Freedom of Expression/Speech

ABC News reports this morning — Secretary of State John Kerry did what for many of Israel’s supporters is the unthinkable and used the A-word: apartheid.

It is a sea change, the kind of transformation that the Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter said was caused by “gales of creative destruction.” In his model, systems change when new ideas, products, and technologies bring about the destruction of the old.

Tax day in America — My Ass!
I’ve been meaning to fix up the bio-sketch below. Certainly, fix the age 56, since I hit 57 two months ago. Born in 1957, now 57 witnessing another lunar eclipse, and the great eclipsing of humanity by algorithmic putzes and their masters: too-big-to-fail multinationals and transfinancials and a media that are so whore-fied, that, well, the new Black is Orange.

so why aren’t we listening, shaping policy around what the downtrodden know and see?

Can you think of anything more arrogant than being a guest in someone’s home and criticizing them because you don’t like their drapes?  Maybe yes, criticizing their drapes when you have none decorating the windows in your own home.  Most people would agree that that behavior would cross the line. How could anyone be so lacking in common courtesy and finesse – especially when that person is a brilliant, well-educated First Lady?

Countries who seek to gain control over their people through the Internet have their own agendas. They are in search of larger governmental control or even censorship online.
– Marietje Schaake, European Parliament Member, February 2014

The journalistic credo is a difficult one. The line between corporate sponsored sycophancy and state sponsored guidance is an all too fine one. Little wonder that today’s news scape is awash with such experiments as those of WikiLeaks, or Glen Greenwald’s The Intercept, potent challenges to the numbing twenty-four hour news cycle.

On February 6, 2014, the Washington Free Beacon reported that a bill was introduced into the US House of Representatives that would cut off federal funding to any academic institution that boycotts the State of Israel.

For too long in this country, people supporting human rights and international law in relation to the Palestinian/Israeli issue have been reluctant to speak out. Many university faculty members didn’t want to get involved in an issue that they believed might cost them their jobs or tenure.

Michael Ratner, president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, the attorney for Julian Assange, and the president of the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights: Documents show the US engaged in major attacks against journalists, publishers, and whistleblowers, as a UK court upholds the legality of David Miranda’s detention at Heathrow airport.