Disinformation Campaign Proves Effective as Anti-SOPA Strike-Breaker

Two or three days ago, announcements were broadcast on various Media Outlets stating that two bills in the Congress and the Senate, SOPA and PROTECT-IP were effectively “Dead-in-the-Water,” resulting in the cancellation (or extreme reduction) of what would have been an extremely disruptive– and therefore highly dramatic– strike/protest by Major Internet Companies against the proposed legislation.

The fact that no sources were actually named, as well as the coordinated nature of this spurious disinformation campaign, indicates that this legislation, involving a precipitous curtailment of the Civil Liberties in the United States, indicates a scope of political interests far beyond those of the Entertainment Industry.

History shows us that a curtailment of Civil Liberties is never instituted without an eye to a further attack on those same liberties at a later date.

This debate is not over. Expect to hear opponents to these bills caricatured as disgruntled pirates of popular entertainment, 20-somethings living in their mothers’ basements, who want to continue downloading music and movies without having to pay for the privilege.

Expect to read further, and ever more disturbing, developments in the coming months.

View A Legal Analysis of S. 968, the PROTECT IP Act [PDF] from the Congressional Research Service

“Birther” Wingnuts Bid to Remove President Obama from Georgia ballot in 2012

It’s like Election 2000 all over again!

In a desperate attempt at a political power grab is afoot in Georgia, wingnut “Birthers” have sued to have President Obama removed from the State ballot in November. The case(s) are being brought before Georgia Administrative Law Judge Michael M. Malihi. The case(s) are being brought by Orly Taitz and a sitting state lawmaker, Republican Mark Hatfield (Waycross).

On Jan. 3, 2012, Malihi, who consolidated several cases challenging Barack Obama’s eligibility to be placed on the primary ballot in Georgia, issued an order denying Obama’s motion to dismiss those challenges. He stated, “Because defendant’s motion to dismiss is denied, in the interest of efficiency, the court finds it unnecessary to wait for plaintiffs’ responses before denying the motion.”

A court hearing is scheduled to begin on January 26 in Fulton County, to determine if President Obama is eligible to appear on the ballot. The judge must make a ruling in the case by March 6th, which is the date of the Georgia Primary.

The judge will only be making a recommendation– Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is Supervisor of Elections, will be making the final decision as to whether or not The President will appear on the Georgia Ballot!

You can view the Gory Details here:

Bid to Remove President Obama from 2012 Georgia ballot

And in a related story:

Texas redistricting case hits U.S. Supreme Court on Monday

Wall Street Declares War on America (Yes, this constitutes Conspiracy!)

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan Admits Cities Coordinated Crackdown on Occupy Movement

Embattled Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, speaking in an interview with the BBC (excerpted on The Takeaway radio program–audio of Quan starts at the 5:30 mark), casually mentioned that she was on a conference call with leaders of 18 US cities shortly before a wave of raids broke up Occupy Wall Street encampments across the country. “I was recently on a conference call with 18 cities across the country who had the same situation. . . .”

Mayor Quan then rambles about how she “spoke with protestors in my city” who professed an interest in “separating from anarchists,” implying that her police action was helping this somehow.

Interestingly, Quan then essentially advocates that occupiers move to private spaces, and specifically cites Zuccotti Park as an example:

In New York City, it’s interesting that the Wall Street movement is actually on a private park, so they’re not, again, in the public domain, and they’re not infringing on the public’s right to use a public park.

Many witnesses to the wave of government crackdowns on numerous #occupy encampments have been wondering aloud if the rapid succession was more than a coincidence; Jean Quan’s casual remark seems to clearly imply that it was.

Might it also be more than a coincidence that this succession of police raids started after President Obama left the US for an extended tour of the Pacific Rim?

Occupy Oakland

Apparently, Wall Street doesn’t believe in the First Amendment right to Freedom of Association:

In a side note: apparently the police tried to claim that it was protesters throwing tear gas grenades. They’re not even good liars.

Also, my nephew went there to observe the event. Good thing he went at the wrong time.

IP Address Hijacking

A couple of years ago, I was watching some streaming video (I forget what it was exactly, probably something like the Daily Show or a music video). Suddenly, the connection slowed to a complete crawl. I looked out my window at the street, and saw a guy sitting there in his car, typing on a laptop. The wireless connection belonged to my roommate, and he either didn’t know how, or was to lazy to set any security on the connection. The guy was obviously poaching off our wireless connection, and since I was paying for my share of the wireless, and this guy was obviously affecting my download, I went out to his car and approached him. At first, he took offense, claiming the airwaves were free. But I mentioned that I was, in fact, paying for the connection, so it obviously wasn’t free. And then I started muttering darkly about theft of signal (something about which I still don’t know the first thing about), and told him I was on my way to discuss this matter with the local gendarmes. He took off.

(Having poached many such connections I felt like such a hypocrite, but I was trying to stream some video, and he was fucking up my signal. Oh well…)

I didn’t think about it at the time, but there was a larger issue involved that I didn’t even realize until I read this:

Laws on proving identities online remain murky

James Temple
Sunday, July 24, 2011

This column recently explored the predicament of Jane, the local grandmother who says a law firm is pressuring her to pay $3,400 to settle accusations that she illegally downloaded pornography.

Her case and at least tens of thousands of others instigated by adult and mainstream media companies are all based on what an Internet protocol [IP] address, the string of numbers an Internet service provider assigns an account, is purportedly seen doing online. Meanwhile, major ISPs recently agreed to scold and even penalize customers when media companies say their account was spotted accessing unauthorized content, a policy that could affect far more Internet users.

All of which raises an important question of the digital age: Are you your IP address? Are you culpable for anything and everything that those numbers are witnessed doing online?

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/07/23/BUKQ1KDU1K.DTL#ixzz1T3qDBfVk

When terrorists aren’t Jihadists: The Media Reaction

From Atlantic

Yesterday’s first reports on the massacre in Norway suggested that there was a link between the horrific attacks, which left 92 dead at latest reports, and Muslim extremists. Only later was the news released that the suspect taken by police, Anders Behring Breivik, was apparently a conservative, right-wing Christian with strong anti-Muslim and anti-immigration beliefs. Many in the media were left reeling over the fact that others were so quick to report and comment that Muslims were involved, before there was clear evidence. Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper The Sun had as a headline on the front page, “Al Qaeda Massacre: Norway’s 9/11.” The Wall Street Journal posted an editorial on the bombings that begins with references to Islam. It starts:

When cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad appeared in a Danish newspaper in the fall of 2005 and sparked a full-blown jihadist campaign against Denmark, then-Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen responded with a telling remark. “We Danes feel like we have been placed in a scene in the wrong movie,” he told the German newsweekly Der Spiegel.”

Joe Weisenthal, deputy editor of Business Insider, tweeted: “It is pretty bewildering that the first 3 paragraphs of this WSJ editorial on Norway are about Al-Qaeda/Islam.”

The most controversial piece, however, seems to be an editorial at The Washington Post by “Right Turn” columnist Jennifer Rubin, who quoted the Weekly Standard that:

We don’t know if al Qaeda was directly responsible for today’s events, but in all likelihood the attack was launched by part of the jihadist hydra. Prominent jihadists have already claimed online that the attack is payback for Norway’s involvement in the war in Afghanistan.

The editorial remains up on the Post, “sixteen hours after its claims were shown to be false and hysterical, it’s still there, with no correction or apology,” according to James Fallows at The Atlantic. Fallows responded to Rubin’s piece, in a blog post titled, “The Washington Post Owes the World an Apology for this Item,” writing that:

No, this is a sobering reminder for those who think it’s too tedious to reserve judgment about horrifying events rather than instantly turning them into talking points for pre-conceived views. On a per capita basis, Norway lost twice as many people today as the U.S. did on 9/11.

Glenn Greenwald writes:

Al Qaeda is always to blame, even when it isn’t, even when it’s allegedly the work of a Nordic, Muslim-hating, right-wing European nationalist… we’ve seen repeatedly: that Terrorism has no objective meaning and, at least in American political discourse, has come functionally to mean: violence committed by Muslims whom the West dislikes, no matter the cause or the target. Indeed, in many (though not all) media circles, discussion of the Oslo attack quickly morphed from this is Terrorism (when it was believed Muslims did it) to no, this isn’t Terrorism, just extremism (once it became likely that Muslims didn’t).

Ibrahim Hewitt writes an editoral at Al-Jazeera, where he observes that once media outlets noted that the suspect was not Muslim, they disassociated connections between the suspect’s beliefs and his alleged violent actions.

…the perpetrator was a “blond, blue-eyed Norwegian” with “political traits towards the right, and anti-Muslim views.” Not surprisingly, the man’s intentions were neither linked to these “traits,” nor to his postings on “websites with Christian fundamentalist tendencies.” Any influence “remains to be seen”; echoes of Oklahoma 1995. Interestingly, this criminal is described by one unnamed Norwegian official as a “madman.”

…Anyone who claims therefore, that the perpetrator’s “right-wing traits” and “anti-Muslim views,” or even links with “Christian fundamentalist” websites are irrelevant is trying to draw a veil over the unacceptable truths of such “traits” and expecting us to believe that right-wing ideology is incapable of prompting someone towards such criminality.

The right-wing, anti-government mindset attributed to the Norwegian rampage suspect has observers recalling US extremist Timothy McVeigh – behind the devastating Oklahoma City bombing which killed 168 people, including 19 children, and injured more than 800.

McVeigh, then just 26, blew up a van he had packed with explosives and parked outside a large federal building in the Oklahoman state capital, on April 19, 1995.

The blast was the deadliest ever domestic attack in US history, and brought into sharp focus the threat of homegrown terrorism.

Arrested shortly afterwards, McVeigh, a Gulf War veteran, was found to have been a figure in neo-Nazi groups and even claimed to have acted for the “common good” of Americans, as he railed against what he thought was the dictatorship of the federal government. (sound like tea party rhetoric?)