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Texas’ Annual Roundup of the Working Poor

By Trisha Trigilio | ACLU of Texas | March 4, 2016

March 5th marks the beginning of the annual Great Texas Warrant Roundup. It sounds like quite a lot of fun, another cowboy extravaganza from a state famous for its stock shows and rodeos.

But what it is, in practice, is a shakedown of Texas’s working poor.

The Great Texas Warrant Roundup is an annual statewide collaboration of courts and law enforcement agencies. Their goal is to collect payment of overdue fines and fees from Texans who have outstanding warrants for unpaid traffic tickets and to arrest and jail those who can’t pay. What little press is dedicated to the Roundup focuses on praising cities for the so-called “amnesty” period that precedes it.

The state’s unreasonable traffic ticket scheme and the devastation it can wreak on low-income Texans receive considerably less attention.

Depending on the jurisdiction, a ticket for failing to signal a lane change — the trooper’s justification for Sandra Bland’s tragic traffic stop — will cost you around $66. But the state tacks on $103 in court costs and a host of fees, some bordering on Kafkaesque. Texas will charge you a public defender fee, even though courts refuse to appoint a public defender for traffic ticket cases. If your fine is already too expensive to afford, Texas charges a fee to put you on a payment plan. You’ll even pay an “administrative fee” for the privilege of handing money over to the court. For people who are too poor to pay their traffic fines, a $66 fine can balloon to over $500 because of these court costs and fees, as well as late fines and warrant fees when towns try to arrest the poor (at times illegally) to collect money they simply do not have.

If you can’t afford to keep up with these fees, the state will suspend renewal of your driver’s license (add another $30 for the License Renewal Suspension Fee), and you’ll be unable to register your car, making it illegal for you to drive to the job you need to take care of your kids and pay off your spiraling debt. An expired registration means you’re certain to be pulled over and put back at square one, with new tickets, new fines, new fees, and no hope.

Case in point: Valerie Gonzales, one of the original plaintiffs represented by the Texas Fair Defense Project in a class action lawsuit against the City of Austin. Valerie is a 31-year-old mother of five children with disabilities. She and her family live in poverty. After receiving two traffic tickets nine years ago, not only had Valerie’s tickets multiplied and her fines ballooned into the thousands of dollars, she lost a job after she was unconstitutionally jailed without the benefit of a court-appointed attorney.

When people like Valerie are arrested in the coming warrant roundup, judges across Texas will follow their usual plan of demanding a payment in exchange for liberty. Without asking questions about financial circumstances, judges literally order people to turn over all the money they happen to be holding when they are arrested. “Give me what’s in your pockets” is not a phrase that should be uttered in a courtroom. What’s worse, when the working poor don’t have enough money to hand over, judges send them to jail without a fair hearing or a second thought.

Jailing people for debt is both unjust and profoundly counterproductive. Not only does it deprive people of their liberty and separate them from their children and families, it also renders them incapable of paying off their fines and costs the taxpayer (by conservative estimates) $51 per person per day of incarceration. It’s in everyone’s best interests to keep Texans with their families and out of jail.

There are sensible alternatives. Courts can consider ability to pay before assessing unmanageable fines or waive debts for people who have made a genuine effort to pay what they can. So why don’t they?

This is what makes the roundup so nefarious. Courts are hoping that the threat of jail will frighten people into turning over whatever they can scrape together in exchange for protection from arrest. Rather than praising amnesty, we should address the systemic injustices that keep low-income Texans in perpetual debt to the state.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

1st edition of Turkish Zaman daily after govt takeover sees smiling Erdogan on front page

RT | March 6, 2016

The editorial policy of Turkey’s best-selling Zaman newspaper, formerly critical of the government, has apparently gone through a change. The Sunday edition, under a newly appointed administration, now appears to support the official line.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan can be seen on the new Zaman daily’s front page, smiling in an article announcing a presidential reception on upcoming Women’s Day (March 8). A costly governmental project of a new bridge to be built across Istanbul’s Bosphorus Strait was also headlined, as well as reports on the funerals of “martyrs” killed in clashes with the Kurds.

More articles supporting the government could be found in the Sunday edition of the paper that has an estimated circulation of 650,000, AFP reported. Containing just 12 pages, the paper is a slimmer version of its previous self, and the content is sparse, according to Reuters.

Protests that erupted following what was widely seen as the seizure of Zaman’s headquarters in Istanbul by the government were glossed over in the new edition, Reuters reported. On Saturday, police used tear gas, water cannon and fired rubber bullets to disperse hundreds-strong crowds of Zaman readers.

Police also raided Zaman’s building, forcefully imposing a Turkish court order to put the media under administration. The newspaper’s editor-in-chief Abdulhamit Bilici was fired by the new trustees.

“The Sunday edition was not produced by Zaman’s staff,” one of the newspaper’s journalists told AFP, adding, “internet has been cut off, we are unable to use our system.”

“It’s impossible to continue to work at Zaman daily because the trustees who were assigned by the government will fire us a couple of days later. All of us will be fired from the newspaper. But if they don’t, of course we will resign, because it’s impossible to work with the government, we will not write what they want,” Emre Soncan, a journalist from Today’s Zaman newspaper, an English version of Zaman daily, told RT on Saturday.

Zaman’s website has been offline, while Today’s Zaman online services have not been updated since Saturday. Government affiliates have also taken control of and blocked access to the outlet’s Cihan news agency, Today’s Zaman earlier reported.

The Zaman newspaper’s former team has launched a new paper of their own, Yarina Bakis (Look to Tomorrow), local media reported, saying that journalists had decided to remain in line with their previous editorial policy. The new paper reported on the weekend protests in Istanbul.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu denied any links between the government takeover of the paper and changes in its editorial policy, saying the seizure had nothing to do with the paper’s criticism of the authorities.

“There are many media outlets in Turkey that criticize our government. None of them are subjected to legal procedures,” Davutoglu told A Haber television on Sunday, as quoted by AFP. “What’s in question here is not merely press activity, but rather an operation targeting a legitimate government that came to power with popular support,” he added, referring to Zaman’s affiliation with now US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, a fierce critic of President Erdogan, who was put on a “most-wanted terrorist list” by Ankara.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | Leave a comment

UK suppresses documents on Gitmo ‘torture collusion’

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Press TV – March 6, 2016

The British government is withholding key documents which could shed light on allegations of UK’s involvement in the torture of detainees in Guantanamo prison, according to a new report.

A number of files have been recently found which reveal confidential exchanges between top former US and UK authorities on the torture and rendition of detainees.

Based on a lawsuit by a British parliamentary group, the US administration is obliged to make public documents which relate to Britain’s involvement.

Former Guantanamo detainees have previously said British officials have either been present at, or submitted questions for, “extreme” interrogation by US officials, according to the Independent.

The documents indicate that former UK prime minister Tony Blair and former US president George W. Bush had been in consultation about the treatment of detainees at the US-run prison in Cuba.

Now, the US State Department is said to have reported that all related documents have been withheld from public disclosure.

At least 12 documents, found in the US State Department’s search, relate to interventions by British politicians and officials over the treatment of detainees and torture techniques.

The State Department has reported, “After reviewing the documents, the UK Government’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office requested that all 12 documents be withheld in full from public disclosure.”

Guantanamo was established by former president Bush in 2002 as a prison for alleged foreign terrorism suspects following the September 11, 2001, attacks in the US.

As many as 775 suspects are said to have been brought to the facility ever since its establishment.

US President Barack Obama had promised to close the Guantanamo Bay prison in his 2008 election campaign, citing its damage to America’s reputation abroad. However, he has so far failed to deliver on that pledge due to stiff opposition from Congress.

A US Senate report in December 2014 revealed that the CIA used a wide array of torture as part of its interrogation methods against Guantanamo prisoners.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Deception, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Britain to Spend Additional $905 Million on Nuclear Submarine Program

Sputnik – 05.03.2016

The British Government is going to spend additional $905 million on its nuclear submarine program, media reported.

British Defense Secretary Michael Fallon announced the new investment Friday, although the Parliament has not yet voted whether to go ahead with the program, UPI reported. The vote is scheduled later this year.

According to Fallon, the additional funding will support construction of new facilities and the purchase of submarine parts, as well as the development of new submarines that are to replace the royal Navy’s current Vanguard-class submarines.

A significant part of this funding — about $317 million — will be spent on new facilities at BAE Systems at Barrow-in-Furness, England, where the submarines will be assembled. There will also be a significant investment in the joint UK/US collaborative R&D called the ‘Common Missile Compartment’, a unified launcher system for new ballistic missiles that will replace current Trident II/D5 missiles, used by both the United Kingdom and the United States.

This initiative, however, is not exactly backed by the Labour party. According to Labour representatives, nuclear submarines will soon become redundant, since underwater drones are becoming advanced enough easily track down and destroy them.

“Tell that to the Americans, the Russians, and the Chinese who are all modernizing their nuclear-armed submarines,” Fallon said to The Guardian. “Perhaps these drones will be so sophisticated they can track down Nessie while they are at it,” he added, implying that cost-effectiveness ratio of both technologies is a subject for discussion.

The Labour party’s position on nuclear weapons is generally negative, since they view the whole concept as an extremely expensive political symbol that will never be used.

During 2015, Russia has launched two nuclear Project 877/636 submarines, armed with Kalibr cruise missiles (NATO designation “Sizzler”), capable of carrying nuclear warheads, while two more are scheduled for launch in 2016, which would make a total of six ships. Project 877/636 has been dubbed ‘Black hole’ for its extremely low noise emission and radar visibility.

The People’s Republic of China has also reportedly launched a new Jin-class nuclear submarine during 2015. According to different sources, the PRC Navy has from 4 to 8 active Jin-class submarines that are supposed to be capable of reaching any point on US territory, should the ship be located near the Hawaiian islands.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Marshall Islands take on nuclear powers at UN court

RT | March 6, 2016

© atomcentral

© atomcentral / YouTube

The Marshall Islands launch a legal campaign against the UK, India and Pakistan this week in a David versus Goliath battle to achieve the goal of a “nuclear free universe”.

The islands accuse the nuclear states of failing to halt the nuclear arms race, and are urging the UN’s highest court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), to pursue a lawsuit against all three.

The Pacific Ocean territory, used as a US nuclear testing site for 12 years, filed applications with the ICJ in April 2014 accusing the world’s nine nuclear-armed states of not respecting their nuclear disarmament obligations under the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and customary international law.

The nine nations possessing nuclear arsenals are the US, the UK, France, Russia, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel – though Israel is the only one which never acknowledged holding nuclear weapons.

The court admitted the cases brought against the UK, India and Pakistan because the three states have already recognised the ICJ’s authority.

The islands’ former Minister of Foreign Affairs Tony de Brum said they commenced “this lawsuit with the greatest respect and the greatest admiration for the big countries of the world, but we think it must be done”.

Hearings will take place in The Hague Monday to examine whether the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is competent to hear the lawsuits against India and Pakistan. Another hearing will take place on Wednesday to examine “preliminary objections” raised by London in the case against Britain, according to AFP.

De Brum has said the people of the Marshalls suffer quietly but they take this suit in “the cause of a nuclear free universe”.

“We are fighting for what we believe is the only solution in terms of peace and prosperity in the world.”

Olivier Ribbelink, senior researcher at the TMC Asser Institute in The Hague says “the case is in a very preliminary stage at this point”, but added: “Either way the outcome, the case has certainly sharply refocused attention on the dangers of nuclear proliferation.”

De Brum and the Marshall Islands legal team have been nominated for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize.

US nuclear test ground

De Brum was nine years old when the Castle Bravo hydrogen bomb was dropped by the US on Bikini Atoll on March 1, 1954 during the Cold War nuclear arms race.

The 15-megatonne bomb was the largest US nuclear test on record at 1000-times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

The resulting characteristic mushroom cloud reached a diameter of 7km (4.5 miles) and a height of almost 40,000 meters (130,000ft) within six minutes of detonation.

The US carried out 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands between 1946 and 1958.

Bikini Islanders lived in exile since they were moved for the first US weapons test, though some returned in the early 1970s after government scientists declared Bikini safe for resettlement.

However, residents were removed again in 1978 after ingesting high levels of radiation from eating local foods grown on the former nuclear testing site.

The Marshall Islands is appealing to the US Supreme Court after its case against the country was dismissed by a US federal court last year.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Hall of mirrors: the psychology of false flags

By Richard Hugus | Aletho News | March 6, 2016

Have you ever met someone in a narrow passage and found it difficult to get around them because they kept moving the same way as you? Did you ever see a bird attacking his reflection in a window, thinking it was another bird? What about the foretelling of an experience in déjà vu?

These are instances of the uncanny. They involve the phenomenon of mirroring. There is something about mirrors that undermines human rationality. We are presented with a logical impossibility – something is apparent to our senses, but it isn’t real. If we do believe it’s real, as Narcissus did, we may fall into an abyss. Birds don’t have even the first clue of what mirrors are, but humans are not much better. Show us our reflection in the outside world and we are discombobulated. Yet, the world often reflects ideas we have of it. And we often project onto the world ideas in our own heads, as if our perceptions were a kind of movie which we are in the process of making.

How does this apply to modern-day false flags? False flags are staged events covertly planned and executed by one state or group which, by impersonating another state or group, incriminates the other in a terrible attack. An enemy is thus created where none existed. By pointing to the crime, the aggressor is able to demonize and justify war against the supposed enemy. The agenda is war.

The more notorious false flags in history are well known: the sinking of the Maine in 1898 started the Spanish American War, the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964 enabled full scale US aggression against Vietnam, and the September 11, 2001 attacks started the first-ever war on an abstraction – the “war on terror.” The war on terror might best be described as a Zionist war against Arabs and Muslims, their lands, their culture, and their religion, following the model of the Zionist attack on Palestine, but with the apparent goal of Israel becoming a superpower as it manipulates others into fighting its wars.

There were a number of false flags during the Cold War under the rubric of Operation Gladio. But since the attacks of 9-11, false flag events have become so numerous that it is as if they are created in the mode of a prime time television series, with production facilities, a large stable of actors, big budgets, script writers, and full publicity, every week churning out another drama.

One of the aspects of those false flags we have the most evidence about is their use of concurrent drills or exercises which mimic the planned crime. The exercises are a good example of mirroring being used to discombobulate people, such as those unwittingly involved in a planned operation. An example is the air traffic controller on 9-11 who responded to an alert of hijacked planes approaching New York by asking, “Is this real world or an exercise?” A large number of drills were taking place on 9-11, some to disable US defenses by sending response aircraft out of range, and others to mimic the event, as with false blips on radar, so that no one knew what was real and what was a simulation.

Drills in false flag operations are like the energized tables in amusement centers where, by turning on the energy, people are able to slide pucks over the table without the force of gravity affecting them. Concurrent drills make all things possible in the commission of broad-daylight crimes, from providing logistic support where and when it is needed, to creating confusion among people who might be in a position to stop the crime. Drills provide the buzz which seems to suspend the laws of physics. The buzz on 9-11 was so strong that two of the tallest skyscrapers in the world could fall with no resistance and no one would ask why.

The motivation for crimes such as 9-11-2001 in the US, the 7-7-2005 bombings in London, the two massacres in Paris in 2015, and the unlikely shoot-up at a center for the handicapped in San Bernardino, California, was to first create and then keep going a war on terror, built upon the demonization of Arabs and Muslims. The means for carrying out this war have been unlimited money, arms, explosives, police power, court authority, full ownership of almost all media, and totally amoral covert “intelligence” manpower.

This is a kind of war not envisioned in theories of class struggle and imperialist plunder. Evil of such magnitude has been perpetrated on the world that it almost seems we are dealing with the diabolical. An agenda of world conquest through war and enslavement can perhaps be explained as a goal of imperialism, but methods by which this agenda is being carried out today involve manipulations of human nature which are unprecedentedly dark and insidious.

The evidence is in those at the top pretending to the power of God, creating reality. In 2004, neocon shill Karl Rove is said to have bragged:

“We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors… and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

The arrogance in this statement is so extreme as to be psychopathic. Most of the people in the world are not psychopaths. Most of the people in the world are good. Good people are unable to fully understand evil when it occurs. They see in the world what they have it in them to see. This often does not include an understanding of evil.

The organizers of the new world order have gotten into the highest positions of power. With the full weight of the mainstream media behind them, they are able to dictate some of the most important memes in today’s culture, to dissent from which is almost the same as being crazy. This is the response many still have to those who claim (rightly) that 9-11 was carried out by a cabal working inside the US government. That the meme of heartless Muslims trying to destroy western freedom might not be true is a prospect too horrible for many people to face. We have, after all, been told the same story year after year, in newspapers, magazines, TV, movies. Could so many different sources all be telling lies? Yes, they could.

The war on terror has been a major investment. Neocons in positions of power in the US government have largely been responsible for creating it. Planners like Philip Zelikow have written of the effect of “searing events” on human psychology, the advantage which large-scale trauma gives those in power to make public myths. For these theoreticians, to attain a hidden goal by sacrificing thousands of innocents, as in 9-11, is not a moral issue; it is a political calculation. This is diabolical.

Those who make a deal with the devil must eventually pay, but until then they have the use of the power they sold their souls for. We must understand that power as well as the hubris it gives them, which goes to the point now where false flag perpetrators barely provide a cover up, and will even forecast what they plan to do. Indeed, forecasting is another kind of mirror, a way of preempting analysis: Who would speak about committing a crime before doing it? Who would call for “a new Pearl Harbor”, and then bring that very thing about?

Yet another kind of mirroring is the criminal blaming the victim of the crime which he, the criminal, has committed. The thief accuses the shopkeeper of theft. The settler accuses the Palestinian of stealing his land. Uncle Sam has accused the Arab world of attacking him.

With their power, the “creators of reality” and their media have put us into a hall of mirrors. Our values have become distorted by a steady stream of deceptions. As Yeats said, “Everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.” Many actually believe we live in a world where there is a valid war on terror. Candidates for public office, making their own deals with the devil, pledge fealty to that war and to its main sponsor, Israel. Political prisoners languish in prison, unheard from. Police gun down African Americans with impunity in American streets. Israeli forces openly execute Palestinians for no reason. False flag mass murders are carried out by covert forces for the political gain of a very few. Millions die in what we’re told will be unending war, created by lies created by a distorted mirror.

We have the power to reject the neocons’ reality and create a reality where the money and guns are immediately taken out of the hands of these psychopaths. Once we understand the trick, the deception no longer works. Steve Biko said, “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.” The real struggle is in our minds. To end this war, we must escort these people and their world out of our own psyches, and then help others do the same.

https://richardhugus.wordpress.com/

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

9/11 Experiments: The Force Behind the Motion

physicsandreason – March 3, 2016

Why can’t the experts demonstrate the force behind the motion?

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | Leave a comment

Costs of Storing US Nuclear Weapons Rising $4.4Bln More Than Planned

Sputnik — 05.03.2016

The cost of storing and safeguarding all US nuclear weapons from 2021 through 2025 will be $4.4 billion higher than previously estimated, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) announced in a report.

The US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has stated that the cost will need to be addressed as part of fiscal year 2017 programming, the GAO pointed out.

“The ‘Fiscal Year 2016 Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan’ includes estimates for 2021 through 2025 that are $4.4 billion higher than the same time period… for funding levels that were included in a joint report by the Department of Defense and Department of Energy,” the report, released on Friday, said.

Budget estimates for safeguarding the US nuclear stockpiles over the next 25 years increased by 13.2 percent over the nominal values in the fiscal year 2015 plan, the report noted.

The NNSA fiscal year 2016 estimates for efforts related to modernizing the US nuclear weapons stockpile total $297.6 billion for the next 25 years, the report added.

March 6, 2016 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite | | Leave a comment

Riyadh to receive French-made arms intended for Lebanon

Press TV – March 5, 2016

Saudi Arabia will take delivery of French-manufactured arms originally ordered for the Lebanese army, following Riyadh’s recent decision to retract USD four billion in military aid to Beirut.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir announced the plan on Saturday during a visit to France.

Last month, the Saudi regime said it had suspended USD three billion in military assistance to the Lebanese military and another USD one billion to the country’s internal security forces.

The aid was cut after Lebanon refrained from endorsing Saudi-crafted statements against Iran at separate meetings held in Cairo and Jeddah.

The move also followed victories by the Syrian army, which is backed by fighters of Lebanon’s resistance movement of Hezbollah, in its battle against Takfiri terrorists battling to topple the government in Damascus.

“We made the decision that we will stop the USD three billion from going to the Lebanese military and instead they will be re-diverted to the Saudi military,” Jubeir told journalists in Paris, adding, “So the contracts (with France) will be completed but the clients will be the Saudi military.”

The aid is vital as the Lebanese army is fighting Takfiri militants from the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front and Daesh near the country’s northeastern border with Syria.

France’s arms delivery to Saudi Arabia comes amid Riyadh’s ongoing military aggression against Yemen and its support for militant groups in Syria.

Several European countries including Germany, Britain and France have been engaged in major arms deals with the Saudi regime, turning a blind eye to calls by rights groups to cancel the agreements.

Back in February, the European Parliament passed a resolution calling for the imposition of an arms embargo against Saudi Arabia, and urging EU member states to stop selling weapons to Riyadh as it is accused of targeting civilians in Yemen.

According to a recent report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Saudi Arabia’s imports for 2011-15 increased by 275 percent compared with 2006–10. The British government has licensed USD 7.8 billion in sales of arms, fighter jets and other military hardware to Riyadh since Prime Minister David Cameron came to power in 2010. France also signed USD-12-billion contracts with Saudi Arabia in 2015 alone.

Yemen has been under military attacks by Saudi Arabia since late March 2015. More than 8,300 people, among them 2,236 children, have been killed. The strikes have taken a heavy toll on the impoverished country’s facilities and infrastructure, destroying many hospitals, schools and factories.

March 5, 2016 Posted by | Corruption, Economics, Militarism, War Crimes | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Everyone is being framed’, journalist deported from Turkey tells RT amid govt media takeover

RT | March 5, 2016

The latest government takeover of the Zaman media outlet in Istanbul is “not a surprise at all,” a journalist who had been working in the country told RT, adding that “the press has never been free in Turkey.”

“Everybody who opposes them [the government], every journalist who is against the government is being framed. I was framed as a terrorist supporter and Zaman is linked to the Gulen movement – which is a movement of a religious Turkish leader [Sunni cleric Fethullah Gulen] who is based in the US, and they say he is trying to stage a coup against the government. So now Zaman journalists and people who read Zaman are being framed as coup supporters, that’s how the government is doing it,” Frederike Geerdink, Dutch freelance journalist who was deported from Turkey last year, told RT.

On Friday, the Istanbul-based Turkish-language Zaman newspaper, which has been sharply critical of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was ordered into administration by a court decision. Following the order, which the outlet journalists proclaimed an “unlawful takeover,” the paper’s editor-in-chief Abdulhamit Bilici was fired by trustees, while police put barbed wire around the headquarters.

“All content management systems at Zaman” have also been blocked by the new administration, Zaman’s sister publication in English, Today’s Zaman, said, with its journalists covering the situation via social media and posting updates on Twitter.

“All internet connection is cut off at the seized Zaman building by police raid,” they posted, adding that after the takeover of the headquarters in Istanbul, the Ankara office has also “lost access to company internal servers.”

Government affiliates have also taken under control and blocked access to the outlet’s Cihan news agency, Today’s Zaman reported, adding that it is “the only news agency that was monitoring elections besides state-run Anadolu.”

“It’s not a surprise at all. Several of the government newspapers have in the last couple of weeks hinted at this [takeover] already, and other media who are linked to the Gulen movement have come under the same procedure with trustees,” Frederike Geerdink, who has herself been prosecuted in Turkey “for making propaganda for a terrorist organization,” said.

The journalist told RT that she has been in contact with one of Zaman’s employees, who told her weeks ago that they had been “having a difficult time” because of government pressure. Zaman was losing advertisers and readers, “because if you work for the state you cannot be seen with Zaman under your arm, as it can lead to losing your job,” the Dutch journalist was told by her Turkish colleague.

Zaman was being attacked for months,” she said, but added that the current situation with the media in the country “is not something new.”

Two years ago, one of Today’s Zaman journalists, Azerbaijan national Mahir Zeynalov, was deported from Turkey after having worked at the Turkish newspaper for years. The reporter was facing prosecution related to a tweet, his employers said, adding that a complaint against Zeynalov was filed by then PM Erdogan, accusing the journalist of “defamation and inciting public to hatred.”

“People now think that Erdogan invented the lack of press freedom in Turkey – which is totally not true. He takes it to extreme heights – that’s definitely true, but the press has never been free in Turkey,” Geerdink told RT. “For example, 20 years ago nobody could go to the southeast to report on the realities there. At the time it was the army that was censoring the press, and now Erdogan is using the same mechanisms to silence opponents,” she said.

Not only government-owned media outlets are being biased in Turkey, the Dutch journalist said. Some are under indirect, economic pressure.

“Most of the big papers and big channels, also the ones we call ‘mainstream’ which are not necessarily total mouthpieces of the government, have economic ties to the government, because they are part of big companies, and have to report in line with general government policy. [Otherwise] these companies lose contracts in the telecom market,” Geerdink said, adding that CNN Turk – which hasn’t been covering the Zaman protests, is one example.

“CNN Turk cancelled two rather popular talk shows of people who are not really in line with the government – and that is another problem in Turkey,” she said.

March 5, 2016 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , | Leave a comment

Anti-truther witch hunt fizzles at Oberlin College

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By Kevin Barrett | Veterans Today | March 3, 2016

A rabid little Fox is drooling and gnashing its teeth.

But that hasn’t stopped Oberlin College from respecting the academic freedom of Professor Joy Karega, who is being witch-hunted by the neocon-Zionist network for speaking honestly about 9/11 and the two 2015 Paris false flags.

According to the outraged Likudnik tabloid the New York Post:

Karega … wrote on numerous Facebook posts that she believes Israel was the mastermind behind numerous terrorist attacks around the world including 9/11 and the Charlie Hebdo slaughter in Paris.”

In a written statement, Oberlin President Marvin Krislov offered an obligatory denunciation of “anti-Semitic conspiracy theories,” while at the same time defending academic freedom:

“I am a practicing Jew, grandson of an Orthodox rabbi. Members of our family were murdered in the Holocaust. As someone who has studied history, I cannot comprehend how any person could or would question its existence, its horrors and the evil which caused it. I feel the same way about anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Regardless of the reason for spreading these materials, they cause pain for many people — members of our community and beyond … I am also the son of a tenured faculty member at a large research university. My father instilled in me a strong belief in academic freedom. I believe, as the American Association of University Professors says, that academic freedom is ‘the indispensable quality of institutions of higher education’ because it encourages free inquiry, promotes the expansion of knowledge, and creates an environment in which learning and research can flourish.”

On Monday, I had emailed a debate challenge to the Oberlin student newspaper, Krislov and 17 other key Oberlin professors and administrators. Perhaps it had helped sway Krislov. Here it is:

To the administrators, faculty, staff and students of Oberlin College (emailed 2/29/2016)

It has come to my attention that a member of the Oberlin faculty, Professor Joy Karega, is being witch-hunted by the same forces that drove me out of the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2006. Specifically, Professor Karega is being hounded for suggesting that the Charlie Hebdo attacks may have been a false flag event, and that Israel and its extremist Prime Minister may have helped orchestrate the crime.

Such views may sound odd or unusual to uncritical consumers of Western mainstream media. But in fact they are both widespread and well-supported by considerable evidence.

Globally, a substantial majority of Muslim intellectuals, as well as those non-Muslim intellectuals who follow alternative media, would tend to agree with Professor Karega. Their interpretation is supported by evidence presented in a book I edited, We Are NOT Charlie Hebdo: Free Thinkers Question the French 9/11.

In that book, which features 22 leading public intellectuals representing a wide variety of backgrounds and viewpoints, bestselling Israeli author and investigative journalist Barry Chamish – a right-wing Zionist himself – suggests that Netanyahu should be considered a key suspect in the apparent false flag attack on the Charlie Hebdo offices. Evidence for that interpretation is presented in several of the essays.

As the editor of We Are NOT Charlie Hebdo and its follow-up volume ANOTHER French False Flag?  I would be happy to visit Oberlin to participate in a debate or symposium about these critically-important issues. Those who disagree with me (and with 40 leading public intellectuals represented in the two books) should be eager to defend their views using logic and evidence rather than ad hominems.

If Professor Karega’s critics are not willing to participate in a free and fair debate, their hysteria and name-calling ought to be of no concern to educated people, including the Oberlin College community.

Student groups interested in sponsoring such a debate or symposium may contact me by email at kbarrett(at)merr[dot]com.

Also, I would like to offer copies of We Are NOT Charlie Hebdo and ANOTHER French False Flag at half price to members of the Oberlin community. If you’d like a copy, simply email me at kbarrett(at)merr[dot]com from an Oberlin.edu address.

Sincerely

Dr. Kevin Barrett

As of Thursday, I had not heard back from any of the 19 Oberlin recipients. So I decided to compose another missive, this one directed to Marvin Krislov:

To Oberlin University President Marvin Krislov,

Thank you for standing up for academic freedom in your recent statement implicitly referring to the witch-hunt of Professor Joy Karega.

As a human being, and the son and grandson of human beings, who has studied history, I cannot comprehend how anyone could question the existence of that Holocaust known as World War II, in which more than sixty million of our fellow humans were murdered. Nor can I understand how anyone can question the evil which caused that war, namely British imperialism, with lesser contributions from other imperialisms. (All realist historians acknowledge that the two World Wars were essentially the same war, launched by the British to pre-emptively destroy a rising German empire.)

Nor can I understand why anyone would single out some World War II victims as more worthy of remembrance than others due to their ethnicity. And I certainly cannot understand why the debate over various details about World War II outlined in Thomas Dalton’s Debating the Holocaust has been criminalized in many European countries and rendered taboo in the American academy.

You write that you are similarly nonplussed by “anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.” Are you referring to the theory that 19 young Semites, led by an older Semite on dialysis in a cave in Afghanistan, blew up the World Trade Center by using box-cutters to kindle minor office fires?

I, too, am outraged by anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Today virtually all of the world’s Semites are the speakers of Arabic. (“Semite” is a linguistic category, not a racial one.) And I am outraged by the way Arabic Semites have been falsely blamed for the controlled demolition of the World Trade Center, the murders of innocents by large white paramilitary professionals  in Paris and San Bernadino, and many similar false flag incidents. These false flag public relations stunts have triggered the murder of more than 1.5 million people and the destruction of the homes and lives of tens of millions more. THIS is the real, indisputable and ongoing Holocaust; you and your colleagues are perpetrating it right now with your tax money, your silences and your lies. The blood of more than a million innocents is on your hands.

So while I appreciate your support for academic freedom, I respectfully request that you take the next step and sponsor a debate or symposium on false flags in general and 9/11 and the 2015 Paris attacks in particular. If you or anyone else believes they can defend the 9/11 Commission Report, or the official versions of the Paris attacks, in a debate, they should be not just willing but actually eager to put the “conspiracy theories” to rest.

I will be happy to travel to Oberlin at my own expense to participate in any such debate. Meanwhile, I am sending my three books Questioning the War on Terror, We Are NOT Charlie Hebdo, and ANOTHER French False Flag as a gift to the Oberlin College Library, where faculty and students can refer to them to understand the positions of Professor Karega and the hundreds of millions of people around the world who share her interpretations of current events.

Sincerely,

Kevin Barrett

March 5, 2016 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Cuban Doctors Have Saved 87,000 Lives in Bolivia Since 2006

teleSUR | March 5, 2016

Cuba is known for sending medical personnel overseas as part of its medical brigade program which was launched during the 1959 Revolution.

The Bolivian Health Ministry thanked Cuban doctors and the Cuban government Friday for the solidarity offered to their country as part of Cuba’s medical internationalism over the past 10 years.

Ariana Campero, the head of agency of the decade-long program, congratulated the local partners and conveyed greetings from President Evo Morales. “Thank you very much to Fidel Castro, Commander Raul Castro and the Cuban people. We are sending you all an embrace of solidarity from Bolivia.”

According to Dr. Pavel Noa, the national coordinator of the mission, the most important results that protrude from the mission encompass more than 63 million consultations offered to the Bolivian people, 179,282 surgical interventions performed and a total of 86,983 lives saved.

Medical workers are often believed to be Cuba’s most important export, having served in countries all over the world and in particular in Latin America, Africa and, more recently in Oceania.

Dr. Alina Ochoa, head of Medical Assistance Brigade, stressed the importance of cooperation in the healthcare sector and said the aim was to ensure the health of the Bolivian people. “Cuba has a long and successful history in providing medical staff worldwide, which was ratified in Bolivia with the presence of more than 700 collaborators.”

The representative of the Pan American Health Organization, Luis Fernando Leanes, acknowledged the work of the Cuban mission, which he described as wonderful and very important. “How nice to be in this country and see Cubans and Bolivians working together for peace and welfare”, he said.

Cuba´s efforts in providing medical services to the poor have been acknowledged internationally as it was among the first countries to respond when the World Health Organization called for medical staff to help with the Ebola crisis. Fidel Castro proudly described the 12,000 medical volunteers who signed up as “an army of white coats”.

March 5, 2016 Posted by | Economics, Solidarity and Activism | , , , | Leave a comment