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EU Alert: Tell MEPs to Reserve Tough New IP Enforcement Tools for Real Criminals
The European Parliament is poised to adopt a controversial directive on Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement that would give rights-holders incredibly powerful tools in their fight against intellectual property infringers. While this might sound like a good idea at first, a closer look reveals that the directive doesn't distinguish between unintentional, non-commercial infringers and for-profit, criminal counterfeiting organizations. If this directive is adopted, a person who unwittingly infringes copyright – even if it has no effect on the market – could potentially have her assets seized, bank accounts frozen and home invaded. Don’t let these tactics become the latest weapons in intellectual property rights-holders' destructive war on “piracy.”

EFF encourages its European supporters to write to their Members of the European Parliament to urge them to limit these harsh enforcement measures to cases in which infringement is undertaken intentionally and for commercial purposes. ... Just click the link above to send a message to your representative.

posted by Lorenzo 4:43 PM

 

Where are Iraq's Pentagon papers?
(Daniel Ellsberg, Boston Globe, 02/22/2004)
AS MORE and more of our young men and women come home from Iraq crippled or in body bags this election season, Americans ask, with increasing urgency, "Why did we send our children to die in Iraq? Was this war necessary?" . . . The evidence uncovered so far says that Saddam was not a threat, to us or his neighbors. Nor -- lacking any evidence of complicity in 9/11 or links to Al Qaeda -- was there a persuasive case that he would have been a significant threat even if he had possessed WMDs. . . . I've been here before. On my first full-time day of work as a high-level staff aide in the Pentagon, Aug. 4, 1964, I heard President Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara explain our first bombing raids against North Vietnam as a response to "unequivocal evidence" of an "unprovoked" attack on our destroyers "on routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf. Already that night I knew, along with many other Pentagon insiders, that each of these statements was a lie. . . . In hearings in February 1968, Senator J. William Fulbright said that if he had known of the Herrick cable alone, he would not have managed the Senate passage of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, "a great disservice to the Senate" which he regretted "more than anything I have ever done in my life." . . . He hadn't known of that cable because I, among many others, didn't tell him. I didn't dream of doing such a thing at the time; and if the thought had occurred to me, I'm sure I would have rejected it. Now I wish fervently that I had made those cables -- along with the rest of the contents of my safe in August 1964, demonstrating the equal falsity of the other statements about "unprovoked" attacks, "routine patrols," and "we seek no wider war" -- available to Congress and the electorate that same autumn, before the bombs had started falling. When I finally did so belatedly in 1971, former Senator Wayne Morse, who had cast one of the two dissenting votes in 1964, told me that if I had given him those documents at that time, "The Tonkin Gulf Resolution would never have gotten out of committee. And if it had been brought to a vote, it would never have passed." That's a heavy burden to bear. . . . However, just as Senators Byrd and Kennedy, the only two remaining in the Senate who voted for the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, learned from an error they have regretted for almost 40 years and tried to warn their current colleagues against repeating it last fall, so can insiders such as I once was do better than I did then. Individuals inside government, from low-level clerks to Cabinet members, have the power -- to be sure, at the risk of their careers -- to tell the truth. There are surely drawers full of documents in Washington right now -- the Pentagon Papers of Iraq -- that, if leaked in bulk, would drastically alter the public discourse on whether we should have sent our children to kill and to die in Iraq, and more urgently, whether we should continue to do so. . . . I urge patriotic and conscientious Americans who have access to these documents, and who know it is wrong for their bosses to lie to the public about why we are in this war, to consider doing what I wish I had done in 1964 or early 1965, years earlier than I did: Go to Congress and the press; tell the truth, with documents. The personal risks are real, but a war's worth of lives are at stake.

posted by Lorenzo 4:29 PM

 

Why The Corporate Media Killed Dean's Campaign
(David Podvin, MakeThemAccountable.com)
On December 1, 2003, Howard Dean was ahead by twenty points in the polls when he appeared on Hardball with Chris Matthews and said, "We're going to break up the giant media enterprises." This pronouncement went far beyond the governor's previous public musings about possibly re-regulating the communications industry, and amounted to a declaration of war on the corporations that administer the flow of information in the United States. . . . It was an extraordinarily noble and dangerous thing to do: when he advocated a truly free press, Dr. Dean was provoking the corrupt media conglomerates that control what most Americans see and hear and read, and thereby control what most Americans think. . . . The media giants quickly responded by crushing his high-flying campaign with the greatest of ease. This time, they didn't even have to invent a scandal in order to achieve the desired result; merely by chanting the word "unelectable" at maximum volume, the mainstream media maneuvered Democratic voters into switching their support to someone who poses no threat to the status quo. . . . John Kerry is a member in good standing of the feeble Daschle/Biden/Feinstein wing of the Democratic Party, a group of politicians whose disagreements with the mercantile elite tend to be merely rhetorical. Any doubts about Kerry's level of commitment to his stated progressive beliefs were conclusively answered in 1994 when he proclaimed himself "delighted" with the Republican takeover of Congress. The media oligarchy knows that a general election race between Kerry and George W. Bush will insure a continuation of its monopoly, regardless of who wins. . . . The news cartel had always been hostile to Dean; independent surveys revealed that he had received the most negative coverage of any candidate except Dennis Kucinich (the only other contender who strongly favors mandatory media divestment). But after his statement on Hardball, reporting about Dean abruptly came to an end and was replaced by supposition. The existing conjecture in political circles about his ability to win was transformed into a thunderous media mantra that drowned out all other issues . . . By mid-December, the news divisions of the four major television networks were reporting as fact that Dean was unelectable. The print media echoed the theme; on December 17, the Washington Post printed a front-page story that posited Dean could not win the presidency. The Post quickly followed up with an onslaught of articles and editorials reasserting that claim. Before the month was over, Dean's lack of electability had been highlighted in The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and every other major paper in the United States. . . . As 2004 began, Time and Newsweek simultaneously ran cover stories emphasizing that Dean was unelectable. In the weeks before the Iowa caucus, the ongoing topic of discussion on the political panel shows was that Dean was unelectable. National talk radio shows repeatedly stressed that Dean was unelectable. The corporate Internet declared that Dean was unelectable. And the mainstream media continued with the storyline that Dean was unelectable right up until Iowans attended their caucuses. Iowa Democrats could not watch a television or listen to a radio or read a newspaper or go online without learning that Howard Dean was unelectable. . . . It was the classic Big Lie. Through the power of repetition, the corporate media . . . Matea Gold of the Los Angeles Times is one of the many deceitful corporate scribes who obediently supplemented the "Dean is unelectable" message with its companion lie, "Dean is emotionally unstable", although she was a little slow on the uptake. In a report she authored the night of the pep rally, Gold wrote, "We will not give up!" (Dean) declared, his gravelly voice barely audible over the din of applause inside the '70s-style disco hall. "We will not quit, now or ever! We want our country back!" . . . But twenty-four hours later, when it had become clear that the official corporate media version of events was to be Dean had gone berserk, Gold omitted all reference to the noise over which the Democrat had been shouting: "Dean leapt onto the stage, tore off his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves. His face beet-red, he punched his fists in the air and spoke in a near-guttoral (sic) roar. The frenetic response to his poor showing struck many as inappropriate." . . . Gold's colleague at the Times, Ronald Brownstein, joined the chorus of supposedly objective journalists who expressed relief after witnessing Dean's apparent demise. Brownstein has written that it is "reassuring" to see Democrats abandon Dean. And to whom is it reassuring? It is reassuring to Brownstein's employers at the Tribune Company, which recently reported record earnings as a result of media deregulation implemented by Bush. . . . Demonstrably, it is never what a politician does that creates a scandal; it is always whether the television networks and major metropolitan newspapers respond to the incident with saturation coverage. When a presidential candidate who was committed to deregulating the corporate media got caught lying about breaking the law, the importance of the event was minimized. When a presidential candidate who was committed to breaking up the corporate media got caught shouting at a pep rally, the importance of the event was maximized. . . . In recent years, corporations have dramatically increased their power at the expense of the average citizen (and with the apathetic complicity of the average citizen). Big Business has evolved from merely being a vital part of society into being master of both the political system and the means of communication. As a result, the boundaries of the national debate are now defined by the interests of the Fortune 500, and the malefactors of great wealth have become increasingly brazen. Americans used to laugh at banana republics, where the ruling elites are so shamelessly debauched that judges go on duck hunting trips with the politicians whose cases they are scheduled to review, but it doesn't seem quite so funny anymore. . . . After the last presidential election, the corporate functionaries on the Supreme Court overrode the will of the people by empowering the man who had lost. It was an awkward procedure, so the process has been refined. In 2004, the mainstream media is rapidly disqualifying all the candidates who fail to honor the business agenda, thus eliminating the need for another controversial judicial intervention. . . . In the United States of America, people who pose a threat to the reigning corporate establishment are destroyed. Or, as the Soviets used to put it, emotionally unstable individuals who deviate from the party line are guilty of engaging in "self-destruction".

posted by Lorenzo 11:14 AM

 

Bush Administration Proposes FEC and IRS Rules in Attack on Free Speech
(Drug Policy Alliance, February 5, 2004)
Two Bush administration agencies are considering new rules that could prevent the Drug Policy Alliance and other advocacy groups from communicating with their supporters about the political actions of federal officials who are up for re-election. These proposals represent one of the worst assaults on the freedom of speech and association ever proposed in the United States. . . . The Federal Elections Commission (FEC) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) proposals would serve to provide those Members of Congress running for re-election with a green light to introduce and pass harmful drug policies right before election day. The proposals would restrict the Alliance's ability to run advertisements in a newspaper or send out emails alerting you to the actions of Congress. The proposed rulings are vague in that they do not clearly state exactly which communications would be prohibited. This would allow the federal government to selectively enforce the rule in order to clamp down on any speech or advertising it doesn’t agree with. . . . Even though the Drug Policy Alliance does not endorse or oppose specific candidates for public office, the proposed IRS and FEC actions would hamper our efforts to contact fellow reformers about drug war laws pushed through Congress by officials up for election or about the drug policy stances of candidates. The proposals would permit any member of Congress to push their legislation into law without hearing the voice of the American people. . . . An essential part of the Alliance’s work is to keep fellow reformers informed about the actions and votes of elected officials. The FEC and IRS proposals would severely limit our ability to do this. If these proposals are adopted, we and other nonprofit advocacy groups may no longer be able to contact our supporters. . . . The Alliance is formulating a response to the proposals. Check back at the Alliance website to see how you can help us put a stop to these controversial Bush administration proposals that would severely hamper our ability to communicate urgent drug policy reform messages to you in the future.

posted by Lorenzo 3:56 PM

 

PGP Encryption workshop held at the Indymedia office in NYC
Rave: Indymedia PGP workshop was awesome!
We must take advantage of the resources our activist community offers! . . . I just came from the PGP Encryption workshop held at the Indymedia office today and it was the bomb! . . . PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) is a program used to encrypt and decrypt e-mail via the Internet. The message will be unreadable by other users or intruders. In short, You see what I send you for your eyes only and can only see it if I give you a copy of a key that will open the mail box so you can read my message. I don't give the presenter justice in my simple and crude definition, but that's as simple as I can break it down. . . . With the state and its host of Agents Smiths using every resource (technology, the 'law', media, and snitches) at their disposal to crush dissent, we as activists and freedom lovers should in turn use every resource, and in this case, technology to protect our way of disseminating information and communicating with one another. . . . I'm not saying that technology is not *the* resource, but a resource we should use to protect ourselves during a time when the police have carte blanche to moniutor our emails, listserves, and live chat rooms. . . . This is the first time I've actually been inside the Indymedia workspace and I felt welcomed. Erez, who led the workshop was very patient and generous with his knowledge. I have personally taught a handful of technology classes, so I know how exhaustive teaching a technology class can be when you're flying solo. . . . Anyway, I just want to give Indymedia props for hosting such a valuable workshop and I look forward to future projects like it.

[COMMENT: I believe that the next PGP Workshop at IndyMedia in NYC will be held in early March 2004. If anyone knows of other workshops like this, please post information about them in the COMMENTS section of this post.]

posted by Lorenzo 11:39 AM