DEFENDERS OF the American surveillance state have a simple response to the criticisms they’ve faced in the wake of revelations about the National Security Agency’s (NSA) lying and spying: You should be happy we’ve violated your rights because the world is a safer place for it.

 … The Democratic White House has already distinguished itself as the most aggressive administration in history in its pursuit of government officials who turn to the press to expose corruption or lawbreaking. Before 2009, the Espionage Act of 1917 had only been used three times in the previous century to prosecute government officials accused of leaking classified information. The Obama administration has used it six times—so far.

 … THE idea that all this surveillance is directed at “preventing terrorism” is itself a deception. Writing in the Guardian, Nafeez Ahmed reports:

Since the 2008 economic crash, security agencies have increasingly spied on political activists, especially environmental groups, on behalf of corporate interests. This activity is linked to the last decade of U.S. defense planning, which has been increasingly concerned by the risk of civil unrest at home triggered by catastrophic events linked to climate change, energy shocks or economic crisis—or all three.

Ahmed cites several military strategy documents, including a report by the U.S. Army’s Strategic Studies Institute that states:

DoD [Department of Defense] might be forced by circumstances to put its broad resources at the disposal of civil authorities to contain and reverse violent threats to domestic tranquility. Under the most extreme circumstances, this might include use of military force against hostile groups inside the United States. Further, DoD would be, by necessity, an essential enabling hub for the continuity of political authority in a multi-state or nationwide civil conflict or disturbance.

In fact, the Department of Homeland Security is already working with local law enforcement agencies on pre-emptive efforts to derail “civil disturbances”—even in the case of nonviolent, legal protest. Despite the denials of intelligence officials, this is an essential component—rather than an inadvertent consequence—of the U.S. surveillance apparatus.

If you’re in the Boston area. This Sunday, June 23rd, 2pm @ Harvard Square.

Solidarity with the uprising in Brazil!

PLEASE CLICK THROUGH TO WATCH THIS VIDEO!

11 June 2013. This is Erdogan’s version of “democracy” in Turkey. Mass round-up and arrests of lawyers and civil servants.

Why doesn’t Obama call for sanctions on his friend Erdogan; or, at the very least, stop allowing him to buy tear gas and other weapons of repression from US-based arms manufacturers?

http://www.milliyet.tv/video-izle/Caglayan-Adliyesi-nde-polis-mudahalesi-nYPunUty07q4.html

Fighting for liberty in Turkey.

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(Reuters) - One of Turkey’s main public sector labor unions said it would call a general strike for Monday after riot police stormed an Istanbul park, firing tear gas and percussion bombs to evict hundreds of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday.

“We had already taken a decision to go on strike if there was an intervention on the park. So tomorrow we will declare a strike for Monday,” said Mustafa Turgut, spokesman of the Public Workers Unions Confederation (KESK), which has some 240,000 members in 11 unions.

A second union grouping, the Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions (DISK), was holding an emergency meeting on whether to also call a strike, a DISK official told Reuters.

(Photo: Police use teargas to clear thousands of protesters from Taksim Square).

Turkish Leader Offers Referendum on Park at Center of Protests | NYTimes

ISTANBUL — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan offered on Wednesday to hold a referendum to decide the fate of the park in central Istanbul that has become the locus of protests against his government and presented him with the most serious challenge he has faced in his decade in power.

But even as Mr. Erdogan seemed to indicate an attempt at compromise with the referendum offer, he coupled it with tougher language, saying that he ordered his interior minister on Wednesday to end all antigovernment protests within 24 hours.

The referendum was proposed after Mr. Erdogan met with a group of protesters in Ankara, the capital. It was the latest move in a seemingly confused strategy by the prime minister to resolve the crisis over Gezi Park in Taksim Square, with measures that included blaming a roster of supposed scapegoats, including the international news media, foreign financial interests and terrorists.

As Mr. Erdogan’s beleaguered government made its latest offer, thousands of protesters returned to the square after the riot police dispersed crowds Tuesday night and Wednesday morning with tear gas and water cannons.

In Gezi Park, which protesters are campaigning to save in the face of government plans to raze it and build a mall designed like an Ottoman-era army barracks, protesters on Wednesday night were girding for a police raid that they expected to come either overnight or Thursday morning. Many were skeptical of the government’s plan to hold a referendum, and some said it was not a suitable solution.

“They first tell us to go home, and then they present the idea of the referendum?” asked Bora Ekrem, 24, a student. “How can we trust them? If they were sincere about a vote, they would not ask us to leave the park. We will not leave until they declare the park is ours.”

The referendum was also seen as an attempt by the government to confine the antigovernment protests to the debate about the park, when the park controversy was in fact the catalyst for a broader outburst of civil unrest against what many Turks see as the increasing authoritarianism of Mr. Erdogan and his governing Justice and Development Party.

“A referendum would be a step forward, and I think we could win,” said another protester, Zeynep Pinto, 28, an interior designer. “But we want more than the park now. We want change.”

With yesterday’s illegal arrest of dozens of lawyers, the Turkish authorities have managed to antagonize yet another part of the population. Thousands of lawyers and supporters march in Istanbul and Ankara today.

Photo shows Istanbul this morning (12 June 2013), outside the Çağlayan courthouse.

My good friend breaks it down in his latest article for the Rainbow Times.

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On May 16^th it was announced that Mayor Thomas Menino had been elected Grand Marshall for the 2013 Boston Pride Parade. Boston Pride described its decision in these words: “A national leader on neighborhood issues and as a strong ally to the LGBT community, Mayor Menino believes that government is about helping people … he has spent a lifetime building a better Boston for residents and businesses. Mayor Menino has always served as a strong advocate and supporter for Boston’s LGBT community.”

When I heard the news of Pride’s Grand Marshal elections I was disappointed. On top of San Francisco Pride’s decision to rescind the naming of Bradley Manning as a Grand Marshal, it feels like Pride has taken another step away from what the first Gay Freedom Day Marches back in 1970 were all about. What began as protests for sexual and gender liberation, an end to war and militarism, and solidarity with all struggles of the oppressed seems to have become street parades, sponsored by corporate sponsors, that are more concerned with courting the respect of the political establishment rather then challenging it.

 … let’s not forget how Mayor Menino responded to Boston’s Occupy movement—a struggle that sought to highlight the economic injustices caused by Corporate America and Wall Street and provide a space for the “99%” to do something about it. He gave the order for brutal police repression. Menino had these words to justify his decision to forcibly shut down the Occupy Boston encampment, “We will tolerate demonstrations, we will tolerate expressions of free speech, but when it comes to civil disobedience we have a real issue with that … Civil disobedience doesn’t work for Boston; it doesn’t work for anyone.”

Quite a bizarre statement coming from someone who is supposed to be an advocate for LGBT equality, considering that civil disobedience has been a staple form of protest for affecting social change for our community; from the rebellion of Stonewall, to the die-ins of ACT UP and Queer Nation, to recent protests for the repeal of Prop 8 and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. The Occupy movement not only employed the tactics of queer movements past, it involved many LGBTQ folks, and focused on economic issues which directly effect working class queers; home foreclosures, unemployment, student debt, and growing class inequality.

Menino’s repression of the Occupy movement and his support for racist policies should be important factors in how we evaluate him as an advocate and ally for the LGBTQ community. Equality for LGBTQ people means little if it doesn’t include social and economic justice for all of our community, including undocumented immigrants, communities of color, working class families and the poor. If we broaden our scope of social justice and equality and focus on the contributions of activists, not just politicians, it becomes clear that there are plenty of people who are more far deserving of recognition for their contributions to the LGBTQ community and its long struggle for justice then another straight, white, cysgender man. Boston Pride deserves a better Grand Marshal than Mayor Thomas Menino.

*Keegan O’Brien is a long time LGBTQ youth activist in Boston, anti-war organizer, a student at UMass Boston, a former board member of BAGLY, and member of the International Socialist Organization in Boston. He also has written extensively on LGBTQ social justice websites.

via a friend:

Amazing video of disabled protestor in Ankara, Turkey, singlehandedly pushing back a police vehicle, (the ones with the water cannons), the reciprocal solidarity of a nondisabled crowd of fellow protesters, finally forcing the police to retreat. All the accumulated hope, strength and beauty of a new society crystallized here. Watch and share. #festivaloftheoppressed

Istanbul (CNN) — Trade unions claiming 240,000 members are throwing their weight behind anti-government demonstrations across Turkey.

The KESK confederation of public sector workers was calling a two-day strike starting Tuesday to protest what it called the “fascism” of the governing party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has become one of the focal points of demonstrators’ anger.

They have united demonstrators from across the political spectrum against a common foe: security forces who unleashed tear gas and water cannon on them in response to what had been largely peaceful protests against Erdogan’s government.

Richard Seymour analyzes the issues involved in an Occupy-style revolt in Turkey.

 … Under the AKP [ruling party], Turkey has been increasing its relative autonomy from traditional supporters in the White House and Tel Aviv, forging close relations with Iran, Hezbollah and even—until recently—President Bashar al-Assad of Syria. This has been interpreted, hysterically, as “neo-Ottomanism.” It is simply an assertion of Turkey’s new power.

Thus strengthened, the government is on the offensive. It has never needed the left or the labor movement, which it has repressed. It no longer needs the liberals, as its attacks on women’s reproductive rights and its imposition of alcohol-free zones show.

This is the context in which a struggle over a small park in a congested city center has become an emergency for the regime, and the basis for a potential Turkish spring.

This is why I did not cheer in the streets for the Boston police after they captured the Marathon bombing suspect. Rather than keeping people safe, they have been spending the past few years spying on and arresting social justice activists around the city …

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In the fall of 2011, a key Boston police counterterror intelligence unit — funded with millions of dollars in U.S. homeland security grants — was closely monitoring anti-Wall Street demonstrations, including tracking the Facebook pages and websites of the protesters and writing reports on the potential impact on “commercial and financial sector assets” in downtown areas, according to internal police documents.

The police monitoring of the activities of Occupy Boston — an off-shoot of the Occupy Wall Street protests that swept the country in 2011 — came during a period after the U.S. government received the second of two warnings from the Russian government about the radical Islamic ties of alleged Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

Occupy Boston steps up for peace in the face of horrific violence.

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The pain we feel for those impacted by yesterday’s tragedy is matched only by the love we feel for our city and for humankind.

Let’s come together tonight to send a message:

Peace, Here and Everywhere.

6-8pm
Parkman Bandstand
Boston Common

Bring candles, flowers, banners, song lyrics — whatever feels right for you. There will be no agenda, no speakers, and no nonsense.

Let’s make space to grieve and to reject violence in all its forms. Together, we can look violence in the eye, and we can respond with peace. We can respond with love. We can respond with community.

Boston, we love you. We thought you should know.

Don’t listen to US authorities trash Chavez. They shouldn’t lecture anyone about freedom of press and dissent.

“Hugo Chavez declared the oil belonged to the people. He used the oil money to eliminate 75% of extreme poverty, provide free health and education for all. That made him dangerous. The Bush administration approved of a coup to overthrow him even though he was a democratically-elected President.” - Michael Moore

a friend writes: “I have a very specific space/building in mind that we can occupy to kickstart a new women’s movement. Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer just purpose-built a fully staffed private nursery next to her office for one child: her son. This she did right after she banned all women workers at Yahoo from working from home. We should take all our kids—every drippy nosed, bacteria germinating one of them— then ask all the Yahoo employees to bring *their* kids, and camp out at Ms. Meyer’s special nursery. Her company is worth $20 billion, surely she can afford to put up with us for a few—erm—months, till all her employees get similar access to round the clock child care?”