew poll not only reveals that the overwhelming majority, two-thirds of the members of this elite foreign policy institution, believes that the United States has gone overboard in favoring Israel, it doesn't consider Israel to have have much importance to the US in the first place.

Read The Rest Here

Audit the Fed – or end it? | fed, paul, auditing - Opinion - The Orange County Register

Sometimes persistence meets opportunity. Dr. Ron Paul, the libertarian Republican congressman from Texas who ran an enthusiastic but ultimately quixotic campaign for the presidential nomination last year, has introduced a bill to audit the Federal Reserve System going back to 1983. He finally got some traction on the idea this year. His bill attracted 317 co-sponsors (180 Republicans, 137 Democrats). It is slated to be voted on and probably approved today as part of a much broader package of new government regulations on financial institutions.

Ironically, Dr. Paul will probably vote against it. His whole purpose in politics is to reduce regulation and government involvement in the economy, and he'll stick to those guns even though the bill has a little sweetener he likes.

Such adherence to principle is admirable and all too rare. Support for the idea of auditing the secretive Fed probably does not reflect widespread support for Dr. Paul's ultimate goal of abolishing the Fed, but a rising populist resentment of powerful secretive institutions and a sneaking suspicion that the Fed contributed to last year's financial fiasco and then focused on protecting bankers and other fat cats.

We hope support for auditing the Fed leads to more fundamental questioning of whether the Fed should exist at all. It's worth noting that the Fed was supposed to stabilize the money supply and the economy, but since it was formed in 1913, panics, downturns and financial fiascos have been more frequent and severe than they were before.

Whether that comes to pass, auditing the Fed and making its operations less opaque seems to be an idea whose time has come.

Source: Orange County register

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The Decline and Fall of the American Empire

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

Albert Einstein said: "the men who possess real power in this country have no intention of ending the cold war." It is one of the most incredible 'coincidences' in history that as the Berlin Wall fell and communism ceased to be the global threat we had been told it was, a new 'bogey man' would arise, as if on cue, to take its place. World terrorism', like a good steward, is now on the job, keeping the crooks on K-street and the Pentagon in firm control of one of the largest, most dangerous empires since Rome. Like the U.S. today, the Roman economy was 'militarized', the empire over-extended, the battles fought by mercenaries. The currency might get you into the Coliseum for the 'games' but little else. Thus --bread and circuses were popular. When the Praetorian Guard auctioned the Roman Empire to Didius Julianus the sale was completed in Greek Drachmas --not worthless Roman Sesterces.

Some two decades ago, it was decided by the global financial elites that the framework for the global economy shall consist of:

1) A global derivative-based financial system, controlled by the US Federal Reserve Bank and its associate global banks in the developed countries. 2) The re-location from the West to the East in the production of goods, principally to China and India to “feed” the developed economies.

The entire system was built on a simple principle, that of a FED-controlled global reserve currency which will be the engine for growth for the global economy. It is essentially an imperialist economic principle. Once we grasp this fundamental truth, Bernanke’s boast that the “US can produce as many US dollars as it wishes at no cost” takes on a different dimension.

I have talked to so many economists and when asked what is the crux of the present financial problem, they all respond in unison, “it is the global imbalances… the West consumes too much while the East saves too much and consumes not enough”. This is exemplified by the huge US trade deficits on the one part and China’s massive surpluses on the other.

--Red Alert: The Second Wave of The Financial Tsunami

The U. S. is routinely pimped on K-Street and, like Rome's sesterces and denarius, the dollar is all but worthless; China boasts the Worlds largest POSITIVE current account balance; the US the largest trade deficit. China props up the US dollar but only because it has to. This Faustian bargain was first cut by Bush Sr who paved the way for Nixon's famous trip to China's Forbidden City.

In December 2008 Lawrence Summers, soon to become the administration’s highest-ranking economist, called for decisive action. “Many experts,” he warned, “believe that unemployment could reach 10 percent by the end of next year.” In the face of that prospect, he continued, “doing too little poses a greater threat than doing too much.”Ten months later unemployment reached 10.2 percent, suggesting that despite his warning the administration hadn’t done enough to create jobs. You might have expected, then, a determination to do more.--Paul Krugman, The Phantom Menace

Some have said that the stiumli were not enough, in other words, 'too small'. It was not that the stimuli were too small but that those getting the stimuli were the banksters who had created this mess to begin with. Alas --nothing is learned from the lessons of history.

Most economists agree: the West consumes too much and the East, primarily China does not consume enough. Compounding the problem --China props up the dollar but only because it had to dump cheap product upon the American market via Wal-Mart, it's retail 'arm' in the U.S.

Source: The Existentialist Cowboy

GUESS WHO CAME TO LEVIEV’S ‘APARTHEID BREAKFAST?’

Commentary by Chippy Dee, Photos © by Bud Korotzer

Earlier this week about 25 anti-occupation, anti Israeli-apartheid activists, organized by Adalah-NY, presented a noisy surprise to the members of the Israeli Business Leaders Delegation having breakfast at a reception for them at the Leviev jewelry store on Madison Avenue in N.Y.C. Astonished, disturbed faces appeared at the window above the Leviev store. The demonstrators chanted and sang parodies of holiday songs that were critical of Israel’s policies toward the Palestinian people in general, and of Lev Leviev in particular. They used their voices, a guitar, a banjo, and a pot being banged with a spoon, while others handed out leaflets.

I Made a Little Settlement

(to the tune of “Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel”)

Apartments for Jews only-

Discrimination, sure!

He thinks Palestine’s the problem

and Apartheid is the cure!

Oh, boycott, boycott, boycott

Don’t buy Leviev today.

Funds crime with all that profit.

Who needs diamonds anyway?

Several Israelis left the reception to come down and address the demonstrators. One said that Israel was going to pull out of the West Bank and leave all that good housing to the Palestinians. Another brought his camera and solemnly photographed the demonstrators.

At one point the police were called. Two officers went into the store for a few minutes and then came out and left. A police van drove up and remained outside the store. When a member of the delegation came out and became argumentative with the demonstrators, one of the police officers stepped between him and the demonstrators and urged him to disengage.

At about 11 AM the reception ended and the guests began to leave. As they filed out some made flippant gestures, some tried to defend Israel’s dismal human rights record, and others gave hostile glances, but most avoided eye contact. One of those in the group was TV personality, Dr. Ruth Westheimer, who seemed to be trying to avoid notice. Another woman glanced at the demonstrators and found herself looking into the face of a friend. The person protesting said, “What are you doing here?” and the friend replied, “You know I’m against the occupation and settlements.” The other answered, “But this man [Leviev] is the settlements and the occupation!”

Ethan Heitner from Adalah-NY explained, “By holding this breakfast at Leviev, the Israeli Business Leaders Delegation and the American-Israel Friendship League have endorsed Israeli settlements. People should not be attending lavish breakfasts hosted by Leviev when his settlements are cutting off Palestinian villages from their farmland and impoverishing them, and Palestinian activists like Mohammed Othman from Jayyous are being imprisoned for protesting against them.”

According to a press release issued by Adalah-NY, “The breakfast at Leviev’s store came at the end of a 3 day N.Y. program for the delegation, organized by the America-Israel Friendship League that featured business and government VIPs from Israel and the U.S., including guest speakers like AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, Loews president James Tish, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren, and Israeli Government Ministers Gideon Sa’as and Uzi Landau.

In addition to Leviev, other Israeli companies featured in the delegation are deeply involved in Israel’s apartheid policies. Michael Federmann, Chairman of the Board of Elbeit Systems Ltd. spoke in the’Homeland Security Roundtable, ‘ though the Norwegian government divested from Elbit due to its provision of surveillance equipment for Israel’s wall that cuts through the West Bank…. Another speaker was Moshe Gaon, Chairman of the Board of B. Gaon Holdings, owner of Ahava, the Israeli cosmetics company that has been the subject of a successful worldwide boycott campaign, organized by CodePink, over Ahava’s exploitation of Dead Sea minerals from the Occupied West Bank, in violation of international law.

Alexis Stern from Adalah-NY explained, ‘the visit of this Israeli business delegation to the U.S. was shameful because there should be no business as usual with Apartheid Israel. Many Israeli companies are directly or indirectly involved in supporting Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people. They should be boycotted, not celebrated.’ “

Later in the day, some of the same demonstrators joined the 2 granny groups working together – the ‘Granny Peace Brigade’ and the Raging Grannies’.Some folks are really trying to make that ‘CHANGE’ a reality….

Thanks to Desert Peace where we first saw this article. Check them out HERE

Nobel Committee Celebrates War As Peace by Rick Rozoff

Source: Dandelion Saladhttp
On Thursday December 10 U.S. President Barack Obama will receive the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced its selection for the prize on October 9 of this year, less than nine months after Obama assumed the mantle of the American presidency and less than a month after that announced the doubling of his nation’s troops for the world’s longest-running war in Afghanistan. The first contingent of new forces, consisting of 1,500 Marines, is to arrive next week, right before Christmas.

Read The Rest Here

The Thin Blue Whine, Pt. I: Petulant Police Demand Impunity

Stand up for thuggery! Hundreds of Portland, Oregon police officers and supporters surround City Hall during a protest march on behalf of Officer Chris Humphreys, who was placed on administrative leave (that is, paid vacation) following repeated use of unnecessary force -- including the lethal beating of a terrified and helpless 145-lb. man who suffered from schizophrenia.



Violence "is unpredictable, chaotic and thoughtless" by its nature, observed Peter Taylor in a recent op-ed column published in The Oregonian. "It doesn't like to be confined and doesn't lend itself to cooperation.... It is saddening to see the effects of violence on its victims, those who witness it and, yes, also those who wield it against others."


As the final clause in that sentence suggests, Taylor's point is not to sympathize with victims of "unpredictable, chaotic and thoughtless" violence, but rather to defend those who often employ it. Taylor is an officer with the Portland Police Bureau, and his column was intended to explain why he -- along with several hundred others -- took part in a protest march and rally outside Portland's City Hall in defense of Officer Chris Humphreys.


Along with his comrades, Officer Taylor wore a customized t-shirt containing the slogan: "I am Chris Humphreys." He used the same rallying cry to wrap up his op-ed column. And like his comrades, Taylor -- either through invincible innate ignorance, or as a result blindness induced through cult-like devotion to his professional clique (these are not mutually exclusive possibilities) -- cannot understand that this description is an indictment.

Read The Rest Here

kenny's sideshow: Climate Reparations

Coming historically close on the heels of the successful reparation program for the 'Holocaust' comes the UN program to force us to pay for our 'environmental sins.'

Everything from 1800 AD is fair game. The 'sins' of our fathers are also ours.

NGOs Propose Measures for Justice

A Platform for Climate Justice, a consortium of people’s movements in Asia, has
highlighted solving climate change and injustice through the transformation of global economic, political and socio-cultural systems. It urges the broad recognition of climate debt, along with reparations to redress it, estimating a figure of US $24 trillion from the climate debt incurred between 1800 and 2008.
{UN}

One of the controlled opposition's leading spokespersons, Naomi Klein, is cheerleading the reparation angle.

Read The Rest Here

The Myth of Neutral Academic Peer Review Exploded by Gary North

A generation ago, Daniel Ellsberg stole thousands of documents from the Rand Corporation, photocopied them, and gave them to the New York Times, which began publishing them. Ellsberg was prosecuted by the government. So was the Times. The defendants won.

Only after the Times broke the story did the mainstream press pick up on it. The Times got its scoop, and the Nixon administration had no way to stop it. This led to Nixon's decision to stop the leaks with the Plumbers squad. That led to his defeat.

The Pentagon Papers did not directly undermine Nixon. He was re-elected in 1972 by a landslide. But the papers reinforced seeds of doubt about the war in Vietnam. Four years later, President Ford pulled the plug on the war.

What made this possible? Ellsberg's theft, the photocopy machine, and the decision by the Times to publish the papers.

Fast-forward a generation. Because of the World Wide Web, the stolen "Climategate" emails were on-line within hours. The mainstream media did their best not to promote the story, but it could not be stopped.

Read The Rest Here

Academics Spar With Populists Over Fed Audits

A group of academic economists – including several Nobel Prize winners, leaders of respected economic journals and former Fed officials – is dialing up its call for lawmakers to drop plans to subject the Federal Reserve to more scrutiny by the Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress.

In a letter to leaders on the Senate Banking Committee and House Financial Services Committee, the economists say a bill proposed by Rep. Ron Paul (R., Tex.) and Alan Grayson (D., Fla.) to let the GAO review Fed monetary policy would do “serious harm to the economy.” They warn increased congressional oversight would harm the Fed’s independence and ability to fight inflation.

Mr. Paul has built a popular movement in part on his attacks against the Fed and won large support in the House for his bill. Ben Bernanke, Fed chairman, has a growing body of academics on his side. Some 270 economists have signed the letter, including Edward Prescott, Myron Scholes, Daniel McFadden, Fynn Kydland, Roger Myerson and Robert Engel, all Nobel winners.

Source: LewRockwell.com