Civil Liberties, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Truth to Power
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Update:
- Hosts Discuss Civil Liberties Amid Pandemic
—-
United States Executive Authority Declares Emergency Powers
The last point President Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen made when he testified last year before Congress was that Trump would never leave office voluntarily. With the pandemic of Covid-19 virus upon us, Trump has the perfect excuse. Last week he declared a state of national emergency. This gives him more than 100 additional powers. He can shut down the Internet, he has already banned gatherings of more than 10 people, and he can send in troops anywhere in the country.
What is the current state of our civil rights and civil liberties?
Guest – Stephen Rohde is a constitutional scholar, lecturer, writer, political activist and retired civil rights lawyer. He is a former President of the ACLU of Southern California and Chair of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California. Mr Rohde has served on the Board of Directors of Death Penalty Focus and was a founder and Chair of Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace. He is a past chair of Bend the Arc: a Jewish Partnership for Justice. Mr. Rohde is the author of two books American Words of Freedom: The Words That Define Our Nation and Freedom of Assembly, and co-author of Foundations of Freedom: A Living History of Our Bill of Rights. He has written for American Prospect, Truth Out, Huffington Post, and the LA Times and is a frequent contributor to the Los Angeles Review of Books
—-
United States Executive Authority in Declaring Emergency Powers
U.S. presidents have the discretion to declare a “national emergency.” As soon as he does, he can sidestep many existing limits to presidential authority. In fact, 100 or more special provisions become available to him. Some provide reasonable responses to real emergencies, while others seem to bolster the power of a so-called unitary executive who wants to amassing or retain power. The president can activate laws allowing him to, for example, shut down many kinds of electronic communications inside the U.S. or to freeze Americans’ bank accounts. Other powers are available without a declaration of emergency, including laws that allow the president to deploy troops inside the country to subdue domestic unrest.
The rationale for having emergency powers is simple: The government’s ordinary powers may not be enough in times of crisis, and amending the laws to provide greater ones would take too long. Emergency powers are intended to give a temporary boost until the emergency passes or there is time to change the law through the regular legislative process. The problem comes when presidents don’t have the best interest of the country in mind.
Guest – Andrew Boyd, Counsel in the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program. Andrew spent 7 years prosecuting senior Khmer Rouge leaders on behalf of the UN for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. He also worked on cases resulting from the 1994 Rwandan genocide at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.
————————————————
————————————————
Censorship, CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Iraq War, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Truth to Power, Uncategorized, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In Defense Of Julian Assange: Attorney Renata Avila
We continue our ongoing coverage of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who remains in confinement at London’s high-security Belmarsh prison. Julian is fighting extradition to the United States on 18 charges, including violating the Espionage Act and conspiring to hack government computers. As listeners will recall, the charges are in connection with Wikileaks’ release of thousands of secret cables in 2010.
Guest – Renata Avila, a member of the Julian Assange legal team. Renata is an international Human Rights lawyer from Guatemala, specializing in preserving human rights during the next wave of tech challenges. She is a Board member for Creative Commons, the Common Action Forum and is a Global Trustee of the Think Tank Digital Future Society. She is also a member of the WEF’s Global Future Council on Human Rights and Technology and a Steering Committee Member of the Information Society Advisory Council for the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.
—-
The Prosecution of Julian Assange – CUNY School of Law and UCLA
We listen to two presentations from a panel discussion among leading journalists, attorneys and human rights defenders as the extradition trial in London of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is set to begin.
The first speaker is lead attorney Barry Pollack representing Julian Assange speaking at The Prosecution of Julian Assange forum at UCLA.
We then hear from Glen Ford speaking at the CUNY School of Law, Glen is the Executive editor, Black Agenda Report. He’s a broadcast, print and web pioneer and founding member of the Washington chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists.
————————————
————————————
CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
CCR Attorney Brings GTMO Cases To Highest International Court
The International Criminal Court was established in 1998 and began sitting in 2002. To date there are 123 countries who have ratified the Rome Statute that created the ICC and participate in it.
The role of the ICC is to bring to justice the world’s worst crimes known to humankind – war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. The United States of America is not one of the 123 countries who participate in this International Court. But it can still be investigated and tried if the crimes it commits were committed in one of the 123 countries.
Guest – Attorney Katherine Gallagher, senior attorney at The Center for Constitutional Rights will be appearing before the ICC in the Hague in Holland on December 4, 2019. Attorney Gallagher will be representing two men currently being held and indefinitely detained in the US offshore prison camp in Guantánamo Cuba. Katherine works on universal jurisdiction and international criminal law cases involving U.S. and foreign officials and torture and other war crimes, and cases involving private military corporations and torture at Abu Ghraib. Her major cases include Al Shimari v. CACI, the international U.S. torture accountability cases, and Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) v. Vatican, seeking accountability for the crimes against humanity of sexual violence by clergy and cover-up.
—-
In Defense of Julian Assange Book Launch
Margaret Kunstler, Aaron Mate, Nathan Fuller, Amy Goodman, and Barry Pollack spoke about the wrongly prosecuted Julian Assange on the occasion of the recent publication by OR Books of In Defense of Julian Assange composed of 39 authors offering a range of insights and perspectives. The event on November 21, 2019 took place at the home of the late Michael Ratner, Assange’s former attorney. We hear from Margaret Kunstler, Barry Pollack, Nathan Fuller and Amy Goodman.
——————————
——————————
Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Surveillance, Truth to Power, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In Defense of Julian Assange
Whistle-blowing truth telling journalist and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange now sits in solitary confinement in London‘s infamous Belmarsh prison. The Trump administration has asked that he be extradited to Virginia for trial as a spy. Today we interview Margaret Kunstler and Tariq Ali who edited and introduce the just published book titled In Defense of Julian Assange. The book demonstrates convincingly what is at stake in his upcoming trial is the future of free journalism, here and abroad.
Julian faces a 175 year sentence under the century old Espionage Act, passed during World War I to be used against spies. He is charged with conspiring with Chelsea Manning to publish the Iraq war logs, the Afghanistan war logs, and State Department cables.
Former CIA director and current Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called WikiLeaks a “non-state intelligence service.“ Hillary Clinton wanted him assassinated by drone. The United Nations special rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer recently visited him in prison and concluded that indeed he was being tortured. When he last appeared in court he was incoherent and couldn’t remember his name or date of birth.
WikiLeaks was launched by Julian Assange in 2006, three years after Bush and Cheney commenced the illegal catastrophic war against Iraq in 2003.
Julian is a computer genius. He invented a way for publishers like WikiLeaks to receive truth telling information anonymously. The first bombshell he published in 2006 was “The Iraqi war logs.“ He got them from whistle-blower Chelsea Manning who was then in the military. They showed a video of American soldiers in a helicopter committing a war crime by gunning down and executing a number of Iraqi civilians, two Reuter’s journalists, and several children. Then they chuckled about it. A photo of the murders is shown on the book’s cover. This leak, furnished by Chelsea Manning, was devastating to the United States. Other whistle-blower leaks followed. The government became relentless in trying to close down WikiLeaks.
Guest – Margaret Kunstler – a civil rights attorney who has spent her career providing movement support and protecting the rights of activists. A powerful speaker on human rights issues, Kunstler is a consultant to the emerging voices of Occupy Wall Street protesters and Anonymous supporters. Kunstler’s Hell No: Your Right to Dissent in Twenty-First Century America, co-authored with Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights, is the leading handbook for activists today.
Guest – Tariq Ali, writer, journalist and film-maker, born in Lahore and educated at Oxford University. He writes regularly for a range of publications including The Guardian and The London Review of Books. He has written more than a dozen books including non-fiction as well as scripts for both stage and screen.
—-
Music is Power: Popular Songs, Social Justice and the Will to Change
Throughout U.S. history social justice music has played many roles, from motivating soldiers on their way to war, to inspiring activists fighting police repression during the civil rights movements. In his new book, “Music Is Power” author Brad Schreiber chronicles a century of politically-conscious music, from Pete Seeger through Joan Baez, Bob Marley, the Sex Pistols and to modern-day rap music.
Perhaps associated largely with folk music, social justice music spans a range of musical genres, from rap, heavy metal, reggae, and psychedelia. Schreiber not only shines a spotlight on musicians’ different approaches, from soulful ballads to expressions of anger, but he also tells engaging stories behind the public figures who have brought music into our lives. There are many surprises in his animation of long-time favorites, many of whom overcame obstacles in bringing their messages of social justice to the recording industry and to the airwaves.
Guest – Brad Schreiber – award-winning author, journalist and screenwriter, his previous books include Death in Paradise, Becoming Jimi Hendrix, and Revolution’s End. He has received fellowships and awards from the National Press Foundation, Edward Albee Foundation, International Book Awards, Independent Publisher Book Awards and Los Angeles Press Club.
—————————–
—————————–
Censorship, CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Human Rights, Iraq War, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Torture, Truth to Power, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Daniel Ellsberg: Julian Assange’s Case And The Doomsday Machine
Two weeks ago the Trump administration announced it had indicted Julian Assange in the Eastern District of Virginia on 17 counts of violating the 1917 Espionage Act. Assange is currently in the Belmarsh prison hospital in London. If extradited, tried, and convicted he faces 175 years in prison.
The Espionage Act is a 102 year old law used initially to imprison the great socialist Eugene V Debs for an anti-World War I speech he gave in Canton, Ohio and also used to crush the industrial workers of the world, the IWW, a large antiwar union at the time.
In 1971 it was famously used against Daniel Ellsberg who released the Pentagon papers to the New York Times and other media outlets. Lately the Espionage Act has been used against many truth telling whistleblowers during the Obama and Trump administrations.
This is the first time it is being used against a journalist.
Wikileaks Defense Funds:
Guest – Daniel Ellsberg, educated at Harvard and Cambridge and has been an activist since the 1970s. Ellsberg’s latest book, The Doomsday Machine, is an extensive study of nuclear theory and nuclear policy. In 2018 he was awarded the Olaf Palme prize for his “profound humanism and exceptional moral courage.
From 1957-59 he was a Junior Fellow in the Society of Fellows, Harvard University. He earned his Ph.D. in Economics at Harvard in 1962 with his thesis, Risk, Ambiguity and Decision. His research leading up to this dissertation—in particular his work on what has become known as the “Ellsberg Paradox,” first published in an article entitled Risk, Ambiguity and the Savage Axioms—is widely considered a landmark in decision theory and behavioral economics.
———————-
———————-
Civil Liberties, Human Rights, NSA Spying, Political Prisoner, Surveillance, Truth to Power, War Resister
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Cyber Threats And US Cyber Security
Russian hackers need only 19 minutes after breaking into a computer to wreak greater destruction and data theft, according to a recent CrowdStrike report. The Kremlin beat out North Korean and Chinese hacker groups who needed two and four hours respectively to go from breaching one computer to another. Cyber threats from Russia are sophisticated and aggressive, according to earlier findings and many experts. As a results Russian saboteurs have moved beyond network intrusion into data manipulation and taking down power systems.
Guest – Patrick Tucker, technology editor for Defense One. Patrick is the author of the 2014 book, The Naked Future: What Happens in a World That Anticipates Your Every Move? Previously, Tucker was deputy editor for The Futurist. He has written widely about emerging technology for such publications as Slate, MIT Technology Review, and BBC News Magazine.
—-
10 Years Since Operation Cast Lead
Last month marked the 10 year anniversary of Israel’s illegal massive deadly attack on the Palestinian people living in the open air prison of the Gaza Strip along the Mediterranean sea in the south of Israel-Palestine.
The attack was carried out with the political and military support of the George W. Bush regime during its final few days. Some 1200 Palestinians were killed including 500 children. This has been documented in the United Nation’s sponsored Goldstone Report.
Israel’s continuing illegal settlement of Palestinian land and it’s dispossession of Palestinian people is made possible by American political, military, and economic support. But this support is coming under increasing challenge with Israel’s violation of human rights and of international law being more widely exposed and discussed.
Guest – Helena Cobban is the publisher of Just World Books and is active through her new not-for-profit organization Just World Educational. She works in broad community education campaigns on matters of war, peace, and justice in the Middle East.
——————-
——————-
