Yesterday, a Senate deal was announced that leaves the door wide open to American citizens and others being indefinitely detained without charge or trial, even on American soil.
The deal was brokered behind closed doors, with no hearing and no public debate, and is an effort by the Senate Armed Services Committee to jam the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the massive defense spending bill, through Congress.
If enacted, sections 1031 and 1032 of the NDAA would:
1) Explicitly authorize the federal government to indefinitely imprison without charge or trial American citizens and others picked up inside and outside the United States;
(2) Mandate military detention of some civilians who would otherwise be outside of military control, including civilians picked up within the United States itself; and
(3) Transfer to the Department of Defense core prosecutorial, investigative, law enforcement, penal, and custodial authority and responsibility now held by the Department of Justice.
These provisions in the NDAA are inconsistent with fundamental American values embodied in the Constitution. The Senate should reject the NDAA and its indefinite detention provisions.
Indefinite detention is wrong under any circumstances. And for the Senate to leave open the possibility that our own citizens and other civilians picked up at home or far from any battlefield could be thrown into prison without being charged and tried is unconscionable.
This unprecedented measure has been challenged by the White House, the Department of Defense, and by the Chairmen of the Senate Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, but certain senators are intent on making it the law almost immediately.
Social Justice: Current Affairs, Business, Politics, and all the reasons in the world to Thrive on Creative Discontent!
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Trying to define Bravery, learn about these three 'peaceful' Freedom Fighters
Jabbar Savalan was jailed after calling for protests against the Azerbaijan government on Facebook.
A day after posting a Facebook message calling for protests against the government, Jabbar Savalan was brought to a police station for questioning. Police conveniently "discovered" marijuana in his outer coat pocket, and after reportedly hitting and intimidating Jabbar without a lawyer present, they coerced him into signing a confession. Jabbar maintains he does not use drugs and that the marijuana was planted on him. Authorities in Azerbaijan have a history of using trumped-up drug charges to jail those seen as critical of the government. Amnesty International believes the charges against Jabbar were fabricated, and considers him a prisoner of conscience.
Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli
Iran
Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli are serving long prison sentences for seeking for greater freedom in Iran. Majid was arrested and reportedly beaten by authorities in December 2009, after addressing a university rally in Tehran. Behareh was arrested later that month and charged with several offenses, including "insulting the leader" and "insulting the president." The two student leaders last year issued a joint statement from prison, encouraging others to continue to push for change in Iran. In response, authorities extended each of their prison sentences by another six months.
A day after posting a Facebook message calling for protests against the government, Jabbar Savalan was brought to a police station for questioning. Police conveniently "discovered" marijuana in his outer coat pocket, and after reportedly hitting and intimidating Jabbar without a lawyer present, they coerced him into signing a confession. Jabbar maintains he does not use drugs and that the marijuana was planted on him. Authorities in Azerbaijan have a history of using trumped-up drug charges to jail those seen as critical of the government. Amnesty International believes the charges against Jabbar were fabricated, and considers him a prisoner of conscience.
Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli
Iran
Behareh Hedayat and Majid Tavakkoli are serving long prison sentences for seeking for greater freedom in Iran. Majid was arrested and reportedly beaten by authorities in December 2009, after addressing a university rally in Tehran. Behareh was arrested later that month and charged with several offenses, including "insulting the leader" and "insulting the president." The two student leaders last year issued a joint statement from prison, encouraging others to continue to push for change in Iran. In response, authorities extended each of their prison sentences by another six months.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Republican Candidates will make the Rich Richer and remove all safety nets for the 99%
The detailed tax plans from Republican presidential candidates would provide tax cuts for the highest earners with those from Rick Perry and Jon Huntsman offering the biggest benefits. Mitt Romney’s proposal, which suggests fewer changes.
On the surface, the 9-9-9 tax plan of Herman Cain would lead to the biggest tax cuts at the top of the income scale and the largest tax increases at the bottom.
On the surface, the 9-9-9 tax plan of Herman Cain would lead to the biggest tax cuts at the top of the income scale and the largest tax increases at the bottom.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Cheers for Wall Street Protesters
Not all reaction to the Occupy Wall Street movement has been predictable. Jim Chanos, a hedge-fund chief, and Bill Gross, the highest profile bond-fund manager in America, expressed sympathy for the protesters. And the chief executive of Citigroup Inc. said he'd be "happy to talk with them." Here's a look at what notable financiers, politicians, and media stars have said about the protests.
Colin Powell, Former U.S. Secretary of State, Army General
"Demonstrating like this is as American as apple pie. We've been marching up and down and demonstrating throughout our history. ... There's an increasing gap between those who are doing very, very well, and I'm doing well, and those who are not doing as well, and those who are not doing as well are not seeing their lives improve. So there's frustration, there's angriness there." (Source: Politico)
Michael Moore, filmmaker
"We started rewarding people not for making things or inventing things. We reward people for making money off money and moving money around and dividing up mortgages a thousand times over, selling it to China. We're against greed and the fact that 1% could get nine slices of the pie and the other 99% are supposed to fight over the last slice." (Source: Piers Morgan)
Russell Simmons, hip-hop entrepreneur
"Simple idea, power to the people. It's not a difficult idea, that we get the special interests and the money out of Washington." (Source: Keith Olbermann)
Bill Gross, founder of Pacific Investment Management Co.
"Class warfare by the 99%? Of course, they're fighting back after 30 years of being shot at." (Source: Twitter)
Laurence Fink, CEO of BlackRock
"The protesting is a statement (that) the future is very clouded for a lot of people. These are not lazy people sitting around looking for something to do. We have people losing hope and they're going into the street…” (Source: Bloomberg)
Joseph Dear, chief investment officer, CalPERS
"The financial system gets bailed out, executives' salaries stay high and the incomes of people who work for a living, paycheck to paycheck, continue to decline." (Source: CNBC)
Colin Powell, Former U.S. Secretary of State, Army General
"Demonstrating like this is as American as apple pie. We've been marching up and down and demonstrating throughout our history. ... There's an increasing gap between those who are doing very, very well, and I'm doing well, and those who are not doing as well, and those who are not doing as well are not seeing their lives improve. So there's frustration, there's angriness there." (Source: Politico)
Michael Moore, filmmaker
"We started rewarding people not for making things or inventing things. We reward people for making money off money and moving money around and dividing up mortgages a thousand times over, selling it to China. We're against greed and the fact that 1% could get nine slices of the pie and the other 99% are supposed to fight over the last slice." (Source: Piers Morgan)
Russell Simmons, hip-hop entrepreneur
"Simple idea, power to the people. It's not a difficult idea, that we get the special interests and the money out of Washington." (Source: Keith Olbermann)
Bill Gross, founder of Pacific Investment Management Co.
"Class warfare by the 99%? Of course, they're fighting back after 30 years of being shot at." (Source: Twitter)
Laurence Fink, CEO of BlackRock
"The protesting is a statement (that) the future is very clouded for a lot of people. These are not lazy people sitting around looking for something to do. We have people losing hope and they're going into the street…” (Source: Bloomberg)
Joseph Dear, chief investment officer, CalPERS
"The financial system gets bailed out, executives' salaries stay high and the incomes of people who work for a living, paycheck to paycheck, continue to decline." (Source: CNBC)
Sunday, November 13, 2011
If Lehman’s Brothers Collapse didn’t convince you…how about MF Global’s collapse = all industries and in particular the financial industry needs severe regulation.
Jon Corzine’s disastrous tenure at MF Global will boost something that Jon Corzine, the liberal senator from New Jersey, undoubtedly would have supported: the Dodd-Frank Act.
The financial reform law passed last year by Congress was aimed at a preventing a relapse of the crisis that nearly brought the U.S. economy to its knees in 2008. But efforts to implement the law have been stymied by congressional Republicans and industry lobbies. The law requires various federal regulators to write and pass about 400 rules, according to an analysis by law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell. Of those, only 74 rules have been finalized.
That may now change. While the failure of MF Global, which Corzine oversaw as its chairman and CEO, did not have the same seismic impact as the collapse of Lehman Brothers, experts say the shuttered futures firm speaks directly to the need for certain aspects of the regulatory framework envisioned by Dodd-Frank. It also gives ammunition to those who want to push through the mountain of rulemaking that remains to be done.
"It adds fire under our feet to get these regulations done as soon as possible," said Bart Chilton, a member of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, in an interview. A staunch advocate for strong regulation, Chilton called MF Global the "new poster child" for the need to beef up market oversight. The CFTC is tasked to write 64 rules, of which it has completed 22, according to Davis Polk.
MF Global was brought down the last week of October after the publicly traded firm reported a record quarterly loss; saw its credit rating slashed to junk; spooked its trading partners and shareholders with its vast and highly leveraged exposure to European sovereign debt; has roughly $600 million unaccounted for, and a federal investigation is underway into both the whereabouts of the money and possible violations by the firm over its disappearance.
Meanwhile, the court-appointed trustee overseeing MF Global’s liquidation on Friday fired more than 1,000 of the firm’s broker-dealer employees to preserve funds for the claims process.
About 50,000 futures customers had their trading accounts frozen and partially transferred to other firms when MF Global entered bankruptcy.
MF Global belonged to an organization that is a central tenet of Dodd-Frank, said Kevin McPartland, senior analyst with the TABB Group.
"MF Global will encourage regulators to shine a much brighter spotlight on questions of clearinghouse governance," she said.
Others are using MF Global’s failure as a clarion call for imposing Dodd-Frank’s ban on federally insured banks using their own capital for speculative investments, otherwise known as proprietary trading.
It’s high time that we get on with it!!!
The financial reform law passed last year by Congress was aimed at a preventing a relapse of the crisis that nearly brought the U.S. economy to its knees in 2008. But efforts to implement the law have been stymied by congressional Republicans and industry lobbies. The law requires various federal regulators to write and pass about 400 rules, according to an analysis by law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell. Of those, only 74 rules have been finalized.
That may now change. While the failure of MF Global, which Corzine oversaw as its chairman and CEO, did not have the same seismic impact as the collapse of Lehman Brothers, experts say the shuttered futures firm speaks directly to the need for certain aspects of the regulatory framework envisioned by Dodd-Frank. It also gives ammunition to those who want to push through the mountain of rulemaking that remains to be done.
"It adds fire under our feet to get these regulations done as soon as possible," said Bart Chilton, a member of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, in an interview. A staunch advocate for strong regulation, Chilton called MF Global the "new poster child" for the need to beef up market oversight. The CFTC is tasked to write 64 rules, of which it has completed 22, according to Davis Polk.
MF Global was brought down the last week of October after the publicly traded firm reported a record quarterly loss; saw its credit rating slashed to junk; spooked its trading partners and shareholders with its vast and highly leveraged exposure to European sovereign debt; has roughly $600 million unaccounted for, and a federal investigation is underway into both the whereabouts of the money and possible violations by the firm over its disappearance.
Meanwhile, the court-appointed trustee overseeing MF Global’s liquidation on Friday fired more than 1,000 of the firm’s broker-dealer employees to preserve funds for the claims process.
About 50,000 futures customers had their trading accounts frozen and partially transferred to other firms when MF Global entered bankruptcy.
MF Global belonged to an organization that is a central tenet of Dodd-Frank, said Kevin McPartland, senior analyst with the TABB Group.
"MF Global will encourage regulators to shine a much brighter spotlight on questions of clearinghouse governance," she said.
Others are using MF Global’s failure as a clarion call for imposing Dodd-Frank’s ban on federally insured banks using their own capital for speculative investments, otherwise known as proprietary trading.
It’s high time that we get on with it!!!
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Thousands shout "clown, clown" to citizen silvio berlusconi the embarassment of Italia!!!
Silvio Berlusconi resigned on Saturday to make way for an emergency government Italians hope will save them from financial ruin as thousands of jeering protesters shouted "clown, clown" and toasted the end of a scandal-plagued era.
List of Scandals
• Lodo Mondadori: bribery of judges (statute of limitation acquittal)
• All Iberian 1: 23 billion Lira bribe to Bettino Craxi via an offshore bank account code-named All Iberian (first court sentence: 2 years 4 month jail; appeal: acquitted since the statute of limitations expired before the appeal)
• Lentini affair: false accounting (not guilty because of changes in the false accounting law)
• Propaganda Due (P2) masonic lodge trial: false testimony (guilty but amnesty applied)
• Macherio estates: false accounting (amnesty applied following the 1992 fiscal remission law)
• All Iberian 2: false accounting (acquittal following the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Sme-Ariosto 2: false accounting (acquittal following the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Sme-Ariosto 1: charge for the sale by IRI, bribes to judges (first instance court sentence)
• Bribery of the Guardia di Finanza (first sentence: 2 years 9 months jail; appeal: statute of limitations for 3 charges, acquittal for the fourth (not proven)
• Medusa Cinema company: false accounting (acquitted since too rich for being aware of such small amounts)
• Sme-Ariosto 1: bribes to the judge Renato Squillante
• Macherio estates: embezzlement, tax evasion, another false accounting (the statute of limitations expired before the first court verdict for one charge; and before the appeal court for the second one)
• Television rights: false accounting, tax evasion, embezzlement
• Fininvest financial statement: false accounting and embezzlement (archived thanks to the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Fininvest consolidated financial statements: false accounting (archived thanks to the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Agreement on the division of publicity between RAI and Fininvest televisions
• Traffic of drug
• Tax bribery on the Pay-tv
• Collusion into the 1992–1993 slaughters
• Mafia collusion, together with Marcello Dell'Utri, money laundering
• Bribe to the lawyer David Mills: corruption to influence a judiciary sentence
• Corruption of senators of the Romano Prodi government camp (procedure transferred from Naples to Rome)
• Paying an underage girl (Karima el-Mahroug) for sex and abuse of office relating to her release from detention
Former European Commissioner Mario Monti is expected to be given the task of trying to form a new administration to face a widening financial crisis which has sent Italy's borrowing costs to unmanageable levels.
More than a thousand demonstrators waving banners mocking Berlusconi flocked to the president's residence at the Quirinale Palace as the motorcade carrying the billionaire media entrepreneur, who has been Italy's longest serving prime minister, entered.
The crowd grew so unruly that Berlusconi was forced to leave (scurry away) secretly via a side entrance and return to his private residence.
Cheers broke out when they heard that Berlusconi had resigned and the square broke out into a party atmosphere. People sang, danced and some broke open bottles of champagne.
An orchestra near the palace played the Hallelujah chorus from Handel's Messiah. "We are here to rejoice," one said.
Demonstrators chanting "resign, resign, resign" also gathered outside the prime minister's office and parliament, heckling ministers as they walked between the two buildings.
After the resignation, hundreds shouting "Jail, Jail, Jail," moved from the presidential palace to Berlusconi's residence to continue the noisy celebrations below his windows.
With a public debt of more than 120 percent of gross domestic product and more than a decade of anemic economic growth behind it, Italy is at the heart of the euro zone debt crisis and would be too big for the bloc to bail out.
Berlusconi, fighting an array of scandals and facing trials on charges ranging from tax fraud to paying for sex with an under-aged prostitute, had been under pressure to resign for weeks as the market crisis threatened to spin out of control.
List of Scandals
• Lodo Mondadori: bribery of judges (statute of limitation acquittal)
• All Iberian 1: 23 billion Lira bribe to Bettino Craxi via an offshore bank account code-named All Iberian (first court sentence: 2 years 4 month jail; appeal: acquitted since the statute of limitations expired before the appeal)
• Lentini affair: false accounting (not guilty because of changes in the false accounting law)
• Propaganda Due (P2) masonic lodge trial: false testimony (guilty but amnesty applied)
• Macherio estates: false accounting (amnesty applied following the 1992 fiscal remission law)
• All Iberian 2: false accounting (acquittal following the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Sme-Ariosto 2: false accounting (acquittal following the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Sme-Ariosto 1: charge for the sale by IRI, bribes to judges (first instance court sentence)
• Bribery of the Guardia di Finanza (first sentence: 2 years 9 months jail; appeal: statute of limitations for 3 charges, acquittal for the fourth (not proven)
• Medusa Cinema company: false accounting (acquitted since too rich for being aware of such small amounts)
• Sme-Ariosto 1: bribes to the judge Renato Squillante
• Macherio estates: embezzlement, tax evasion, another false accounting (the statute of limitations expired before the first court verdict for one charge; and before the appeal court for the second one)
• Television rights: false accounting, tax evasion, embezzlement
• Fininvest financial statement: false accounting and embezzlement (archived thanks to the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Fininvest consolidated financial statements: false accounting (archived thanks to the new law on the false accounting passed by the Berlusconi government)
• Agreement on the division of publicity between RAI and Fininvest televisions
• Traffic of drug
• Tax bribery on the Pay-tv
• Collusion into the 1992–1993 slaughters
• Mafia collusion, together with Marcello Dell'Utri, money laundering
• Bribe to the lawyer David Mills: corruption to influence a judiciary sentence
• Corruption of senators of the Romano Prodi government camp (procedure transferred from Naples to Rome)
• Paying an underage girl (Karima el-Mahroug) for sex and abuse of office relating to her release from detention
Former European Commissioner Mario Monti is expected to be given the task of trying to form a new administration to face a widening financial crisis which has sent Italy's borrowing costs to unmanageable levels.
More than a thousand demonstrators waving banners mocking Berlusconi flocked to the president's residence at the Quirinale Palace as the motorcade carrying the billionaire media entrepreneur, who has been Italy's longest serving prime minister, entered.
The crowd grew so unruly that Berlusconi was forced to leave (scurry away) secretly via a side entrance and return to his private residence.
Cheers broke out when they heard that Berlusconi had resigned and the square broke out into a party atmosphere. People sang, danced and some broke open bottles of champagne.
An orchestra near the palace played the Hallelujah chorus from Handel's Messiah. "We are here to rejoice," one said.
Demonstrators chanting "resign, resign, resign" also gathered outside the prime minister's office and parliament, heckling ministers as they walked between the two buildings.
After the resignation, hundreds shouting "Jail, Jail, Jail," moved from the presidential palace to Berlusconi's residence to continue the noisy celebrations below his windows.
With a public debt of more than 120 percent of gross domestic product and more than a decade of anemic economic growth behind it, Italy is at the heart of the euro zone debt crisis and would be too big for the bloc to bail out.
Berlusconi, fighting an array of scandals and facing trials on charges ranging from tax fraud to paying for sex with an under-aged prostitute, had been under pressure to resign for weeks as the market crisis threatened to spin out of control.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Occupy Wall Street: CEO of Goldman Sachs makes $16,000/hour while Unemployment for Young Vets hit 30% and is Rising!!!! God Bless America…
On Veterans Day in America, it’s sobering to realize just how badly the job market has turned against the men and women who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics employment data: while the job market is slowly improving for most Americans, it’s moving in the opposite direction for Gulf War II vets (defined by the BLS as those on active duty since 2001). The youngest of veterans, aged 18 to 24, had a 30.4 percent jobless rate in October, way up from 18.4 percent a year earlier. Non-veterans of the same age improved, to 15.3 percent from 16.9 percent. For some groups, the numbers can look a good deal worse: for black veterans aged 18-24, the unemployment rate is a striking 48 percent.
That 18-24 category only covers 320,000 veterans.
“The numbers don’t lie,” says Ryan Gallucci, deputy legislative director for the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Washington. “The new veterans are going into the unemployment pile.”
The skills issue is particularly troubling. Hiring is strongest in jobs that require specialized education, and weakest for blue collar jobs, says Stephen Fuller, a professor of employment and economics at George Mason University in Arlington, Va. Even military jobs that are in the right ballpark for growth industries — say, software or electronics technician — may involve specialization that doesn’t readily apply to Silicon Valley’s Web 2.0 or software-services jobs.
So ponder this America. A young Marine goes over 2011, to having missed his kids birthdays, his wife probably having cheated on him, no work, and bills to pay. the recruiters hipe about skills easily transferrable to the civilian sector are just BS. But we have 1,400 billionaires/millionaires who paid zero ($0) taxes in 2010.
Wake up!!! Civilization is based on the premise of community = communal responsibilities; communities take care of those who sacrifice for them = this was even true in the stone age....
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics employment data: while the job market is slowly improving for most Americans, it’s moving in the opposite direction for Gulf War II vets (defined by the BLS as those on active duty since 2001). The youngest of veterans, aged 18 to 24, had a 30.4 percent jobless rate in October, way up from 18.4 percent a year earlier. Non-veterans of the same age improved, to 15.3 percent from 16.9 percent. For some groups, the numbers can look a good deal worse: for black veterans aged 18-24, the unemployment rate is a striking 48 percent.
That 18-24 category only covers 320,000 veterans.
“The numbers don’t lie,” says Ryan Gallucci, deputy legislative director for the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Washington. “The new veterans are going into the unemployment pile.”
The skills issue is particularly troubling. Hiring is strongest in jobs that require specialized education, and weakest for blue collar jobs, says Stephen Fuller, a professor of employment and economics at George Mason University in Arlington, Va. Even military jobs that are in the right ballpark for growth industries — say, software or electronics technician — may involve specialization that doesn’t readily apply to Silicon Valley’s Web 2.0 or software-services jobs.
So ponder this America. A young Marine goes over 2011, to having missed his kids birthdays, his wife probably having cheated on him, no work, and bills to pay. the recruiters hipe about skills easily transferrable to the civilian sector are just BS. But we have 1,400 billionaires/millionaires who paid zero ($0) taxes in 2010.
Wake up!!! Civilization is based on the premise of community = communal responsibilities; communities take care of those who sacrifice for them = this was even true in the stone age....
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