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Chinese Frogs Leap Into Tibet: Populace Flees the Hopping Hans!

China is the biggest Big Brother on the planet, no doubt about it.  Below are two views about development in Tibet and who will benefit. These reports try to walk the tightrope between reporting as the politburo wants it, and reporting facts for the real world.  First, the NY Times interpretation of this special new strategy:

China Seeks Stability in Tibet via Development
By EDWARD WONG Published: January 23, 2010
BEIJING — China’s top leaders laid out a strategy last week for bringing “leapfrog development and lasting stability” to the Tibetan regions, the state news agency reported late Friday.
President Hu Jintao and other leaders at a Tibet planning conference decided that “more efforts must be made to greatly improve living standards of the people in Tibet, as well as ethnic unity and stability,” the Xinhua news agency reported.
President Hu Jintao and other leaders at a Tibet planning conference decided that “more efforts must be made to greatly improve living standards of the people in Tibet, as well as ethnic unity and stability,” the Xinhua news agency reported.
The emphasis on economic development indicates that Chinese leaders still see the solution to the problem of Tibet as one of supplying creature comforts. If the region can develop fast enough, the reasoning goes, then Tibetans will buy into Chinese rule[...] [Anybody know anything about Tibetan Buddhism?  Like the concept of non-attachment?  Will somebody please let Hu Jintao know you can't FORCE people to be materialistic when their heritage views material success as illusion?]
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/world/asia/24china.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

Now here's the report as presented by the Xinhua News Agency.  Watch the painful effort to put a smiley face on everything:

China to achieve leapfrog development, lasting stability in Tibet
Editor: Mu Xuequan
BEIJING, Jan. 22 (Xinhua) -- China has made plans to achieve leapfrog development and lasting stability in Tibet Autonomous Region in a bid to ensure China's development as a whole, according to a high-level meeting held here this week.
Chinese President Hu Jintao and other senior leaders attending the fifth meeting on the work of Tibet, from Jan. 18 to 20, agreed that more efforts must be made to greatly improve living standards of the people in Tibet, as well as ethnic unity and stability.
[…]  During the meeting, senior leaders also meted out plans to develop Tibetan-inhabited areas in Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai.
The Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee's policies towards Tibet in the new era were totally correct, suiting to national condition, Tibet's actual conditions and the fundamental interests of people of all ethnic groups in Tibet. [sic]  [I’m thinking this is a sneaky way of saying, “Yeah, this is great but only if the Tibetans want your so-called stability“.]
[…]  While vowing to take substantial measures to ensure "normal order of Tibetan Buddhism", Hu said the awareness of being part of the Chinese nation and being law-abiding citizens [my bold] must be constantly enhanced among cadre and the masses in Tibet.  [We all know that being “law-abiding citizens” can mean something different to people under the boot of an oppressive regime, no matter how many times they use the word “people” in their official titles & proclamations.]
[…]  He stressed Tibet's significance in ensuring China's national security, and efforts in building the region into a strategic reserve of natural resources, an agricultural production base, a land with unique culture and a world-class tourism destination.
[…]  Speaking of education, he said free education would be offered for all the children of farmers and herdsmen in primary schools and junior and senior high schools.  [Will Tibetan children now be educated in the Tibetan language or Mandarin?  I think I know the answer!]
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/world/asia/24china.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

I'm not just preoccupied with a free Tibet because it is a just cause or because I am a Buddhist.  Our economy has essentially collapsed and China owns us.  It's just a matter of time before the Han government insinuates itself into all aspects of American life, free speech and all.  But if you think the powers that be are going to leave the USA alone, letting us live our own lives the way we choose, I have a bridge to sell you.

International Peace Day Candle Action, 9/21

Candle for Tibet on
International Peace Day

Sunday, 21 September 2008

We will light candles and pray for peace and freedom to the people of Tibet.
We will do it at home, with friends or combined with other peace activities we plan for Peace Day.
PLEASE INVITE ALL YOUR FRIENDS

http://candle4tibet.ning.com/

Preemptive Strike on the First Amendment

Sticks & stones may break my bones but urine is WAAAAAAAAAY over the line! It's all too ridiculously predictable, like a terrible movie. Don't you wish we change the ending?

Storm Troopers at the RNC

By Ray McGovern
September 8, 2008

[...] When I flew into St. Paul on the evening of Aug. 30, I encountered a din in local media about “preemptive strikes” on those already congregating there to demonstrate against the Iraq war and injustice against the poor in our country.

St. Paul’s Pioneer Press expressed surprise that “despite preemptive police searches” and arrests, a group calling itself “the RNC Welcoming Committee” was still intent on “disrupting the convention.”

[...] Ironically, it was FBI Special Agent Coleen Rowley, living in the St. Paul area, who served warning of precisely that in her hard-hitting Feb. 26, 2003, letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller, three weeks before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. [NYT, March 6, 2003]

Confronting Mueller on a number of key issues (like “What is the FBI’s evidence with respect to the claimed connection between al-Qaeda and Iraq?”), Rowley warned of the trickle-down effect of “the administration’s new policy of ‘preemptive strikes’”:

“I believe it would be prudent to be on guard against the possibility that the looser ‘preemptive strike’ rationale being applied to situations abroad could migrate back home, fostering a more permissive attitude on the part of law enforcement officers in this country.”

Rowley called Mueller’s attention to the abuses of civil rights that had already occurred since 9/11, and pointedly warned “particular vigilance may be required to head off undue pressure (including subtle encouragement) to detain or ‘round up’ suspects.”

[...] The “preemption” began on Friday, Aug. 29, well before the RNC began on Monday, Sept. 1.

An academic doing research on social movement organizations, who for several months has been observing the main protesters — the RNC Welcoming Committee, the Coalition to March on the RNC and End the War, and the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign — provided this account:

“On Friday evening the space in St. Paul that was being rented by the Welcoming Committee was raided by riot police, who knocked in the door with automatic weapons drawn, forced the 60-70 activists inside onto the floor, handcuffed them, then proceeded to confiscate all the banner-making supplies and movement literature. [Is this how a democratic country treats its citizens?]

“Over the course of several hours the cops interrogated, photographed, ran warrant checks, and eventually, released everyone one by one. Then they closed down the space for a code violation. The next morning a city code inspector arrived and found no basis for closing the space.

“Saturday morning was one of escalation and terror. The Ramsey County Sheriff Department, together with the St. Paul police, Homeland Security, and the FBI raided four private houses. At 8:00 AM, dozens of cops in SWAT gear broke down the door of one house where about a dozen activists were staying. They were awakened with rifle barrels in their faces and forced to lie face down for more than an hour. [my bold]

“The cops stole all the computers and other electronic devices in the house, and core members of the Welcoming Committee sleeping there were arrested. It being a holiday weekend, those arrested for alleged crimes could not arrive in court until Wednesday, at the earliest. Thus, those trying to organize demonstrations will be in jail for the entire time the RNC is going on. Four other houses were raided and dozens of activists were detained.”

The academic who wrote the report appealed to those concerned over “this enormous police over-kill” to contact the Twin Cities’ mayors and demand an end to the “witch hunt.”

He added, “The people who were arrested were some of the gentlest, most dedicated activists I’ve ever met.” A far cry from the “criminal enterprise” described by notorious Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher.[...]

[... St. Paul City Councilman Dave] Thune objected in particular to Fletcher’s deputies using battering rams to knock down doors, then entering with guns drawn, and forcing people to the ground, [my bold] as they did on Friday night.

[...] On the fringes there was some property damage and further arrests. What violence there was bore the earmarks of provocation by the likes of Sheriff Fletcher and his Homeland Security, FBI, and, according to one well-sourced report, Blackwater buddies.

That’s right. Agent provocateurs.

Primary targets of the repression were the alternative media, [my bold] including any and all those who might have a camera to record the brutality — as was successfully done at the RNC in New York four years ago.

The manner in which Amy Goodman and the two producers of “Democracy Now!” were deliberately mistreated was clearly to serve as a warning that the rules had gone up in smoke — the First Amendment be damned.

[...] I observed no violence at all; yet, the police/FBI/national guard/and who-knows-who-else decided they needed to clear the streets. My friends and I narrowly escaped being tear-gassed, pepper-sprayed, or worse. It was an overwhelming show of force — not to protect, but to intimidate.

[...] After the widespread kidnapping, torture, indefinite imprisonment, and our cowardly Congress’ empowerment of the president to imprison sine die anyone he might designate an “enemy combatant” — after all that...well, it seems to me that reading a person his/her rights takes on more, not less, importance.

Not to mention the massive repression then under way right outside the convention hall.

[...] The young protesters had some success in exposing infiltrators in their ranks. During confrontations, members of the Welcoming Committee, in particular, took copious photos of law enforcement officers and then memorized the faces. [my bold]

This tactic worked like a charm in one of the St. Paul parks, when a man who looked like a protester — dark clothes, backpack, a bit disheveled — walked by.

One of the protesters recognized the man’s face and searched through her camera until she found a photo of the man actually performing the raid on the Welcoming Committee’s headquarters on Friday night.

The young protesters asked the man, and two associates, to leave the park, at which point the three hustled into a nearby unmarked sedan.

The license plate, observed by a Pioneer Press reporter, traced back to the detective unit of the Hennepin County sheriff’s office, according to the county’s Central Mobile Equipment Division.

Protesters later picked two other men out of the day’s planned march — one because he was wearing brand-new tennis shoes. [Ah! The shoes always give cops away. Or jeans that look ironed.] The two left without indicating whether they were with the organs of public safety.[...]

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. He is a member of the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/090808a.html
Hey, kids, special treat! They took everything but the kitchen sink. Read it yourself and believe it or not.
Police document

Warrant for Minneapolis raid

Amy Goodman Arrested at RNC

There is no way these police actions are legal. They seem to be on a wilding as they storm through houses looking for ... leaflets? Among the victims, Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow! and you can see the brief video below:

ST. PAUL, MN—Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman was unlawfully arrested in downtown St.
Paul, Minnesota at approximately 5 p.m. local time. Police violently manhandled Goodman, yanking her arm, as they arrested her. Video of her arrest can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYjyvkR0bGQ
Goodman was arrested while attempting to free two Democracy Now! producers who were being unlawfully detained. They are Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar. Kouddous and Salazar were arrested while they carried out their journalistic duties in covering street demonstrations at the Republican National Convention. Goodman's crime appears to have been defending her colleagues and the freedom of the press.
Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher told Democracy Now! that Kouddous and Salazar were being arrested on suspicion of rioting. They are currently being held at the Ramsey County jail in St. Paul.
Democracy Now! is calling on all journalists and concerned citizens to call the office of Mayor Chris Coleman and the Ramsey County Jail and demand the immediate release of Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar. These calls can be directed to:
Chris Rider from Mayor Coleman's office at 651-266-8535 and the Ramsey County Jail at 651-266-9350 (press extension 0).
Democracy Now! stands by Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar and condemns this action by Twin Cities law enforcement as a clear violation of the freedom of the press and the First Amendment rights of these journalists.
During the demonstration in which they were arrested law enforcement officers used pepper spray, rubber bullets, concussion grenades and excessive force. Several dozen others were also arrested during this action.
Amy Goodman is one of the most well-known and well-respected journalists in the United States. She has received journalism's top honors for her reporting and has a distinguished reputation of bravery and courage. The arrest of Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar is a transparent attempt to intimidate journalists from the nation's leading independent news outlet.
Democracy Now! is a nationally syndicated public TV and radio program that airs on over 700 radio and TV stations across the US and the globe.
Video of Amy Goodman's arrest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYjyvkR0bGQ

Amy Doing Her Job

Here's Amy on the job. You can view Amy Goodman in the upper left of the video, with grey streaks in her hair. The man being interviewed was cuffed, arrested and prevented from leaving his own house while the cops searched his computer and went through anything they wanted.
St. Paul resident describes RNC security force raid on his house.

iWitness Video Among Many RNC Arrests

Here is the iWitness Video home page:
http://iwitnessvideo.info/index.html
Amy Goodman makes a brief appearance and can be heard telling a cop: "Don't touch me!" Here's local news coverage of the arrests:
'Pre-Crime' Arrests and Detentions in St. Paul-Minneapolis

Tibetan Filmmaker Imprisoned Before Olympics is Still Missing in China

Tibetan filmmaker Dhondup Wangchen and his cameraman Golog Jigme have been in prison somewhere in China for who knows why and who knows how long. His film, Leaving Fear Behind can and should be seen at www.leavingfearbehind.com. His mission (crime?) was to interview Tibetans on their thoughts about the Olympics. His timing was amazing, because he wrapped up just before the March 10 uprising. Although created just a few short months ago, this story would be poignant if the truth weren't so horrific. Here's info about their plight, then the update on the release.
All stills are from Leaving Fear Behind. Here is Dhondup Wangchen, the director.
Wife of arrested Tibetan Filmmaker Dhondup Wangchen appeals to IOC President Jacques Rogge
NOC Tibet[Monday, August 25, 2008 09:56]
London/Beijing, August 24 - A letter was sent today to International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge asking once more for his support to free Dhondup Wangchen and Golog Jigme, the two Tibetan filmmakers who made the documentary film "Leaving fear Behind" *. Thousands of people around the world have joined this appeal. So far, there has been no response by the IOC concerning this matter.
Lhamo-Tso, wife of Dhondup Wangchen, appealed to Rogge to help her to free her husband. Dhondup Wangchen was arrested with his friend Golog Jigme in March 2008 for filming a documentary that contains critical remarks about the Olympics and Chinese rule in Tibet.
About the film: "Leaving Fear Behind" (www.leavingfearbehind.com) is a 25 minute documentary made by a Tibetan filmmaker inside Tibet. The self-taught filmmmaker, Dhondup Wangchen, and his monk cameraman, Golog Jigme, filmed testimonies of a range of people in Eastern Tibet, about their views on the Dalai Lama, the Beijing Olympics and Chinese rule. Each interviewee knew the risks they were taking in being filmed but were adamant that their faces be shown. Dhondup Wangchen managed to send his footage out of Tibet but was subsequently arrested. Both he and his cameraman are currently in Chinese custody.
Contact: Dechen Pemba, for Filming for Tibet: +44 778 482 3907
* The full text of Lhamo-Tso's letter reads:
Dear Mr. Rogge:
My name is Lhamotso and I am the wife of Dhondup Wangchen. It is with desperation and sorrow over the fate of my husband and Golog Jigme, who has been detained by Chinese authorities since March 2008. Their crime was to film Tibetans’ peaceful expression of their views on the XXIX Olympic Games.
My husband, Dhondup Wangchen, from Hualong, Haidong (Qinghai) was detained by authorities on or about March 26, 2008. He was held in Ershilipu Detention Center in Xining (Qinghai), and was last seen in Guangsheng Binguan on or about July 12, 2008.
Dhondup Wangchen spent most of his time helping the needy and serving the community. He’s a very good husband and also a good father to our four children. I appeal to the Chinese Government to release Dhondup. I urge you and the IOC to use your influence on China so that the host of the Olympic Games remains true to its promises of freedom of expression to the people.
Tomorrow, the Games in Beijing will be over, the people from all over the world will return home taking away the spot light from China. I beg you on behalf of my children and Dhondup’s family to use the last day and opportunity to speak out on behalf of my husband.
Lhamotso
Dhondup Wangchen in Leaving Fear Behind
http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id=22618
You can take action by writing letters via the following:
http://leavingfearbehind.com/take-action.html
Contact the IOC
CLICK HERE FOR A SAMPLE LETTER
President of the IOC
Jacques Rogge
Chateau de Vidy
Lausanne, 1003
Switzerland
Email: jacques.rogge@ioc.olympic.org
Phone 1: +41 21 621 67 46 (w) Phone 2: +41 79 43 31 022 (cell)
Fax: +41 21 621 63 53
Contact the Chinese government:
CLICK HERE FOR A SAMPLE LETTER
President of the People’s Republic of China
Hu Jintao Guojia Zhuxi
The State Council General Office
2 Fuyoujie, Xichengqu
Beijingshi 100017
People’s Republic of China
[Salutation: Your Excellency]
Premier of the People’s Republic of China
Wen Jiabao
The State Council General Office
9 Xihuangcheng Genbeijie
Beijingshi 100032
People’s Republic of China
Email: gazette@mail.gov.cn
[Salutation: Dear Prime Minister]
Minister of Public Security of the People’s Republic of China
Meng Jiangzhu Buzhang
Gong’anbu
14 Dongchang’anjie
Dongchengqu, Beijingshi 100741
People’s Republic of China
Fax: 011 86 10 63099216
[Salutation: Your Excellency]
Send copies of your correspondence to the Chinese Embassy in your country.
CHINESE EMBASSIES:
http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/wjb/zwjg/2490/default.htm
Contact your embassy in China and ask them to express concern.
FOREIGN EMBASSIES IN CHINA:
http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/chn/lbfw/namelist/embassy%20list/
SUPPORT Filming for Tibet

Free the Bejing 6! Others Still Missing

Useless US bureaucrats wring their hands while who knows what is happening to our citizens!
US urges free speech after China detains
six foreigners
22 hours ago
BEIJING (AFP) — The United States called on China Thursday to allow peaceful protests, after Beijing police detained six foreigners amid a wave of demonstrations by pro-Tibet activists during the Olympics.
"We are concerned by recent reports that the Chinese have detained protesters," the embassy said in a statement.
"We call on China to respect the fundamental and universally recognised right of all persons to peacefully express their views, including Chinese citizens, and we urge the Chinese to put their best face forward during these Olympic Games."
The US statement came shortly after Beijing police said it had handed out 10-day detention terms to six foreigners believed by an overseas activist group to be pro-Tibet campaigners involved in Olympic protests this week.
In a brief faxed statement, the city police information department said "Thomas" and five other foreigners had been apprehended on Tuesday for "upsetting public order", without identifying the six people any further.
"Beijing police decided to give Thomas and the five others 10 days of administrative detention," the faxed statement said.
Administrative detention is a punishment that can be meted out by Chinese police without having to go through the courts.
A US embassy spokeswoman declined to comment on the report of the detention of the six and emphasised the statement was not in direct response to those cases.
But Students For a Free Tibet said it assumed the six were American pro-Tibet activists who police detained in Beijing on Tuesday.
"These young men were in Beijing to amplify Tibetan voices calling for freedom and human rights and the right of all people to freedom of expression," Students For a Free Tibet executive director Lhadon Tethong said.
"They are no more guilty of a crime than Tibetans or Chinese who speak out for justice.
"For the Chinese authorities to sentence them at all shows the government's paranoia and intolerance of even the most peaceful challenges to its control."
Students For a Free Tibet has orchestrated a series of protests in Beijing to coincide with the Olympics in an effort to highlight what it says is China's repressive 57-year rule of Tibet.
In comments published by French newspaper Le Monde on Thursday, exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama said more than 400 people had been killed since Chinese security forces cracked down on unrest in Tibet in March.
At least eight pro-Tibet protests have taken place in Beijing since early August to coincide with the Olympics, which end on Sunday.
Most of the previous protesters were deported from the country after being held by police for a short time, with a total of 10 foreign activists currently still believed in police custody.
Aside from the six Americans picked up on Tuesday, two other Americans, a Tibetan-German and a Briton have been missing since trying to stage a protest near the Olympic venues just after midnight on Thursday.
Among the six detained on Tuesday was James Powderly, an American artist who planned to project a giant laser beam onto a Beijing building with a message in support of a free Tibet.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jQq9z1M3x4oIQlFKsfPaHGx2qGvg

SFT’s Statement on the Sentencing
These individuals were in Beijing to amplify Tibetan voices calling for freedom and human rights and the right of all people to freedom of expression. They are no more guilty of a crime than Tibetans or Chinese who speak out for justice and for the Chinese authorities to sentence them at all shows the government’s paranoia and intolerance of even the most peaceful challenges to its control. (continues below…)
SFT WILL FIGHT THIS UNTIL THEY ARE HOME - MORE HERE SOON ON WHAT YOU CAN DO: Remember why they went, and keep in mind - Americans get 10 days jail, Chinese grannies get one year forced labor, and Tibetans get shot.

http://freetibet2008.org/globalactions/citizenjournalists/update0821/

NY Times Acknowledges Freedom is Squelched in China

Now you might think a blog called DisabilityNation would be biased toward two old ladies who are blind and need a cane. So ok, for a less, er, subjective report, the New York Times makes this story sound almost cute and normal. Note the lack of the words "freedom, liberty, dissent." Note the presence of the words "demonstrate, protest, disturbing public order". Maybe the NY Times doesn't see things so differently?
Too Old and Frail to Re-educate? Not in China
By ANDREW JACOBS
Published: August 20, 2008
BEIJING — In the annals of people who have struggled against Communist Party rule, Wu Dianyuan and Wang Xiuying are unlikely to merit even a footnote.
The two women, both in their late 70s, have never spoken out against China’s authoritarian government. Both walk with the help of a cane, and Ms. Wang is blind in one eye. Their grievance, receiving insufficient compensation when their homes were seized for redevelopment, [are you listening, Lower East Side?] is perhaps the most common complaint among Chinese displaced during the country’s long streak of fast economic growth.
But the Beijing police still sentenced the two women to an extrajudicial term of “re-education through labor” this week for applying [my bold] to hold a legal protest in a designated area in Beijing, where officials promised that Chinese could hold demonstrations during the Olympic Games.
They became the most recent examples of people punished for submitting applications to protest. A few would-be demonstrators have simply disappeared, [my bold] [yikes!] at least for the duration of the Games, squelching already diminished hopes that the influx of foreigners and the prestige of holding the Games would push China’s leaders to relax their tight grip on political expression.
“Can you imagine two old ladies in their 70s being re-educated through labor?” asked Li Xuehui, Ms. Wu’s son, who said the police told the two women that their sentence might remain in suspension if they stayed at home and stopped asking for permission to protest.
“I feel very sad and angry because we’re only asking for the basic right of living and it’s been six years, but nobody will do anything to help,” Mr. Li said.
[...] When the International Olympic Committee awarded the Games to Beijing in 2001, ignoring critics who said China should not be rewarded for repression, its president, Jacques Rogge, offered assurances that the Games would invariably spur China toward greater openness.
But prospects dimmed even before the opening ceremony, when overseas journalists arrived to discover that China’s promise to provide uncensored Internet access [my bold] was riddled with caveats. The ensuing uproar did persuade the government to unblock some politically sensitive Web sites, but many others, including those that discuss Tibet and the banned spiritual group Falun Gong, remain inaccessible at the Olympic press center.
[...] “In order to ensure smooth traffic flow, a nice environment and good social order, we will invite these participants to hold their demonstrations in designated places,” Liu Shaowu, the security director for Beijing’s Olympic organizing committee, said at a news conference. He described the creation of three so-called protest zones and suggested that a simple application process would provide Chinese citizens an avenue for free expression, a right that has long been enshrined in China’s Constitution but in reality is rarely granted.
But with four days left before the closing ceremony, the authorities acknowledge that they have yet to allow a single protest. They claim that most of the people who filed applications had their grievances addressed, obviating the need for a public expression of discontent.
Chinese activists say they are not surprised that the promise proved illusory. Li Fangping, a lawyer who has been arrested and beaten for his dogged representation of rights advocates, said there was no way the government would allow protesters to expose some of China’s most vexing problems, among them systemic corruption, environmental degradation and the forced relocation of hundreds of thousands of residents for projects related to the Olympics.
“For Chinese petitioners, if their protest applications were approved, it would lead to a chain reaction of others seeking to voice their problems as well,” Mr. Li said.
During the past two decades, China has embraced a market economy [my bold] and shed some of the more onerous restrictions that dictated where people could live, whom they could marry and whether they could leave the country. But with political dissent and religious freedom, the government has been unrelenting.
[...] In recent months, the pressure has only intensified: scores of rights lawyers and political dissenters have been detained, and even the armies of migrant workers who built the Olympic stadiums have been encouraged to leave town, lest their disheveled appearances detract from the image of a clean, modern nation. [my bold] [oh, please, I can’t S T A N D it!]
“When you have guests coming over for dinner, you clean up the house and tell the children not to argue,” Mr. Bell said.
While the demands of Ms. Wu, 79, and Ms. Wang, 77, the protest applicants, might be seen as harmless, they threatened to expose the systemic problems that bedevil the lives of millions of Chinese. Like many disenchanted citizens, the two women, former neighbors, were seeking to draw attention to a government-backed real estate deal that promised to give them apartments in the new development that replaced their homes not far from Tiananmen Square. Six years later, [9/11 First Responder Alert!] they are living in ramshackle apartments on the outskirts of the city, and their demands for compensation have gone unanswered.
On Monday, when they returned to the police station to follow up on their protest applications, the women were told they had been sentenced to one year at a labor camp for “disturbing public order.” For the moment, the women have been allowed to return to their homes, but they have been warned that they could be sent to a detention center at any moment, relatives said.
[...] At a news conference on Wednesday, Wang Wei, the vice president of Beijing’s Olympic organizing committee, was asked about the lack of protests. He said it showed the system was working. “I’m glad to hear that over 70 protest issues have been solved through consultation, dialogue,” he said. “This is a part of Chinese culture.”
But human rights advocates say that instead of pointing the way toward a more open society, the Olympics have put China’s political controls on display.
“Given this moment when the international spotlight is shining on China, when so much of the international media are in Beijing, it’s unfathomable why the authorities are intensifying social control,” said Sharon Hom, the executive director of Human Rights in China. “The truth is they’re sending a clear and disturbing message, one they’re not even trying to hide, which is we’re not even interested in hearing dissenting voices.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/sports/olympics/21protest.html?ex=1219896000&en=bbbd73a1742fcf00&ei=5070&emc=eta1

Olympian Ideals Support Tibet

China can’t block the music! If the bureaucrats think people won't buy this CD because THEY tell them not to, then they're going to be disappointed. Remember: use your freedom to help others without it. Peace can only exist when we are all free to express ourselves.
Over 40 Olympic athletes in Beijing download Tibet solidarity album 'Songs for Tibet'
International Campaign for Tibet and the Art of Peace Foundation
August 18th, 2008

Washington DC, (August 18, 2008) - The album 'Songs for Tibet: The Art of Peace,' a top-selling rock download in the US, Canada, several European countries and Japan - which reached #4 on the Billboard album download charts in its first week of sales - has been downloaded by more than 40 Olympic athletes competing at the Beijing Games. China's official media published a provocative online article that reported many "angry" Chinese 'netizens' are "denouncing" the project and that some have called for a boycott on companies that make the pro-peace album available for sale on the web, and a ban on those involved in making the album from entering China. Over a hundred download sites and on-line retailers sell the album worldwide. Twenty musicians contributed tracks, including Sting, Dave Matthews, Alanis Morissette, John Mayer and Moby. [my bold]
Michael Wohl, Executive Director of the Art of Peace Foundation which initiated the project, said today: "We are delighted that Olympics athletes took the opportunity to download this unique album, which conveys a message of hope and solidarity with the Tibetan people, as well as a commitment to freedom of expression that cannot be suppressed."
Over 40 Olympic athletes in North America, Europe and even Beijing contacted The Art of Peace Foundation by email and through the Foundation's website. Athletes downloaded the album as an act of solidarity with Tibet. International organizations including the International Campaign for Tibet, Students for a Free Tibet, and Team Darfur helped contact the athletes. Several of the athletes, who were assured anonymity, thanked the Art of Peace Foundation. In one case, an Olympian commended the Foundation's "efforts, music and passion for peace."
Following international media coverage of the album and its success, an article about the album - which referred to "angry netizens" who "are rallying together to denounce internet retailers that offer 'Songs for Tibet' for purchase" was published on two Chinese websites, china.org.cn - the authorized government portal site to China, managed by the Information Office of the State Council (http://www.china.org.cn/china/national/2008-08/08/content_16161481.htm) - and http://www.chinanews.com, a semi-official internet news portal which operates under close scrutiny and control of the Communist Party. This follows demonstrations by overseas Chinese against some companies (such as the French supermarket chain Carrefour) and broadcasters (CNN and the BBC) that have occurred since the international community has criticized China for its crackdown in Tibet, and in the buildup to the Olympics. The demonstrations and outpouring of Chinese nationalism, particularly linked to protests against Chinese government policies at the time of the Olympic torch relay, have been fueled by misinformation and propaganda from the Chinese authorities.
"The predictably hostile response to the album from Chinese internet users and an official website at this time reflects continued attempts to suppress any support for Tibet at a time of crisis for the Tibetan people, as well as the level of entrenched misinformation about Tibet propagated by the Beijing government among the Chinese public," said Kate Saunders from the International Campaign for Tibet, which is supporting the project.
The double album, 'Songs for Tibet' celebrates peace, the Dalai Lama and Tibet. Twenty artists, including Sting, Alanis Morissette, Dave Matthews, John Mayer and Moby contributed songs for the release.
Proceeds that the foundation receives will support initiatives for promoting peace and Tibetan cultural preservation projects. Details at http://www.artofpeacefoundation.org. The video for the album, 'Songs for Tibet - Freedom is Expression,' is available on YouTube. http://www.savetibet.org/

Sunday Sermon from Rev. Billy

Whisper in the American Ear: Resist Consumerism!

2008, the clock is ticking. Now, when American families momentarily break from the decades-long hypnosis of buying and debt, of toxic travel and the corporatizing of the unconscious. How do we whisper, Resist Consumerism!
American consumer confidence was supposed to finance an endless series of surges, of buy-outs, of epidemics. Now we've had a waking up. It's as if everyone in the country had a minor car accident, enough to walk away from the car shaking our head. We have a window of opportunity here. Resist Consumerism!
How to make a message as powerful as the Clash in 1979, or a Tibetan kid in a Chinese mall last March, make a whisper with a scream in it, "The ice is melting, the wheat is growing thin!" Resist Consumerism!
Just now, in 2008, when American families are sitting at tables and having a budget meeting for the first time. "Kids - what do we spend money on? Let's start this way. What is really necessary?" Resist Consumerism!
The whisper will not be televised. It might come from a neighbor nobody ever saw, who lost his job, and starts walking to town and back. One day he sees something and gets to work. Resist Consumerism! -- Rev
(Photo thanks to RoadsidePictures)

Burmese Rise Against Oppression

Arrests as Burma marks uprising
At least 20 people have been arrested in the Burmese town of Taunggok after staging a silent protest on the 20th anniversary of a major uprising.
They were detained after marching while wearing T-shirts which referred to the date of the uprising - "8/8/88".
Activists outside Burma are marking the anniversary with demonstrations.
The 1988 protests drew hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets, but ended with a violent clampdown and the deaths of at least 3,000 civilians.
The date 8 August 1988 was significant for the numerologically minded Burmese, and marked the start of six weeks of rallies against military rule.
[…] The BBC is banned from Burma - also known as Myanmar - but reports from opposition sources inside the country say at least 20 people were arrested in Taunggok, and that the number could be as high as 50.
[…] Three activists staging separate protests are said to have been detained in the vicinity of Rangoon.
In the city itself, opposition sources said they were concerned for the welfare of a young woman seen walking in the streets wearing a T-shirt bearing an image of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
There have been few such open signs of the significance of the date in Burma, with reports suggesting monks and laypeople met in private for secret ceremonies to remember those who died.
Nyan Win, a spokesman for Ms Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), told AFP news agency that the anniversary marked "an important historical turning point".
Until the 8/8/88 protests, Ms Suu Kyi was only known as the daughter of liberation hero Aung San, but her speech to the assembled protesters during the rallies propelled her to the centre of the pro-democracy movement.
Anti-China protests
Elsewhere in Asia, human rights groups and activists who fled in the aftermath of the 1988 protests held demonstrations outside Burmese and Chinese embassies.
"We are here because China is the main supporter of the military regime," Kyaw Lin Oo, a Burmese activist, told reporters outside the Chinese embassy in Bangkok.
"We want the Chinese government to understand the actual cost of their support to the people inside of Burma," he added.
Anti-junta protests also took place in Manila, Tokyo, and Delhi, and protesters joined wider demonstrations to mark the start of the Olympics in London, Brussels, Berlin and Hong Kong.
"As the world celebrates the opening of the Beijing Olympics, people should pause to remember the atrocities in Burma 20 years ago," said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights

Watch.[…]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7548770.stm

Burma, 8/8/88

Goodbye "Inalienable Rights"

Gitmo 'Justice' for US Citizens?
By Robert Parry
July 21, 2008
A conservative-dominated U.S. Appeals Court has opened the door for President George W. Bush or a successor to throw American citizens – as well as non-citizens – into a legal black hole by designating them “enemy combatants,” even if they have engaged in no violent act and are living on U.S. soil.
The federal Appeals Court in Richmond, Virginia, ruled 5-4 on July 15 that Bush had the right, while prosecuting the “war on terror,” to hold Qatari citizen (and Peoria, Illinois, resident) Ali al-Marri indefinitely as an “enemy combatant.”
But some of the court’s more liberal judges expressed alarm, saying the legal reasoning that denied al-Marri meaningful due process not only trampled on American legal traditions but could be used to lock up U.S. citizens as well.
“For over two centuries of growth and struggle, peace and war, the Constitution has secured our freedom through the guarantee that, in the United States, no one will be deprived of liberty without due process of law,” wrote Judge Diana Motz, a Bill Clinton appointee, who dissented against the court’s approval of sweeping presidential powers.
[...] Currently, the U.S. Supreme Court has a slim 5-4 majority in favor of limiting Bush’s authority to deny basic constitutional rights to people designated “enemy combatants,” but the replacement of one member of the majority with another Alito or Roberts would tip the balance and effectively permit the rewriting of the U.S. Constitution.
Though the July 15 ruling was convoluted and did call for a federal District Court to afford al-Marri some more rights, the Appeals Court decision effectively upheld Bush’s assertion of nearly unlimited power to have people detained as “enemy combatants.”
The ruling suggested that even American citizens – if they are deemed “enemy combatants” – could be subjected to Bush’s military commissions, where truncated legal rights make proving a person’s guilt much easier than in civilian courts.
Stunned Realization
Previously, the New York Times editorial page and some liberal legal experts had criticized Bush’s high-handed approach toward non-citizens, but had assured Americans that the military commissions would not apply to them.
But at Consortiumnews.com, we noted that language buried in the Military Commissions Act of 2006 seemed to cover – indeed even target – U.S. citizens. [See “Who Is ‘Any Person’ in Tribunal Law? or our book, Neck Deep.]
For instance, one section dealing with penalties stated that “any person is punishable as a principal under this chapter who commits an offense punishable by this chapter, or aids, abets, counsels, commands, or procures its commission,” according to the law.
Another clause stated that “any person subject to this chapter who, in breach of an allegiance or duty to the United States, knowingly and intentionally aids an enemy of the United States ... shall be punished as a military commission … may direct.” [Emphasis added]
[...] But it took the Appeals Court ruling – and the blunt language from Judge Motz about denying constitutional rights to U.S. citizens – to catch the New York Times’ attention.
In a July 20 editorial, the Times wrote that the Appeals Court's “decision gives the President sweeping power to deprive anyone – citizens as well as non-citizens – of their freedom. …
“The implications are breathtaking. The designation ‘enemy combatant,’ which should apply only to people captured on a battlefield, can now be applied to people detained inside the United States. Even though Mr. Marri is not an American citizen, the court’s reasoning appears to apply equally to citizens.”
[...] In effect, Bush’s interpretation of his own powers – allowing him to imprison, torture and kill at his discretion – trumps the Founders’ vision that everyone possesses certain “unalienable rights” that a government can’t take away.
[...] In siding with Bush, conservative Appeals Court judges noted al-Marri had offered only a general denial of the accusations against him and failed to rebut the specific charges. Al-Marri’s lawyers argued that their client should have a right to confront his accusers and not be put in a position of having to prove his innocence.
[...] “While a showcase of American values, an open and public criminal trial may also serve as a platform for suspected terrorists,” [Judge Harvie] Wilkinson [a Ronald Reagan appointee who is often cited as a possible Republican Supreme Court nominee].wrote. “Terror suspects may use the bully pulpit of a criminal trial in an attempt to recruit others to their cause. Likewise, terror suspects may take advantage of the opportunity to interact with others during trial to pass critical intelligence to their allies.”
[...] “A citizen, no less than an alien, can be an enemy combatant,” [my bold] administration lawyer David B. Salmons told the Appeals Court in oral arguments on Feb. 1, 2007, adding that the courts cannot interfere with the President’s wartime judgments on such matters.
Salmons insisted that Bush is not interested in using this power too broadly, but argued that the judgment on whom is deemed an “enemy combatant” must solely be at the discretion of President Bush. [NYT, Feb. 2, 2007]
What may be decided in Election 2008 is whether the U.S. Supreme Court will be stocked with like-minded legal theorists.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/072108.html

Frivolous Judges Ban Descriptive Language

We are back to revisit the bizarre turn of events in a "date"-rape trial. BTW--District Judge Jeffre Cheuvront's name does not appear in most of the coverage. I wonder why?
Judge’s ban on the use of the word ‘rape’ at trial reflects trend
By TONY RIZZO
The Kansas City Star, Posted Sat, 6/7/08
It’s the only way Tory Bowen knows to honestly describe what happened to her.
She was raped.
But a judge prohibited her from uttering the word “rape” in front of a jury. The term “sexual assault” also was taboo, and Bowen could not refer to herself as a victim or use the word “assailant” to describe the man who allegedly raped her.
The defendant’s presumption of innocence and right to a fair trial trumps Bowen’s right of free speech, said the Lincoln, Neb., judge who issued the order.
“It shouldn’t be up to a judge to tell me whether or not I was raped,” Bowen said. “I should be able to tell the jury in my own words what happened to me.”
Bowen’s case is part of what some prosecutors and victim advocates see as a national trend in sexual assault cases.
“It’s a topic that’s coming up more and more,” said Joshua Marquis, an Oregon prosecutor and a vice president of the National District Attorneys Association. “You’re moving away from what a criminal trial is really about.”
In Jackson County, Senior Judge Gene Martin recently issued a similar order for the trial of a Kansas City man charged with raping a teenager in 2000. Despite the semantic restrictions, the Jackson County jury last week found Ray Slaughter guilty of forcible rape and two counts of forcible sodomy.
[...] “For the life of me, I do not understand why a judge would tell an alleged rape victim that she cannot say she was raped when she testifies in a trial about rape,” wrote U.S. District Judge Richard G. Kopf.
Wendy J. Murphy, an adjunct professor at the New England School of Law in Boston, is representing Bowen. She said the practice is “absolutely” unconstitutional.
“There’s no law anywhere that allows courts to issue these kinds of orders against private citizens,” Murphy said. “That doesn’t mean judges aren’t doing it.”
Prosecutors may object, but rarely do they have the time and resources to stop a trial midstream to appeal, she said.
But in cases where the defendant’s version of events is pitted against that of the alleged victim, “words are really important,” Marquis said.
“To force a victim to say, ‘when the defendant and I had sexual intercourse’ is just absurd,” he said.
[...] Murphy said it’s disturbing that such “censorship orders” are entered almost exclusively in cases involving rape or sexual assault. [my bold]
“If it’s about defendants’ rights, then why aren’t they used in other cases?” she asked.[...]
http://www.kansascity.com/105/story/654147.html
Here’s Law.com’s take on the subject:
Courts Putting Hot-Button Words on Ice
Tresa Baldas, 6-16-2008
Call it the age of the Loaded Word.
A steadily increasing number of courts across the United States are prohibiting witnesses and victims from uttering certain words in front of a jury, banning everything from the words "rape" to "victim" to "crime scene."
Prosecutors and victims' rights advocates nationwide claim the courts are going too far in trying to cleanse witness testimony, all to protect a defendant's right to a fair trial. Concerns and fears over language restrictions have been percolating ever since judges in Nebraska and Missouri last year banned the word "rape" during rape trials.
But that was just the tip of the iceberg, claim critics, who say courts telling witnesses what words they can and can't say is a much larger trend than they had realized. In addition to "rape," courts also have banned the terms "homicide," "drunk," "victim," "murderer," "killer" and "crime scene."
"I've gotten a flood of e-mails saying, 'Wow, you should see the number of times that this is happening in our jurisdiction,' " said Joshua Marquis, vice president of the National District Attorneys Association, who strongly objects to censoring witnesses, especially victims. "It's absurd. It's dangerous. And it's growing."
[...] "I've had wise judges frequently order that prosecutors and witnesses not refer to certain individuals as 'victims' or locations as 'crime scenes.' Such orders are required by the presumption of innocence," said criminal defense lawyer Daniel E. Monnat of Monnat & Spurrier in Wichita, Kan.
Monnat convinced a judge to exclude the terms "victim" and "crime scene" in a pending homicide case. Kansas v. Floyd, No. 06CR17 (Stanton Co., Kan., Dist. Ct.).
Monnat said that words like "victim" and "crime scene" contradict the presumption of innocence by assuming a conclusion that a jury is supposed to arrive at on its own.
"It only makes sense. You don't want the witnesses and officers of law enforcement talking as if it was a foregone conclusion, almost drumming it into the jurors' minds that a crime was committed by virtue of the fact that there is a victim," Monnat said. "I think that courts are more and more open to restricting terminology like this because of the number of wrongful convictions that have been demonstrated to have occurred in the U.S."
Attorneys with the Cook County Public Defender's office in Chicago have had similar luck with requests to bar witnesses from using certain words, including "victim," "rape" and "crime scene."
[...] Efrem M. Grail, a white-collar defense attorney in Reed Smith's Pittsburgh and Philadelphia offices, said words like "embezzle" and "defraud" also raise eyebrows in white-collar crime cases."
As a defense lawyer, I am an advocate for my clients, and any word that I believe is going to unfairly import itself on the jury's conscience, then I will object to it on any legal grounds that I can conceive," he said. "Your tool is the language that is used in front of the court. The words are swords and shields."
Attorney Jack King, spokesman for the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, defended the defense bar's efforts to ban certain words during trial. For example, he said, there are several instances where defense lawyers are justified in trying to bar the use of the word "rape." They include: if they are claiming the act was consensual; they are claiming there was no rape at all; or they are claiming the alleged victim was under the influence of a drug, or mentally ill, and therefore confused about what really happened.
"Sometimes it's not ludicrous," King said, responding to criticisms of attempts to keep certain words, such as rape, out.
"There are some things you can't say in the courtroom," he said. "You might have the right to say things on the courtroom steps but not in a courtroom while on trial. And I dispute any constitutional scholar that says the First Amendment trumps due process in the courtroom. It never has. It never will."
But not allowing a rape victim to say she or he was raped is "a travesty to our criminal justice system," countered James P. Fox, president of the National District Attorneys Association and district attorney in San Mateo County, Calif.
"Their testimony is censored in order to protect the presumption of innocence, and that is outrageous," Fox said. "It's an example of the pendulum swinging, I think, to the side of the defendant -- the poor defendant is presumed innocent and we're not going to give much of a concern to the victims of these crimes."
Fox added: "I'm sorry, but the presumption of innocence argument only lasts as long as there's no other evidence to the contrary."
[...] Wendy J. Murphy of the New England School of Law [...] tried when she appealed the Nebraska judge's decision to bar a rape victim from using the word rape. She lost the case, and is now appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court. Bowen v. Honorable Jeffre Cheuvront, No. 4:07 CV3221 (D. Neb.).
For Murphy, it is all about preserving the victim's right to tell her story freely and candidly in court. Telling someone not to speak is one thing, she said. But telling witnesses and victims what to say "is the ultimate anti-American thing to do."
First Amendment lawyer Rex Heinke, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, wonders where all this is going.
"It strikes me as a little odd that you can't use that term [rape]," he said. "Does that mean you can't use murder, robbery, breaking and entering?"He added: "It's pretty hard to prosecute a murder case without being able to say the word murder."
http://www.law.com/jsp/law/LawArticleFriendly.jsp?id=1202422274880
See also my September 18, 2007 post about Ms. Bowen and a State Senator's response: Rape Victim Abused by Word-Fearing Judge

First Amendment-A-Loo Ya!

Folks, it doesn't get better than the glorious First Amendment when it comes to ensuring a free, enduring democracy. Rev. Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping have given me lots of opportunities to personally experience the exhilaration and freedom of reciting the blessed 46 words in public spaces, clubs, churches, wherever citizens go and need to know, or be reminded of the one thing that makes the USA different. We may not be #1 in producing goods anymore, but as long as we can make our elected officials comply to our founding parents' wishes, pretty soon there will be redemption! Peace-a-loo ya!
Now turn up your speakers for a sample of what you can hear in Union Square on June 5 (please see the next post for details on how we, the people will response to the attempted privatization of Union Square:

Write this down, carry it with you wherever you go, and most of all, practice using it!

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Union Square Must NOT be Privatized

RALLY AND SURPRISE PARTY:
Thursday, June 5th, 5pm
Union Square - North Side

Who: marching bands, hoola hoopers, soapbox preachers, park lovers, green growers, sun tanners, art vendors, likely a wingnut or two, and a walking tour performance by the ghosts of Union Square past. And Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Gentrifying. And YOU!
HERE'S THE SKINNY:
http://www.saveunionsquare2008.blogspot.com
http://www.revbilly.com/petition
After letting the pavilion building fall into disrepair for over a decade, the city government was finally ready to pony up the cash to repair the building and return it to public use. Before the city could even complete their own plans, the Union Square Business Improvement District, or BID, (led by corporate chain stores such as Barnes and Noble and Whole Foods) got involved, dangling wads of extra (anonymously donated) cash, and before you know it the plans that emerged took on a decidedly unfriendly tone, particularly if you happen to be an artist selling your work, a farmer selling food, or any citizen who might want to spend time in the park without spending money.
The Union Square Partnership, led by celebrity chef Danny Meyer, plans to turn the pavilion on the north side of this park into an upscale restaurant. They are pushing around the Greenmarket and the artist vendors, cutting down 80 year old trees, ending the day-care resources, driving out local residents and making it harder and harder for us, regular new Yorkers, parents, students, residents, visitors, to enjoy our own park. This park is being privatized. It is part of a city-wide pattern. The city underfunds the park, pushes aside public funds and then brings in a BID and a few millionaire friends posing as saviors. We don’t need saving. We need transparency, a real democracy, and a public park.
We want to know who donated 5 million dollars to “buy” the pavilion and who will profit from the planned restaurant? We want to know why 17th street needs to be four lanes instead of two, and why the Farmers Market, artist vendors and park lovers were sold out for a fancy Chardonnay restaurant.
Union Square is a national Free Speech landmark, the pavilion was built as a stage for public assembly and democratic gathering. This is where our American conscience erupted in the songs of Paul Robeson, the shouts of Emma Goldman and the prayers of Dorothy Day. The 8-hour workday was born at Union Square and crowds surged before that reviewing stand in the tens of thousands. The first Labor Day Parade took place here in 1882 and after 9/11 we gathered here instinctively just like George Washington and the Continental Army did in 1776.
Help keep the park public - show up to the rally on Thursday June 5th at 5pm in the north side of Union Square. The Union Square Partnership (the group behind the swanky restaurant scheme) is holding their annual dinner just a block or two from the park that night. A fitting occasion to invoke the history of Union Square by speaking out for its future!
Message sent by: The Change You Want To See, 84 Havemeyer St, Brooklyn, NY, 11211