‘”I didn’t even know he was in town,” Howards says. “He was walking through the area shaking hands. Initially, I walked past him. Then I said to myself, ‘I can’t in good conscience let this opportunity pass by.’ So I approached him, I got about two feet away, and I said in a very calm tone of voice, ‘Your policies in Iraq are reprehensible.’ And then I walked away.” [..]
But the Secret Service did not take kindly to his comment.”About ten minutes later, I came back through the mall with my eight-year-old son in tow,” Howards recalls, “and this Secret Service man came out of the shadows, and his exact words were, ‘Did you assault the Vice President�'”
Here’s how Howards says he responded: “No, but I did tell Mr. Cheney the way I felt about the war in Iraq, and if Mr. Cheney wants to be shielded from public criticism, he should avoid public places. If exercising my constitutional rights to free speech is against the law, then you should arrest me.”
Which is just what the agent, Virgil D. “Gus” Reichle Jr, proceeded to do.’
`Harry Potter creator JK Rowling has been voted the author Americans most want to ban from libraries over fears that her books promote witchcraft.
The American Library Association (ALA), who compiled the list for their Banned Book Week, said there were more than 3,000 attempts to remove the books from libraries and schools between 2000 and 2005.
The ALA said some of the main reasons cited for protesters trying to get controversial books removed from circulation were sexually explicit material, having an occult theme or offensive language.’
`The bill rejects the right to a speedy trial and limits the traditional right to self-representation by requiring that defendants accept military defense attorneys. Panels of military officers need not reach unanimous agreement to win convictions, except in death penalty cases, and appeals must go through a second military panel before reaching a federal civilian court. [..]
At the same time, the bill immunizes U.S. officials from prosecution for cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of detainees who the military and the CIA captured before the end of last year. It gives the president a dominant but not exclusive role in setting the rules for future interrogations of terrorism suspects.’
`It looks like the new Rolling Stone due out tomorrow will have a doozy of an article by RFK, Jr. whick will look into whether the 2006 election can be hacked. Based on a few blurbs that were “sneak previewed” by Raw Story it looks like there is an even bigger story in that article – an admission by a Diebold consultant that machine software was altered in 5,000 machines in DeKalb and Fulton counties on the day of the election.
If anyone remembers the 2002 election in Georgia, that is the one where Max Cleland’s five to six point lead was erased overnight to a seven point loss, leading to a miraculous win by Saxby Chambliss, which even describes his come from behind win as “stunning and historical” in his Senate website.’
`For the first time, US President George W. Bush has confirmed the existence of secret CIA prisons around the world, defending the program as well as “tough” interrogation procedures. [..]
Human rights groups have branded the administration’s “tough” interrogation techniques as torture and European Union MPs claim the CIA has conducted covert flights around Europe to transport terror suspects to countries where they could face torture.
Mr Bush stressed that the US does not use torture, claiming “it’s against our laws and it’s against our values”. He would not detail the type of interrogation techniques that are used through the program, but said they were lawful.
“I can say the procedures were tough, and they were safe, and lawful, and necessary,” he said.’
`The idea appeared in Technology Review citing Peter Norvig, director of research at Google, who says these ideas will show up eventually in real Google products – sooner rather than later.
The idea is to use the existing PC microphone to listen to whatever is heard in the background, be it music, your phone going off or the TV turned down. The PC then identifies it, using fingerprinting, and then shows you relevant content, whether that’s adverts or search results, or a chat room on the subject.
And, of course, we wouldn’t put it past Google to store that information away, along with the search terms it keeps that you’ve used, and the web pages you have visited, to help it create a personalised profile that feeds you just the right kind of adverts/content. [..]’
`Electronic spy ‘bugs’ have been secretly planted in hundreds of thousands of household wheelie bins.
The gadgets – mostly installed by companies based in Germany – transmit information about the contents of the bins to a central database which then keeps records on the waste disposal habits of each individual address.
Already some 500,000 bins in council districts across England have been fitted with the bugs – with nearly all areas expected to follow suit within the next couple of years.’
`Attorney-General Philip Ruddock has questioned the culture of complaint over the detention of David Hicks, arguing that no one criticised the detention of “Middle Eastern boys” accused of gang rape for nearly five years before they were convicted.
Comparing supporters of the Adelaide-born terror suspect to communist sympathisers during the Cold War, Mr Ruddock said yesterday he had not heard many complaints when suspects in Sydney’s vicious gang rapes were held for many years as a result of successive legal challenges.’
`For two months, from mid-November 2004 to mid-January 2005, Odd languished in the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility, trying to figure out why he was there, and desperately trying to convince somebody – anybody – to set him free.
Odd, 42, was jailed at the request of a Philadelphia assistant district attorney – not as punishment for a crime, but to ensure his testimony as a witness in a murder case.
Yet, even after the murder charges were dismissed, no one bothered to release Odd from prison.’
`A draft Bush administration plan for special military courts seeks to expand the reach and authority of such “commissions” to include trials, for the first time, of people who are not members of al-Qaeda or the Taliban and are not directly involved in acts of international terrorism, according to officials familiar with the proposal.
The plan, which would replace a military trial system ruled illegal by the Supreme Court in June, would also allow the secretary of defense to add crimes at will to those under the military court’s jurisdiction. The two provisions would be likely to put more individuals than previously expected before military juries, officials and independent experts said.’
`Is the U.S. becoming a police state? Here are the top 10 signs that it may well be the case.’
`A Philadelphia family said they are outraged over the arrest of one of their family members. [..]
Cruz said police told him that he broke a new law that prohibits people from taking pictures of police with cell phones.
“They threatened to charge me with conspiracy, impeding an investigation, obstruction of a investigation. … They said, ‘You were impeding this investigation.’ (I asked,) “By doing what?’ (The officer said,) ‘By taking a picture of the police officers with a camera phone,'” Cruz said.’
`In recent years, police around the country have started to use powerful infrared cameras to read plates and catch carjackers and ticket scofflaws. But the technology will soon migrate into the private sector, and morph into a tool for tracking individual motorists’ movements, says former policeman Andy Bucholz, who’s on the board of Virginia-based G2 Tactics, a manufacturer of the technology. [..]
“I know it sounds really Big Brother,” Bucholz says. “But it’s going to happen. It’s going to get cheaper and cheaper until they slap them up on every taxicab and delivery truck and track where people live.” And work. And sleep. And move.’
`US President George W Bush has said he would like to close the US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay and send many detainees back to their home countries.
However, he said not all the inmates would be returned – some would need to be put on trial in the US because they were “cold-blooded killers”.’
`Two men from Saudi Arabia and one from Yemen were found dead shortly after midnight today in separate cells, said the Miami-based US Southern Command, which has jurisdiction over the prison. Attempts were made to revive them, but they failed.
“They hung themselves with fabricated nooses made out of clothes and bed sheets,” base commander Navy Rear Adm. Harry Harris told reporters in a conference call from the US base in southeastern Cuba.
“They have no regard for human life,” he said. “Neither ours nor their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation but an act of asymmetric warfare against us.”‘
Also Guantanamo suicides a ‘PR move’:
`A top US official has described the suicides of three detainees at the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as a “good PR move to draw attention”.’
`The world reacted with shock and dismay last month to the news that Iranian Jews were being forced to wear yellow badges, a policy made infamous by the Nazis. Canada’s National Post featured the story on its front page with a headline reading “Iran Eyes Badges For Jews” above a photograph of Hungarian Jews wearing yellow Stars of David from 1944. The world media quickly followed the National Post’s lead, with the reports repeated in major newspapers across the globe. The Simon Weisenthal Center confirmed the story, noting “Iran is moving closer and closer to the ideology of the Nazis”. The Australian and Canadian Prime Ministers expressed outrage, with Stephen Harper observing that the Iranian regime was “very capable of this kind of action”.
The only problem with this story? It was a complete fabrication.’
`Prisoners wielding improvised weapons clashed with guards trying to stop a detainee from committing suicide at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the military said Friday.
The fight occurred Thursday in a medium-security section of the camp as guards were responding to the fourth attempted suicide that day at the detention center on the U.S. Navy base, said Cmdr. Robert Durand.
Detainees used fans, light fixtures and other improvised weapons to attack the guards as they entered a communal living area to stop a prisoner who was trying to hang himself, Durand said.
Earlier in the day, three detainees in another part of the prison attempted suicide by swallowing prescription medicine they had been hoarding.’
`A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources.
“It’s time for you to get some new cell phones, quick,” the source told us in an in-person conversation.
ABC News does not know how the government determined who we are calling, or whether our phone records were provided to the government as part of the recently-disclosed NSA collection of domestic phone calls.
Other sources have told us that phone calls and contacts by reporters for ABC News, along with the New York Times and the Washington Post, are being examined as part of a widespread CIA leak investigation.’
`The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.
The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren’t suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews.
“It’s the largest database ever assembled in the world,” said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA’s activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency’s goal is “to create a database of every call ever made” within the nation’s borders, this person added.’
`It’s easier to rig an electronic voting machine than a Las Vegas slot machine, says University of Pennsylvania visiting professor Steve Freeman. That’s because Vegas slots are better monitored and regulated than America’s voting machines, Freeman writes in a book out in July that argues, among other things, that President Bush may owe his 2004 win to an unfair vote count.’
`An honors student at New Brighton Area High School has been expelled after a strange set of circumstances.
At an all-school assembly on Tuesday, a motivational speaker told Corey Johnson he looks like Osama Bin Laden.
Johnson says he was teased about it for two straight days, and finally snapped, saying if he were Osama he’d have pulled a “Columbine” – referring to a deadly school shooting at Columbine High School.
A teacher overheard the and the school expelled him.’
`When the government told a court Friday that it wanted a class-action lawsuit regarding the National Security Agency’s eavesdropping on Americans dismissed, its lawyers wielded one of the most powerful legal tools available to the executive branch — the state secrets privilege. [..]
In this case, the government will be asking a federal judge in California to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation against AT&T for its alleged complicity in warrantless government surveillance of its customer’s internet and telephone communications. The EFF alleges that AT&T gave the government access to a massive phone billing database and helped the NSA spy on its customers’ internet use. [..]
Judges almost invariably agree to such requests, according to William Weaver, a law professor and senior adviser to the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition.
“It’s like one of magic rings from The Lord of the Rings,” Weaver said. “You slip it on and you are invisible — you are now secret.
“Ostensibly judges could have flexibility, but they have not done that,” Weaver said. “There has never been an unsuccessful invocation of the state secrets privilege when national security is involved. The (EFF) suit is over.”‘
`Fire departments are using Homeland Security grants to buy gym equipment, sponsor puppet and clown shows, and turn first responders into fitness trainers.
The spending choices are allowable under the guidelines of the Assistance to Firefighters grant administered by the Homeland Security Department, which has awarded nearly 250 grants since February totaling more than $25 million out of the current spending pot of $545 million.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff vowed to redirect grant spending based on risk of a terrorist attack, but Congress has ignored his pleas, federal officials say.
“The administration has not supported the funding for physical fitness equipment as part of the fire grant program,” says Marc Short, Homeland Security spokesman. “Physical fitness is an individual responsibility.”
The Bush administration has specifically asked Congress not to allow funding for physical fitness, but the members who run Congress’ appropriation committees keep inserting the language into the department’s budget, officials say.’
`AT&T provided National Security Agency eavesdroppers with full access to its customers’ phone calls, and shunted its customers’ internet traffic to data-mining equipment installed in a secret room in its San Francisco switching center, according to a former AT&T worker cooperating in the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s lawsuit against the company.
Mark Klein, a retired AT&T communications technician, submitted an affidavit in support of the EFF’s lawsuit this week. That class action lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco last January, alleges that AT&T violated federal and state laws by surreptitiously allowing the government to monitor phone and internet communications of AT&T customers without warrants. [..]
According to a statement released by Klein’s attorney, an NSA agent showed up at the San Francisco switching center in 2002 to interview a management-level technician for a special job. In January 2003, Klein observed a new room being built adjacent to the room housing AT&T’s #4ESS switching equipment, which is responsible for routing long distance and international calls.’
`British anti-terrorism detectives escorted a man from a plane after a taxi driver had earlier become suspicious when he started singing along to a track by punk band The Clash, police said Wednesday.
Detectives halted the London-bound flight at Durham Tees Valley Airport in northern England and Harraj Mann, 24, was taken off. [..]
Mann told British newspapers the taxi had been fitted with a music system which allowed him to plug in his MP3 player and he had been playing The Clash, Procol Harum, Led Zeppelin and the Beatles to the driver.
“He didn’t like Led Zeppelin or The Clash but I don’t think there was any need to tell the police,” Mann told the Daily Mirror.’
`Last week, Federal Parliament passed a law that allows the Government to read private emails, text messages and other stored communications without our knowledge. The power extends to innocent people, called B-parties, if they have been unlucky enough to communicate with someone suspected of a crime or of being a threat to national security.
The Government should sometimes be able to monitor the communications of innocent people. This may be necessary to protect the wider community where a suspect can only be tracked through another person. However, the law goes beyond what can be justified and undermines our privacy more than is needed.
Under the Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment Act, the Government will be able to access communications not only between the B-party and the suspect, but also between the B-party and anyone else. If you have unwittingly communicated with a suspect (and thereby become a B-party), the Government may be able to monitor all your conversations with family members, friends, work colleagues, your lawyer and your doctor.’
`How easy is it for the average internet user to make a phone call secure enough to frustrate the NSA’s extrajudicial surveillance program?
Wired News took Phil Zimmermann’s newest encryption software, Zfone, for a test drive and found it’s actually quite easy, even if the program is still in beta.
Zimmermann, the man who released the PGP e-mail encryption program to the world in 1991 — only to face an abortive criminal prosecution from the government — has been trying for 10 years to give the world easy-to-use software to cloak internet phone calls.’
`When President Bush signed the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act this month, he included an addendum saying that he did not feel obliged to obey requirements that he inform Congress about how the FBI was using the act’s expanded police powers. [..]
Bush signed the bill with fanfare at a White House ceremony March 9, calling it ”a piece of legislation that’s vital to win the war on terror and to protect the American people.” But after the reporters and guests had left, the White House quietly issued a ”signing statement,” an official document in which a president lays out his interpretation of a new law.
In the statement, Bush said that he did not consider himself bound to tell Congress how the Patriot Act powers were being used and that, despite the law’s requirements, he could withhold the information if he decided that disclosure would ”impair foreign relations, national security, the deliberative process of the executive, or the performance of the executive’s constitutional duties.”‘
`The board game that brings the thrill of trampling the Constitution right into your home… newly updated for 2006 to include NSA wiretaps and renewal of provisions!’
`As a government scientist, James Hansen is taking a risk. He says there are things the White House doesn’t want you to hear but he’s going to say them anyway.
Hansen is arguably the world’s leading researcher on global warming. He’s the head of NASA’s top institute studying the climate. But this imminent scientist tells correspondent Scott Pelley that the Bush administration is restricting who he can talk to and editing what he can say. Politicians, he says, are rewriting the science. [..]
Asked if he believes the administration is censoring what he can say to the public, Hansen says: “Or they’re censoring whether or not I can say it. I mean, I say what I believe if I’m allowed to say it.”‘
