Obama May Censor ’Net In Effort to Shut Down ‘Conspiracy Theorists’

By Victor Thorn

Big Brother is running scared, and it’s the double-edged sword of technology that pursues him. Most certainly science can be used to control, but just as powerfully it can be utilized to expose. That’s why the moneyed elite have historically been so horrified of allowing information to be freely released to the masses, and why they so desperately try to conceal it.

The great science fiction writer Robert Heinlein once propounded, “Secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy—censorship. When any government or any church, for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, ‘This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,’ the end result is tyranny and oppression.”

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UN Security Stops Journalist’s Questions About ClimateGate

A Stanford Professor has used United Nation security officers to silence a journalist asking him “inconvenient questions” during a press briefing at the climate change conference in Copenhagen.

Professor Stephen Schneider’s assistant requested armed UN security officers who held film maker Phelim McAleer, ordered him to stop filming and prevented further questioning after the press conference where the Stanford academic was launching a book.

McAleer, a veteran journalist and film maker, has recently made a documentary “Not Evil Just Wrong’ which takes a sceptical look at the science and politics behind Global Warming concerns.

He asked Professor Schneider about his opinions on Climategate – where leaked emails have revealed that a senior British professor deleted data and encouraged colleagues to do likewise if it contradicted their belief in Global Warming.

Professor Phil Jones, the head of Britain’s Climate Research Unit, has temporarily stood down pending an investigation into the scandal.

Professor Schneider, who is a senior member of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said he would not comment on emails that may have been incomplete or edited.

During some testy exchanges with McAleer, UN officials and Professor Schneider’s assistants twice tried to cut short McAleer’s question.

However as the press conference drew to a close Professor Schneider’s assistant called armed UN security guards to the room. They held McAleer and aggressively ordered cameraman Ian Foster to stop filming. The guard threatened to take away the camera and expel the film crew from the conference if they did not obey his instructions to stop filming Professor Schneider.

The guard demanded to look at the film crews press credentials and refused to allow them to film until Professor Schneider left the room.
McAleer said he was disappointed by Professor Schneider’s behaviour.

“It was a press conference. Climategate is a major story – it goes to the heart of the Global Warming debate by calling into question the scientific data and the integrity of many scientists involved.”

“These questions should be answered. The attempts by UN officials and Professor Schneider’s assistant to remove my microphone were hamfisted but events took a more sinister turn when they called an armed UN security officer to silence a journalist.”

Two officers corralled the film crew and one officer can be seen on tape threatening the cameraman. The Guard can also be heard warning that if the crew did not stop filming their would seize the equipment and the journalists expelled from the conference.

McAleer says he has made an official complaint tabout the incident.

“I have met Mr Christopher Ankerson the UN’s head of security for the conference and he has confirmed it was Professor Schneider’s staff who asked the security guards to come corral us at the press conference. Mr Ankerson could not say what grounds the security guard had for ordering us to stop filming.”

“This is a blatant attempt to stop journalists doing journalism and asking hard questions. It is not the job of armed UN security officers to stop legitimate journalists asking legitimate questions of senior members of the UN’s IPCC.”

Professor Schneider was interviewed for McAleer’s “Not Evil Just Wrong” documentary but lawyers later wrote to McAleer saying he was withdrawing permission for the interview to be used.

McAleer, who is from Ireland, has gained quite a reputation for asking difficult questions of those who have been promoting the idea of man-made Global Warming.

His microphone was cut off after he asked former vice-president Al Gore about the British court case which found that An Inconvenient Truth had a nine significant errors and exaggerations. Almost 500,000 people have watched the incident on youtube.

Source: Big Government

Canadian Human Rights Commission Horror Stories - Steven Boissoin

“So many people genuinely believe in the freedom of the press”

Suzanne Breen describes her battle to protect her sources from police in Northern Ireland

Nobody expected us to win. Just by mentioning of the word “terrorism” nowadays, the state generally secures whatever it wants, even on the flimsiest basis. So when the Police Service of Northern Ireland went to court seeking a production order for computers, phones and notes relating to stories I’d written in the Sunday Tribune on the Real IRA, everyone thought they’d succeed.

Ten years ago another Northern Ireland reporter, Ed Moloney, had been pursued for material relating to a loyalist paramilitary he interviewed. After a year-long, hugely expensive legal battle, the courts eventually ruled in the journalist’s favour. But that case was taken under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. The PSNI were pursuing me and the Sunday Tribune under the Terrorism Act 2000, an even more draconian piece of legislation.

And the political backdrop against which detectives pursued us was hardly conducive to a progressive, liberal verdict. This is the year that two British soldiers were killed by the Real IRA after a decade without security force casualties in Northern Ireland. The London and Dublin governments, local unionist and nationalist politicians, as well as the vast majority of society, were naturally appalled.

Under these circumstances, the general consensus was that the courts would favour the police. If ever we did win it would be far down the appeal road — probably at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

There was no way I was ever going to hand over material to the PSNI even if failure to do so carried a sentence of up to five years in jail. The reasons were two-fold.

Were I to do what police wanted my life would have been in imminent danger from the Real IRA. But, secondly and just as importantly, compliance would make a nonsense of the concept of journalistic confidentiality and the protection of sources.

In a courageous judgment, Belfast recorder Tom Burgess recognised these arguments. He acknowledged my rights under Article 2 of the European Convention. Significantly he also ruled “that the concept of confidentiality for journalists protecting their sources is recognised in law and specifically under the 2000 Terrorism Act and Article 10 of the (European) Convention”.

It is the first time since the Terrorism Act that protection of sources has been enshrined in a judgment. How police must wish they’d never taken this case. Now they are now in a significantly weaker legal position if they wish to pursue another journalist in the same way.

To win at the first hearing in a domestic court was particularly welcome and I hope that the judgment encourages police forces in Ireland and Britain to wise up. Do your job and let journalists do theirs. We are not detectives or agents or informants for the state. We exist to put information into the public domain. Full stop.

I also hope that it encourages journalists not to be bullied or lured by police into betraying their professional ethics. In my case, the police initially invited me to have an off-the-record private chat with them about my sources. No journalist should ever venture down such a dangerous and compromising route.

No journalist should be intimidated when detectives apply for a production order. As we’ve shown, such a move can be challenged and overcome. It is up to reporters and photographers to fight for press freedom, not to capitulate at the first police phone call, letter, or other approach.

On the first day of the hearing, the public, press, myself and my lawyers were cleared from the court so the PSNI could present their arguments in camera. It was Kafkaesque. How could we mount a defence when we didn’t even know what police were saying? We were fighting in a massively disadvantaged position.

And so we decided our tactics would be the exact opposite to those of the police. If their case was shrouded in secrecy, we would respond with transparency. I would go into the witness box and be open to intensive cross-examination. This wasn’t just the PSNI against one journalist and newspaper — it was an attack on the entire media.

We called a range of well-respected journalists as witnesses: Panorama’s John Ware, Channel 4’s Alex Thomson, Liam Clarke of the Sunday Times, and former Mirror editor, Professor Roy Greenslade. Apart from making their secret statement the police didn’t publicly enter the witness box themselves nor did they call any witnesses.

I suspect that the PSNI application against the Sunday Tribune was politically, not security, driven. When the Real IRA murdered two soldiers at Massereene in March it challenged the official view, promoted by the British government across the world, that the gunmen’s day in Northern Ireland was over, that militant Irish republicanism belonged only to the history books.

While much has changed in Northern Ireland there hasn’t quite been the 100 per cent transformation that the authorities portray. The state’s reaction was to make life difficult for journalists who talk to the Real IRA.

The message was, “if you interview these people, if you communicate with them in any way, we will pursue you, we will take you to court, we could even jail you”. But not interviewing the Real IRA won’t make them go away any more than the broadcasting ban made the Provisionals disappear. If we don’t talk to paramilitaries when acts of violence occur we will be forced to rely solely on official police statements for information.

During our legal battle the Sunday Tribune and the National Union of Journalists joined forces in a campaign for source protection. What was most heartening was the overwhelming response from writers, academics, lawyers, the arts world, trade union activists, the business community and ordinary members of the public. So many people genuinely believe in the freedom of the press.

In Northern Ireland that sentiment crosses the nationalist-unionist, Catholic-Protestant, left-right divide. I was delighted that even those bitterly opposed to paramilitaries supported our stance. Willie Frazer the director of FAIR, which represents thousands of people bereaved or injured by republicans, said: “Much as I loathe the Real IRA, I want to know what they’re saying not what (PSNI Chief Constable) Hugh Orde wants me to hear”.

Ex-republican informers, named as targets by the Real IRA, not only signed our 5,000-strong petition but also offered to appear in court as witnesses for the Sunday Tribune if required. If the authorities wanted to deliberately confuse the messenger with the message, in terms of paramilitary interviews, they failed.

The PSNI and their legal advisers called it completely wrong. They thought they’d walk in and win hands-down. Instead, their arguments were comprehensively rejected by the court.

I hope this judgment sets a precedent. It certainly shows that a journalist challenging police demands is no lost cause. The mere mention of the word “terrorism” isn’t enough to create a frenzy and ensure detectives get what they want. For once in these often depressing times, decent liberal principles won. And that old-fashioned concept, the freedom of the press, came back in style.

Source: Index On Censorship

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN GERMANY AND IRAN? NOT MUCH!

By My Hate Speech
We had a good laugh today when we read an article posted on Yahoo News, "Merkel likens Iran to repressive East Germany." Of course it was her attempt to deflect what really goes on Germany today by reminding her own nation's sheeple of how good things are, in comparison to the former East Germany, and the current situation that unfolded in Iran last week. If you are aware of people such as Ernst ZUndel, Germar Rudolf, and others you may allready understand. As far as we were concerned the articles title could have been changed to something like, "Whats the Difference between Germany and Iran." Well lets see where this goes.

See if you can guess which country commits the following actions against its people.

What is the country, is in close lead for the harshest censorship laws, after China and North Korea?

What country is it that is proud of conducting more than 10,000 criminal prosecutions against persons for having committed peaceful "thought crimes"?

What country is it where the authorities declare that half of their population deserves to be ostracized for harboring political views?

What country is it where the head of state asks for children to spy on their parents and parents to spy on their children to make sure they do not harbor unwanted political views?

What country is it where even the mainstream media admit that this country is in a state of hysteria while persecuting political dissidents?

What country is it where members of certain political opposition groups considered constitutional can nevertheless be deprived of some of their civil rights?

What country is it that has a huge spy agency designed to snoop on opposition groups?

What country is it that has institutions designed to conduct political trials?

What country is it that prosecutes defense lawyers if they try to introduce exonerating evidence on behalf of their clients?

What country is it where judges are threatened with prosecution because they did not punish political and historical dissenters harshly enough?

What country is it that hides from its citizens, which media are outlawed, so that one cannot possibly know whether or not one commits a crime when distributing such media?

What country is it where authors, editors, publishers, printers, wholesalers, retailers, importers and exporters, warehouses, and customers buying more than two copies of a certain medium can be prosecuted for producing, stocking, importing/exporting, distributing dissenting political and historical literature?

What country is it where well-founded, heavily footnoted books on political and historical topics, authored by academics with plenty of credentials, can be confiscated and burned by the authorities?

What country is it that sends a historical dissenter to prison for more than two years just because he published peaceful, scholarly historical material?

What country is it where a professor criticizing internationalism can be kicked out of his job, harassed, prosecuted and driven into suicide?

What country is it where a history teacher is sent to jail for uttering historical dissent in a private letter to a high-profile personality?

What country is it where a highly renowned historian writing a well-founded book of his country's history can be threatened with prosecution because what he found out is not liked by the authorities?

What country is it where a judge, writing a well-founded, but highly controversial book on historical topics, sees his book confiscated and burned, his pension cut, and his PhD title withdrawn as a result of this?

What country is it where a professor who writes his disbelief about certain historical events in a footnote, written in Latin, in a scholarly anthology can be prosecuted and threatened with jail?

What country is it where people can get fined for raising an arm to wave their hands at a person?

What country is it where somebody raising his country's flag would be harassed by his neighbors for being an extremist?

What country is it where a teacher suggesting that all students should sing the national anthem first thing every morning would lose his job for being an extremist?

Had enough? We have. We could go on but we just get angrier and angrier. If you guessed Iran you would be only partly right. If you guessed Germany, and we are not talking about former east Germany or Nazi Germany, but rather todays modern Germany, you would be 100% correct.

So what is the difference between Germany and Iran. Well Germany claims to be a Democracy, while Iran does not. Don't you just love democracies.

Italian journalists speak out against wiretapping law

On 13 June, a draft law limiting journalists’ ability to provide the public with vital information was passed in the lower house of the Italian parliament and now awaits the senate’s approval. Unions representing lawyers, journalists and editors have all expressed their firm opposition, organising a series of events, including a conference last week and another planned for tomorrow in Rome, and promoting a petition to stop the law, which has 260,000 signatories –– and counting.

In recent years, the Italian press has published transcripts of private conversations obtained through wiretapping. Some of these transcripts were relevant to ongoing trials; others were not. Both exposed left and right-wing politicians alike to public anger and sometimes embarrassment. To gain popular support, the government is arguing that the exceptionally high number of tapped phone lines (estimated to be around 300,000) justifies their plan to fast-track the law through parliament. Two years ago, the Prodi government unsuccessfully tried to pass a similar law.

Among the restrictions outlined in the draft is a provision making it illegal for journalists and editors to publish information about a trial (on wiretaps or anything else) until the preliminary investigations are over, even if these documents are already in the public domain. Punishment can be up to 30 days in jail, plus a €10, 000 fine for journalists and €465,000 fine for editors. “This implies censorship of news that could be very relevant to most citizens. For example, under the new law, the press would not have been able to report on the Parmalat scandal for many years,” said Franco Siddi, general secretary of the Italian Press Federation (FNSI). Similar concerns were expressed by both the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) and the International Press Institute (IPI).

In addition, the new law will make it illegal to publish extracts from wiretaps not relevant to trials. For journalists, this could lead to the maximum sentence of three years in prison.

Under the new law, prosecutors will only be allowed to wiretap individuals for a maximum of 30 days. They can do so only if they have strong criminal evidence, and only when the maximum punishment for the alleged crime exceeds five years in prison. These evidence requirements are less strict when the alleged crime involves organised crime or terrorism. “Theoretically we can still perform investigations on criminal organisations such as the Mafia, but the five-year limit implies that we will not be allowed to wire-tap for typical Mafia crimes such as extortion,” said Giuseppe Cascini, secretary of the supreme court.

“It is a serious blow to everybody’s security and a great help for a lot of criminals,” said Giancarlo Caselli, head prosecutor in Turin. “If this law was already effective the arrests made [of activists allegedly trying to rebuild the Red Brigades] would not have been carried out,” said Olga D’antona, MP and widow of Massimo d’Antona, killed in the 1990s by the new Red Brigades.

Source: Index On Censorship

The Role of “The People” in Protecting Inalienable Rights

It is interesting to know that many of the attendees at the Constitutional Convention held in 1787 were OPPOSED to including a Bill of Rights in the Constitution. Why would this be so? The chief concern was that if a written bill of rights were included, the people would, over time, think that these rights were the ONLY rights they had. They were wise enough to know that the people would not understand how vast this body of “inalienable” rights was, and would therefore allow the government (especially the federal government) to dictate, and invade, the sacred domain of self-government that was to remain with the people.

As a result, the Bill of Rights was not included in the original Constitution, but was later introduced by James Madison in 1789 to the First United States Congress as a series of amendments to the Constitution.

The Bill of Rights, which are now defined as the first ten amendments to the Constitution, are understood to protect such rights as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion. Also included (among others) are the freedom of assembly, the right to keep and bear arms, and protections against unreasonable search and seizure. It is critical to understand that this in no way limits the extent of the rights of “the people.” What has been generally lost is an understanding of the purpose and meaning to the 9th Amendment which states:

“The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”

Obviously, the founders were referring to these other “unspoken and unwritten” rights which the people possessed, even if the Bill of Rights did not explicitly detail those rights.

In addition, “the people” (that is us) have lost an understanding of our role in the governing process. An understanding of the purpose and intent of the 10th Amendment is also critical to understand the “vision” of the founders. The 10th amendment states:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Therefore, there has existed, and still exists, a vast realm of rights (also referred to as “natural rights”) that we, the people, possess that are not defined by the Constitution or its amendments. In order to gain an understanding of these rights, let me ask a few questions about only one of the important areas of our lives, our physical health.

Despite no specific mention in the Constitution or its amendments, do humans have an individual right to choose their form of medicine or medical treatments? Do we have an individual right to choose “alternative” forms of medicine (such as Native American medicine, ancient Chinese medicine, or ancient Ayurvedic medicine, as examples? On the other hand, can we be forced to only accept what our government states is “legal” medical treatment according to current governmental regulations? Does the Federal government have any constitutional authority to even speak on the subject?

A study of the history of “acceptable” medicine in this country reveals that “chiropractic” treatments were for many decades “illegal,” as government authorities (dominated by the American Medical Association) had not yet deemed it “safe.” Some of the greatest breakthroughs in medical history were not “legal” according to existing governmental authorities. This reality is even more evident today as new breakthroughs in alternative medicine are being discovered every day. Does it make sense to allow a government bureaucracy (which is obviously subject to control by special interest groups) to make such an important decision for YOU, as your choice of medical treatment? Or is this potential life or death decision part of “the peoples” inalienable rights to make choices for themselves, without having to resort to “permission” from some government authority?

Hopefully, this discussion will help to clarify how we, the people, must not allow governments to invade those sacred realms of personal decisions and responsibilities, collectively referred to as our “inalienable rights.” In upcoming articles I will continue to uncover how the Founders were attempting to give us our freedom, if only we would accept it.

Source: 10th Amendment Center

Another victim of an archaic law

Darryn Walker has suffered unemployment and vilification for writing a pornographic story. The censorious obscenity law that allows this to happen must be scrapped, say John Ozimek and Julian Petley

Authors across the UK breathed a sigh of relief on Monday, as a landmark prosecution for obscenity was dropped at the eleventh hour. The importance of this case cannot be underestimated. The alternative, a world in which this prosecution had gone ahead and succeeded, would have changed the nature of the Internet (and publishing) in the UK for years to come.

Newcastle civil servant Darryn Walker was charged with publishing “obscene material” — namely a story called Girls (Scream) Aloud — which he had posted nearly two years ago on the Alt Sex Stories Text Repository, an Internet archive based in the US and dedicated to hosting stories of an erotic nature.

Walker’s blog was seriously questionable both on grounds of literary merit and taste: a work of violent sexual fantasy involving the mutilation and murder of each member of the pop group Girls Aloud, whose body parts are then sold on eBay.

The Daily Star drew it to the attention of the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), which is responsible for policing certain categories of material found on the Internet in the UK (primarily child abuse-related materials, but also the ‘criminally obscene’). The IWF reported the story to the police and, after an investigation, charges followed.

The significance of this case lay in the fact that the matter in question was wholly written. When it comes to obscenity, the law that has to be taken into account (in England and Wales) is the Obscene Publications Act 1959. When prosecuted under this Act in 1960, the publishers of Lady Chatterley’s Lover were found not guilty, and subsequent guilty verdicts on Last Exit to Brooklyn and Inside Linda Lovelace were overturned on appeal in 1966 and 1976 respectively. Given the extreme difficulty of achieving a successful prosecution of the written word under the Act, the prosecuting authorities have for many years fought shy of bringing such a case. Since the Linda Lovelace case in 1976, after which the Metropolitan Police were reported as saying that if this was not obscene “nothing was”, it has come to be assumed that the written word to all intents and purposes falls outside the scope of the Act.

What then might have been the consequence of a successful prosecution in this case? If Girls (Scream) Aloud were to be judged obscene, then so could works by J G Ballard, Georges Bataille, William Burroughs and the Marquis de Sade.

Of course, it could be argued that the works cited possess certain literary qualities and would thus escape prosecution (much as, no doubt, there are those who would like to see them banned). But this assumes that there exist literary standards upon which everyone is agreed and that there is an absolute and watertight distinction between works of high and low culture.

The popularity of the “crime procedural” means that a very great deal of mainstream fiction is nowadays focused on the most gory aspects of homicide and sexual crime — often combined. Had this prosecution succeeded, the authors of such works would have had to be constantly looking over their shoulders.

A further argument which appeared in the popular press was that the focus on the real living members of Girls Aloud meant that the story was tantamount to harassment or evidence of other darker motives. But if that was the case, why not prosecute for harassment?

One of the key grounds for prosecution was that because of Girls Aloud’s young fanbase, the blog was very likely to be chanced upon by people who would be seriously disturbed by it. However, a simple Google search for “Girls Aloud” will reveal millions of web pages dedicated to these individuals. You would need to focus the search terms much more closely (adding words such as “rape” and “murder”) before you would be likely to “chance” upon this story — and even then, we are still talking odds of one in one hundred thousand. This was the key factor that led to the CPS dropping the case: Darryn Walker’s fantasy was not in fact easily accessible to the general public.

Had this prosecution succeeded, we might have been looking forward to a world in which bookshops were stripped of titles deemed obscene by the police and the prosecuting authorities, and in which anyone based in the UK and seeking to publish an erotic story on the Internet would now be doing so in a state of considerable anxiety.

So why was the case brought in the first place? In particular, why did the Internet Watch Foundation report it to the police when it involved only the written word, which, as we have seen, has not been successfully prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act for over 30 years. And, in these circumstances, why did the CPS press ahead with the case?

The answer to the latter question lies, we believe, in the differing views of different factions within the CPS. Our understanding is that the head of the Crown Prosecution Service in the North-East, at the time of Darryn Walker’s arrest, had pressed for it to go forward, but that, at the national level, the CPS ultimately decided to abandon the trial.

Obscenity prosecutions do not require the oversight of the director of public prosecutions (DPP). This is a particular concern given that the end result of this case could have impacted seriously on the rights of every individual in the UK in terms of how they express themselves.

It may well be that parliament has created an odd little loophole, allowing prosecution under the Obscene Publications Act, which covers publication of obscene material, without involvement of the DPP, whilst the more recently legislated extreme porn law, covering mere possession, does require DPP consent to proceed.

Some thought should go to the defendant in this case. Darryn Walker has lost his job. He has been pilloried in the press. His reputation is in tatters. He has spent a year in limbo, unable to get on with his life, and undoubtedly under great stress. Although found not guilty, this delay means he has suffered a form of extra-legal punishment — of a form that seems all too frequently to be associated with obscenity cases — presumably “pour encourager les autres”. Doubtless he won’t be receiving any apologies, either.

If the Obscene Publications Act is once again in trouble, one obvious solution would be simply to abolish it.

Source: Index On Censorship

When Did We Lose the First Amendment?

The First Amendment to our Constitution seems to have disappeared. It appears we lost it on June 27, 2009.

In an LA Times interview with California State Assembly Speaker Karen Bass is asked the question, “How do you think conservative talk radio has affected the Legislature’s work?”

The Speaker answers with this gem…

The Republicans were essentially threatened and terrorized against voting for revenue. Now [some] are facing recalls. They operate under a terrorist threat: “You vote for revenue and your career is over.” I don’t know why we allow that kind of terrorism to exist. I guess it’s about free speech, but it’s extremely unfair.

Its unfair… Its terrorism. Oh yes we don’t want competition for these jobs of running the state of California and we certainly don’t want any Constitutional Ballyhoo.

Ok for all you Constitutional slackers let’s look at the 1st Amendment.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

It appears that Bass doesn’t believe in the right of the people to petition the Government for a redress of grievances; a right guaranteed by one of the most powerful documents ever created.

There’s a lot of stupidity and tyranny locked into those few words. The First Amendment guarantees the right to petition the government for redress of grievances, even apart from the “free speech” issues Bass casually discards. Elected politicians are accountable to the people who elect them in a free society. Politicians do not acquire lordly status when they go to the Assembly, or anywhere else. The Hot Air Blog

How the hell is it that our “leaders” don’t understand the foundation of the Government they work for? I guess it’s because America aka the voters are so caught up in non-important matters as to ignore the particularly important ones.

Let’s just look at the last week. TV News Devotes 28 Hours to Michael Jackson; 93% of Cable Airtime. While the media was eating up Michael Jackson’s death they failed. The media missed Iran having a major upheaval over a tainted election. Congress is working on the largest tax of all time, a tax that will kill our economy. Obama is attempting to spend Trillions of dollars on social programs like government healthcare insurance. Many important issues are being swept aside by the mainstream media and in turn our 2 second attention spans and a society that is showing signs of missing a moral compass are not monitoring what is important to this country.

No one is watching our political leaders. Our political leaders are as confused as anyone as to right and wrong. Our leaders choose to cheat, lie and do whatever with impunity. We see failure to pay taxes, failure to promises and committments including family bonds. We as a society have lost our ability to choose right from wrong. We have become confused as to what is what. Our societies moral compass is broken. Unfortunately if we don’t change, we will find bondage as the country as we are crushed under a massive debt created by a failure to choose good from evil.

Source: Erins's World

Girls Aloud obscenity case dropped

The Crown Prosecution Service has dropped its case against Darryn Walker, the civil servant who was facing trial under the Obscene Publications Act for writing a violent pornographic fantasy story about pop group Girls Aloud.

Darryn Walker was charged last year after posting a pornographic fantasy about Girls Aloud on a website. The story, entitled “Girls (Scream) Aloud”, described the kidnap, rape, mutilation and murder of the members of the group.

Most prosecutions brought under the Obscene Publications Act relate to images and video. The prosecution of Darryn Walker would have been a landmark test case for the freedom to publish pornographic writing online.

A statement from the Crown Prosecution Service said: “[T]he prosecution had received a number of expert reports, one of which cast doubt over the accessibility of the article to people searching the Internet and that it could only be found by those determined to find it. The prosecution was unable to provide sufficient evidence to contradict this and so took the decision there was no longer a realistic prospect of conviction.”

“This prosecution should never have been brought in the first place,” said Jo Glanville, editor of Index on Censorship. “Since the landmark obscenity cases of the 60s and 70s, writers have been protected from such prosecutions and have remained free to explore the extremes of human behaviour. This case posed a serious threat to that freedom. In future, obscenity cases should be referred directly to the director of public prosecutions before any prosecution is triggered.”

Source: Index On Censorship