January 25, 2012

War makes for strange bedfellows. Both Democrats and Republicans voted FOR the NDAA and here’s how some Democrats and Republicans are acting AGAINST it.

Due Process Guarantee Act

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) has introduced S2003,  The Due Process Guarantee Act (full text of S 2003): “…to clarify that an authorization to use military force, a declaration of war, or any similar authority shall not authorize the detention without charge or trial of a citizen or lawful permanent resident of the United States and for other purposes.”

Representative John Garamendi (D-CA) has introduced a matching bill  HR 3702, Due Process Guarantee Act in the House.  Excerpt: “We must clarify existing law to guarantee the due process rights of every American. It is a foundational principle of our great nation that we are all innocent until proven guilty and that we all deserve a fair trial…”

Local Government Resolutions

El Paso County in Colorado Passes Resolution Nullifying the National Defense Authorization Act
Excerpts from the El Paso County, CO, Resolution to Preserve Habeas Corpus and Civil Liberties:

“WHEREAS, Sections 1031 and 1032 (or any other wording as the bill is modified) of the 2011 United States Senate National Defense Authorization Act, Bill Number SB1867, as proposed, provide that in limited circumstances, an American citizen may be detained by our own United States government and by our Armed Forces, which detention could last, without trial until the end of the hostilities currently authorized by the Authorization for Use of Military Force…

“WHEREAS, Sections 1031 and 1032 (or any other wording as the bill is modified) of the National Defense Authorization Bill, SB 1867, jeopardize the fundamental rights of American citizens to remain free from detention without due process and the right to habeas corpus in direct contravention of the guarantees of the Bill of Rights and the United States and Colorado Constitutions…

“BE IT RESOLVED, the Board of County Commissioners of El Paso County, Colorado, is in opposition to Sections 1031 and 1032 of the United States Senate National Defense Authorization Act, and does hereby support the Colorado Constitution and the Constitution of the United States of America and all the freedoms and guarantees as guaranteed by our Founding Fathers and as provided by the brave efforts of the members of our Armed Forces…”

[Sections 1021 and 1022 in the new version of the bill were originally sections 1031 and 1032 in the old version of the bill.]

Repeal of NDAA, Section 1021

Representative Ron Paul (R-TX)  has introduced a bill to have Section 1021 of NDAA  repealed.

Ron Paul (R. TX)  says Section 1021 of the NDAA is so vague that it allows  for the detention of American citizens without trial. Excerpts of speech:

“Section 1021 essentially codifies into law the very dubious claim of presidential authority under 2001 authorization for the use of military force to indefinitely detain American citizens without access to legal representation or due process of law. Section 1021 provides for the possibility of the U.S. military acting as a kind of police force on U.S. soil apprehending terror suspects, including Americans, and whisking them off to an undisclosed location indefinitely, no right to attorney, no right to trial, no day in court. This is precisely the kind of egregious distortion of justice that Americans have always ridiculed in so many dictatorships overseas…

“Some have argued that nothing in Section 1021 explicitly mandates holding Americans without trial, but it employs vague language, radically expanding the detention authority to include anyone who has substantially supported certain terrorist groups or associated forces. No one has defined what those terms mean. What is an ‘associated force?’…

“Sadly, too many of my colleagues are too willing to undermine our Constitution to support such outrageous legislation. One senator [Senator (R- S.C.) Lindsay Graham] even said about American citizens being picked up under this section of the NDAA, ‘When they say I want a lawyer, you tell them, shut up! You don’t get a lawyer!’ Is this acceptable in someone who has taken an oath to uphold the Constitution?” -Jan. 18, 2012

Withdraw authorization from AUMF, Authorization for Use of Military Force, granted by Congress 14 Sept 2001

What Congress must do to Fix the Damage of NDAA, by Stewart Rhodes, oathkeepers.org, 19 January 2012.

Excerpts:

“Right now, the President can claim that Congress has authorized him to use war powers and the laws of war against the American people, to kill them, detain them indefinitely, or to try them for pretended offenses against the laws of war.   To remove that supposed power, and stop it from being used on Americans, Congress MUST do the following:

1. Repeal.  Repeal Section 1021 and 1022 of the NDAA, or at least amend it to clearly state that nothing therein applies to U.S. citizens or lawful residents…
2. Deny authorization. Congress must clearly state that it does not authorize the President to use military force, military detention, or military trial against US citizens or lawful residents (and amend current laws, including the NDAA as needed to be consistent with that clear statement that Congress does not give such authorization).    Congress may need to say that any prior authorization, including within the 2001 AUMF, whether express or implied,  is hereby withdrawn, or state that Congress now clarifies that it did not intend such authorization in 2001…
3. Prohibit use of the laws of war against Americans.  Clearly prohibit the use of military force, military detention, or military trial (except as to those Americans serving in the Armed forces) against any US citizen or lawful resident for any crime whatsoever, including any alleged violations of the laws of war.
4. Mandate a trial for Treason, before a jury. Congress must clearly mandate that a US citizen or lawful resident who is suspected, accused, or even “determined” to be levying war against the United States, or committing any belligerent act, or to be aiding and abetting the enemy, must be indicted by a Grand Jury, pursuant to the 5^th Amendment, for the crime of treason and must be tried for treason, before a jury of their peers (as required by Article III, Section 2 and by the 6^th Amendment), in a civilian court, with a requirement of two witnesses to the same overt act or confession in open court before conviction, as required by Article III, Section 3.”

Refer to State and US Constitution

Representative Daniel Gordon’s (R-Rhode Island) statement on NDAA, 16 January, 2012:

“Given the fact that the constitutions of Rhode Island and that of the United States are replete with guarantees of individual liberties, right to habeas corpus, and right to freedom of speech, the offending sections of that law are repugnant to the sensibilities of anyone that has a basic understanding of the foundation of this country,”

“When I took the oath of office, I swore that I would support the constitutions of Rhode Island and the United States. And before one single constituent of mine is snatched up in the dead of night, without due process under our laws, they’ll have to pry those documents from my cold dead hands…”

Recall Members of Congress

Montana Launches Recall Efforts Against NDAA Supporters, by Raven Clabough, New American, 24 January 2012

Excerpts:

“Montana is just one of nine states with constitutional provisions asserting the right to recall members of its congressional delegation for reasons including a violation of their oath of office…

The other eight states are Arizona, Colorado, Louisiana , Michigan, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, and Wisconsin.

“The draft language of Montana’s petition provides the following justifications for recalling the three men [Senator Max Baucus and Senator Jonathon Tester (Democrats) and Representative Denny Rehberg (Republican):
1. 'The Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees all U.S citizens: a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed...'

2. The National Defense Authorization Act of 2011 (NDAA 2011) permanently abolishes the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial, 'for the duration of hostilities' in the War on Terror, which was defined by President George W. Bush as a ''task which does not end' to a joint session of Congress on September 20, 2001.

"And the recall petition specifically addresses the last-minute additional provision to the NDAA that was used to defend the rest of the bill and assert that the law would not be used against American citizens: 7. Section 1021 reads: 'Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law.' But 'existing law' may be construed to refer to Padilla v. Rumsfeld in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld the government’s claim of authority to hold Americans arrested on American soil indefinitely."

Refer to oath taken to the US Constitution

Oathkeepers: 10 orders we will not obey, oathkeepers.org, 3 March 2009

Excerpts:

Oathkeepers: "...a non-partisan association of current and formerly serving military, reserves, National Guard, veterans, Peace Officers, and Fire Fighters...who support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic...our Oath is to the Constitution."

"3. We will NOT obey any order to detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to trial by military tribunal.

One of the causes of the American Revolution was the denial of the right to jury trial, the use of admiralty courts (military tribunals) instead, and the application of the laws of war to the colonists. After that experience, and being well aware of the infamous Star Chamber in English history, the Founders ensured that the international laws of war would apply only to foreign enemies, not to the American people. Thus, the Article III Treason Clause establishes the only constitutional form of trial for an American, not serving in the military, who is accused of making war on his own nation. Such a trial for treason must be before a civilian jury, not a tribunal.

The international laws of war do not trump our Bill of Rights. We reject as illegitimate any such claimed power, as did the Supreme Court in Ex Parte Milligan (1865). Any attempt to apply the laws of war to American civilians, under any pretext, such as against domestic “militia” groups the government brands “domestic terrorists,” is an act of war and an act of treason...

"7. We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext...Whenever a government interns its own people, it treats them like an occupied enemy population...

"8. We will NOT obey orders to assist or support the use of any foreign troops on U.S. soil against the American people to “keep the peace” or to “maintain control” during any emergency, or under any other pretext. We will consider such use of foreign troops against our people to be an invasion and an act of war...

"During the American Revolution, the British government enlisted the aid of Hessian mercenaries in an attempt to subjugate the rebellious American people. Throughout history, repressive regimes have enlisted the aid of foreign troops and mercenaries who have no bonds with the people.

"Accordingly, as the militia of the several states are the only military force contemplated by the Constitution, in Article I, Section 8, for domestic keeping of the peace, and as the use of even our own standing army for such purposes is without such constitutional support, the use of foreign troops and mercenaries against the people is wildly unconstitutional, egregious, and an act of war..."

Some are going even further than NDAA:

Enemy Expatriation Act, EEA

'Enemy Expatriation Act' Could Compound NDAA Threat to Citizen Rights, by Ashley Portero, International Business Times, Business & Law, 24 Jan. 2012

Excerpts:

"In October [2011], Rep. Charles Dent, R-Pa., and Sens. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., and Scott Brown, R-Mass., introduced a slight but powerful amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Act that gives the government the authority to strip a person of their American citizenship if that person is accused or suspected of supporting “hostilities” against the U.S…”

“If the amendment [EEA, S1698, HR 3166] became law, the government could potentially revoke the citizenship of anyone deemed to be supporting hostilities against the U.S., thereby subjecting him or her to the indefinite military detention provision of the NDAA…”

For more, see Action Alerts.

Protesters march against Guantanamo and indefinite detainment 
Washington,DC, Jan 11, 2012 Photo by Andrew Courtney

Yesterday, my column “10 Reasons The United States Is No Longer The Land Of The Free” ran in the Sunday Washington Post. I have been heartened by response to the column. However, a few commenters continue to suggest that the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) does not allow for the indefinite detention of citizens. This claim is being advanced by Senator Carl Levin (D., Mich.) in emails and fax messages to voters. I wanted to respond to Senator Levin’s points which are detached from language of the law and the clear intent of the majority of Senators. I would also like to address those who have stated that our liberties are not at risk when such powers will not affect most Americans.

I have previously explained why the claim by Sen. Levin is unfounded, as have others like the ACLU and commentators like Glenn Greenwald. The White House itself offered the spin to supporters in Congress, explaining why the President reneged on his pledge to veto the law. The White House is saying that changes to the law made it unnecessary to veto the legislation. That spin is facially ridiculous. The changes were the inclusion of some meaningless rhetoric after key amendments protecting citizens were defeated. The provision merely states that nothing in the provisions could be construed to alter Americans’ legal rights. Since the Senate clearly views citizens are not just subject to indefinite detention but even execution without a trial, the change offers nothing but rhetoric to hide the harsh reality. The exemption for American citizens from the mandatory detention requirement (section 1032) is the screening language for the real section, 1031, which offers no exemption for American citizens from the authorization to use the military to indefinitely detain people without charge or trial. Section 1031 only contains a meaningless provision stating “Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens, lawful resident aliens of the United States, or any other persons who are captured or arrested in the United States.”

First, this provision was added after an amendment to exempt citizens was defeated by the Senate — legislative history that any court is likely to note in the interpretation of its meaning.

Second, the fact that the Senate put a clear exemption in the mandatory detention provision for citizens but opted not to simply include the same provision in the discretionary detention provision reinforces this meaning.

Third, after the exemption for citizens was defeated overwhelmingly, the same Senators who voted to deny any exemption proceeded to vote for this language — clearly indicating that it did not offer such protection for citizens.

Fourth, Levin and others are seeking to deny the authority that the President just acknowledged in his signing statement. Obama stated “I want to clarify that my Administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens.” He does not deny that he has such authority . . . only that he does not intend to use it.

Fifth, Levin admitted on the floor that it was the White House that insisted on eliminating the exemption for citizens — affirming that without such an exemption, citizens would be subject to such detention. In an exchange with Senator Udall, Levin stated:

Is the Senator familiar with the fact that it was the administration which asked us to remove the very language which we had in the bill which passed the committee, and that we removed it at the request of the administration that this determination would not apply to U.S. citizens and lawful residents? Is the Senator familiar with the fact that it was the administration which asked us to remove the very language, the absence of which is now objected to by the Senator from Illinois?

Sixth, many of the members at the time of passage voiced their understanding that the provision authorized the indefinite detention of citizens – including those who wanted such a power codified and those who opposed the power. For example, At least Senator Lindsey Graham was honest when he said on the Senate floor that “1031, the statement of authority to detain, does apply to American citizens and it designates the world as the battlefield, including the homeland.”

Seventh, the language that was ultimately put into the bill was standard cover language for Senators who knew that they would be criticized for voting for the law. Indeed, when Levin referred to the language, he insisted that it would merely permit what is already permitted by law “whatever it may be.” Of course, the White House has claimed the right to kill citizens on the president’s sole authority. The indefinite detention of citizens would seem the lesser included in such a greater. Moreover, the Senators refused to change the existing law by putting in an exemption for citizens. It is also worth noting that the White House has successfully opposed the right of citizens to present national security powers to federal courts for independent review. What is the “law” is often only the assertion of power by the President – unchecked by judicial review.

Levin has been hammered by civil libertarians and liberals over his role in passing this harmful law. His official Senate site now features a statement at the top. One of his financial supporters (who told me that he had declared that he will not to support Levin in the future due to the bill) sent me the following email from Levin’s office:

“The provisions on detention of terror suspects in the bill got more attention than all these other important priorities. The criticism of these provisions has usually been wildly inaccurate; if the bill did what some of its critics claim, I would have led the opposition. . . . It does not prohibit civilian trials for terror suspects. It does not strip the FBI and other civilian law enforcement agencies of their authority. It does not allow the military to make arrests on U.S. soil. It does not enact new authority to hold U.S. citizens without trial or charge. It does not provide for indefinite detention of citizens without access to civilian courts.”

Note the use of new authority. This is authority that has been claimed as being part of the President’s inherent authority — just as he claims the right to kill citizens. However, this law codifies new detention powers and the Senate expressly chose not to exempt citizens — and the President himself acknowledged the ability to indefinitely detain citizens in his pledge not to use it. Moreover, it was the duty of Levin and others to fight the passage of this law in the absence of an exemption, including fighting to use every power available from a filibuster to demanding a president veto. Instead, they took the political convenient approach and sought to excuse their act of constitutional nonfeasance behind this meaningless language.

I am hardly shocked that senators are not answering the criticism over this provision by being open about their failure to protect citizens. However, I continue to be amazed by comments on the Washington Post and this blog from citizens that we are not really losing any rights because most citizens are unlikely to be subject to these powers. It is disgraceful argument that only “those” people will be denied rights so I must remain free. Of course, since these are secret powers, you are not likely to know if you have been subject to surveillance or some other measures. More importantly, something is not a right if it is discretionary with your government to allow or to take away. By the time you find yourself denied of the right, it is too late to do anything about it. It is the same amoral logic described by pastor Martin Niemöller:

First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak out because I was Protestant.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Thankfully are we not facing the type of horror faced by Niemöller, but the logic is the same: I do not need to object unless the government denies me a right.

The government always embraces abusive power by targeting the least popular among us. The test of patriotism is to fight for the values that define us. While people appear ready to protest over taxes against “big government,” some of the people often seem to remain silent in the face of the very abuses that the Framers sought to combat from indefinite detention to warrantless searches to assassination. The play on security as a rationale to limit freedom is nothing new. As Benjamin Franklin observed, “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

Jonathan Turley
Professor, George Washington U., (Complete Bio)

2. Why I’m Suing Barack Obama, by Chris Hedges, truthdig.com, Jan. 16. 2012

Attorneys Carl J. Mayer and Bruce I. Afran filed a complaint Friday in the Southern U.S. District Court in New York City on my behalf as a plaintiff against Barack Obama and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to challenge the legality of the Authorization for Use of Military Force as embedded in the latest version of the National Defense Authorization Act, signed by the president Dec. 31.

The act authorizes the military in Title X, Subtitle D, entitled “Counter-Terrorism,” for the first time in more than 200 years, to carry out domestic policing. With this bill, which will take effect March 3, the military can indefinitely detain without trial any U.S. citizen deemed to be a terrorist or an accessory to terrorism. And suspects can be shipped by the military to our offshore penal colony in Guantanamo Bay and kept there until “the end of hostilities.” It is a catastrophic blow to civil liberties.

I spent many years in countries where the military had the power to arrest and detain citizens without charge. I have been in some of these jails. I have friends and colleagues who have “disappeared” into military gulags. I know the consequences of granting sweeping and unrestricted policing power to the armed forces of any nation. And while my battle may be quixotic, it is one that has to be fought if we are to have any hope of pulling this country back from corporate fascism.

Section 1031 of the bill defines a “covered person”—one subject to detention—as “a person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.”

The bill, however, does not define the terms “substantially supported,” “directly supported” or “associated forces.”

I met regularly with leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza. I used to visit Palestine Liberation Organization leaders, including Yasser Arafat and Abu Jihad, in Tunis when they were branded international terrorists. I have spent time with the Revolutionary Guard in Iran and was in northern Iraq and southeastern Turkey with fighters from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. All these entities were or are labeled as terrorist organizations by the U.S. government. What would this bill have meant if it had been in place when I and other Americans traveled in the 1980s with armed units of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua or the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front guerrillas in El Salvador? What would it have meant for those of us who were with the southern insurgents during the civil war in Yemen or the rebels in the southern Sudan? I have had dinner more times than I can count with people whom this country brands as terrorists. But that does not make me one.

Once a group is deemed to be a terrorist organization, whether it is a Palestinian charity or an element of the Uighur independence movement, the military can under this bill pick up a U.S. citizen who supported charities associated with the group or unwittingly sent money or medical supplies to front groups. We have already seen the persecution and closure of Islamic charity organizations in the United States that supported the Palestinians. Now the members of these organizations can be treated like card-carrying “terrorists” and sent to Guantanamo.

But I suspect the real purpose of this bill is to thwart internal, domestic movements that threaten the corporate state. The definition of a terrorist is already so amorphous under the Patriot Act that there are probably a few million Americans who qualify to be investigated if not locked up. Consider the arcane criteria that can make you a suspect in our new military-corporate state. The Department of Justice considers you worth investigating if you are missing a few fingers, if you have weatherproof ammunition, if you own guns or if you have hoarded more than seven days of food in your house. Adding a few of the obstructionist tactics of the Occupy movement to this list would be a seamless process. On the whim of the military, a suspected “terrorist” who also happens to be a U.S. citizen can suffer extraordinary rendition—being kidnapped and then left to rot in one of our black sites “until the end of hostilities.” Since this is an endless war that will be a very long stay.

This demented “war on terror” is as undefined and vague as such a conflict is in any totalitarian state. Dissent is increasingly equated in this country with treason. Enemies supposedly lurk in every organization that does not chant the patriotic mantras provided to it by the state. And this bill feeds a mounting state paranoia. It expands our permanent war to every spot on the globe. It erases fundamental constitutional liberties. It means we can no longer use the word “democracy” to describe our political system.

The supine and gutless Democratic Party, which would have feigned outrage if George W. Bush had put this into law, appears willing, once again, to grant Obama a pass. But I won’t. What he has done is unforgivable, unconstitutional and exceedingly dangerous. The threat and reach of al-Qaida—which I spent a year covering for The New York Times in Europe and the Middle East—are marginal, despite the attacks of 9/11. The terrorist group poses no existential threat to the nation. It has been so disrupted and broken that it can barely function. Osama bin Laden was gunned down by commandos and his body dumped into the sea. Even the Pentagon says the organization is crippled. So why, a decade after the start of the so-called war on terror, do these draconian measures need to be implemented? Why do U.S. citizens now need to be specifically singled out for military detention and denial of due process when under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force the president can apparently find the legal cover to serve as judge, jury and executioner to assassinate U.S. citizens, as he did in the killing of the cleric Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen? Why is this bill necessary when the government routinely ignores our Fifth Amendment rights—“No person shall be deprived of life without due process of law”—as well as our First Amendment right of free speech? How much more power do they need to fight “terrorism”?

Fear is the psychological weapon of choice for totalitarian systems of power. Make the people afraid. Get them to surrender their rights in the name of national security. And then finish off the few who aren’t afraid enough. If this law is not revoked we will be no different from any sordid military dictatorship. Its implementation will be a huge leap forward for the corporate oligarchs who plan to continue to plunder the nation and use state and military security to cow the population into submission.

The oddest part of this legislation is that the FBI, the CIA, the director of national intelligence, the Pentagon and the attorney general didn’t support it. FBI Director Robert Mueller said he feared the bill would actually impede the bureau’s ability to investigate terrorism because it would be harder to win cooperation from suspects held by the military. “The possibility looms that we will lose opportunities to obtain cooperation from the persons in the past that we’ve been fairly successful in gaining,” he told Congress.

But it passed anyway. And I suspect it passed because the corporations, seeing the unrest in the streets, knowing that things are about to get much worse, worrying that the Occupy movement will expand, do not trust the police to protect them. They want to be able to call in the Army. And now they can.

Text of Hedges’ Legal Complaint

Journalist Chris Hedges Sues Obama Admin over Indefinite Detention of U.S. Citizens Approved in NDAA (video), Democracy Now, democracynow.org, Jan. 17, 2012

3.   How Congress is Signing its own Arrest Warrants in the NDAA Citizen Arrest Bill, by Naomi Wolf, naomiwolf.org, Dec. 12, 2011

I never thought I would have to write this: but—incredibly—Congress has now passed the National Defense Appropriations Act, with Amendment 1031, which allows for the military detention of American citizens. The amendment is so loosely worded that any American citizen could be held without due process. The language of this bill can be read to assure Americans that they can challenge their detention — but most people do not realize what this means: at Guantanamo and in other military prisons, one’s lawyer’s calls are monitored, witnesses for one’s defense are not allowed to testify, and one can be forced into nudity and isolation. Incredibly, ninety-three Senators voted to support this bill and now most of Congress: a roster of names that will live in infamy in the history of our nation, and never be expunged from the dark column of the history books.

They may have supported this bill because—although it’s hard to believe—they think the military will only arrest active members of Al Qaida; or maybe, less naively, they believe that ‘at most’, low-level dissenting figures, activists, or troublesome protesters might be subjected to military arrest. But they are forgetting something critical: history shows that those who signed this bill will soon be subject to arrest themselves.

Our leaders appear to be supporting this bill thinking that they will always be what they are now, in the fading light of a once-great democracy — those civilian leaders who safely and securely sit in freedom and DIRECT the military. In inhabiting this bubble, which their own actions are about to destroy, they are cocooned by an arrogance of power, placing their own security in jeopardy by their own hands, and ignoring history and its inevitable laws. The moment this bill becomes law, though Congress is accustomed, in a weak democracy, to being the ones who direct and control the military, the power roles will reverse: Congress will no longer be directing and in charge of the military: rather, the military will be directing and in charge of individual Congressional leaders, as well as in charge of everyone else — as any Parliamentarian in any society who handed this power over to the military can attest.

Perhaps Congress assumes that it will always only be ‘they’ who are targeted for arrest and military detention: but sadly, Parliamentary leaders are the first to face pressure, threats, arrest and even violence when the military obtains to power to make civilian arrests and hold civilians in military facilities without due process. There is no exception to this rule. Just as I traveled the country four years ago warning against the introduction of torture and secret prisons – and confidently offering a hundred thousand dollar reward to anyone who could name a nation that allowed torture of the ‘other’ that did not eventually turn this abuse on its own citizens — (confident because I knew there was no such place) — so today I warn that one cannot name a nation that gave the military the power to make civilian arrests and hold citizens in military detention, that did not almost at once turn that power almost against members of that nation’s own political ruling class. This makes sense — the obverse sense of a democracy, in which power protects you; political power endangers you in a militarized police state: the more powerful a political leader is, the more can be gained in a militarized police state by pressuring, threatening or even arresting him or her.

Mussolini, who created the modern template for fascism, was a duly elected official when he started to direct paramilitary forces against Italian citizens: yes, he sent the Blackshirts to beat up journalists, editors, and union leaders; but where did these militarized groups appear most dramatically and terrifyingly, snapping at last the fragile hold of Italian democracy? In the halls of the Italian Parliament. Whom did they physically attack and intimidate? Mussolini’s former colleagues in Parliament — as they sat, just as our Congress is doing, peacefully deliberating and debating the laws. Whom did Hitler’s Brownshirts arrest in the first wave of mass arrests in 1933? Yes, journalists, union leaders and editors; but they also targeted local and regional political leaders and dragged them off to secret prisons and to torture that the rest of society had turned a blind eye to when it had been directed at the ‘other.’ Who was most at risk from assassination or arrest and torture, after show trials, in Stalin’s Russia? Yes, journalists, editors and dissidents: but also physically endangered, and often arrested by militarized police and tortured or worse, were senior members of the Politburo who had fallen out of favor.

Is this intimidation and arrest by the military a vestige of the past? Hardly. We forget in America that all over the world there are militarized societies in which shells of democracy are propped up — in which Parliament meets regularly and elections are held, but the generals are really in charge, just as the Egyptian military is proposing with upcoming elections and the Constitution itself. That is exactly what will take place if Congress gives the power of arrest and detention to the military: and in those societies if a given political leader does not please the generals, he or she is in physical danger or subjected to military arrest. Whom did John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, say he was directed to intimidate and threaten when he worked as a ‘jackal’, putting pressure on the leadership in authoritarian countries? Latin American parliamentarians who were in the position to decide the laws that affected the well-being of his corporate clients. Who is under house arrest by the military in Myanmar? The political leader of the opposition to the military junta. Malalai Joya is an Afghani parliamentarian who has run afoul of the military and has to sleep in a different venue every night — for her own safety. An on, and on, in police states — that is, countries with military detention of civilians — that America is about to join.

US Congresspeople and Senators may think that their power protects them from the treacherous wording of Amendments 1031 and 1032: but their arrogance is leading them to a blindness that is suicidal. The moment they sign this NDAA into law, history shows that they themselves and their staff are the most physically endangered by it. They will immediately become, not the masters of the great might of the United States military, but its subjects and even, if history is any guide — and every single outcome of ramping up police state powers, unfortunately, that I have warned for years that history points to, has come to pass — sadly but inevitably, its very first targets.

See websites and phone numbers of President and West Marin’s Representative and Senators on Action Alert page.

Senator Feinstein’s speech on her amendment 1126 (rejected).

Facebook page: Nationwide NDAA 2012 Congressional Protest

Friday, Feb 3, 2012, 12-7pm, at Congressional Offices throughout country

Sunday, Feb. 26, 4-5:30 pm
Dance Palace, Point Reyes

Register for Growing Our Future Farmers

Update: Jan 2, 2012

President Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) on Dec. 31, 2011. He attached a signing statement expressing “serious reservations”:

Excerpt: “…I want to clarify that my Administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens. Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a Nation. My Administration will interpret section 1021 in a manner that ensures that any detention it authorizes complies with the Constitution, the laws of war, and all other applicable law…”

[But how will future presidents interpret this aspect of the law? The law gives the President the power to detain Americans without trial but he says he won't use it. One can't help but wonder, then, what is the purpose of this law? The President has already gone further than detained a US citizen without due process of accusation and court, he has killed him. So why wouldn't he use it?]

Carl Levin’s speech in Congress on the Administration’s request to remove language which would have exempted US citizens from the indefinite detainment:

ACLU statement on National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), Dec. 31, 2011.

Excerpts:

The statute is particularly dangerous because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be used by this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any battlefield…

The ACLU believes that any military detention of American citizens or others within the United States is unconstitutional and illegal, including under the NDAA. In addition, the breadth of the NDAA’s detention authority violates international law because it is not limited to people captured in the context of an actual armed conflict as required by the laws of war.

Defense Act Affirms Indefinite Detention of US Citizens, by Matthew Cardinal, Commondreams.org, Dec. 30, 2011.

Excerpts:

David Gespass, president of the National Lawyers Guild, called it an “enormous attack on the U.S. and our heritage” and a “significant step” towards fascism…

Section 1021(e) says the act does not alter any rights of U.S. citizens, meaning that the Bill of Rights of the Constitution remains intact. It might be up to the courts, however, to eventually determine whether the application of these NDAA provisions to a U.S. citizen would be constitutional.

However, if they are being detained indefinitely with no lawyer, then how does anyone know they are there, to appeal to the civilian courts on their behalf?

Another section says “the requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States”. It does not say military custody is not an option; merely that it is not required.

Section 1021 defines who can be detained by the military.

The definition of “covered persons” under the provision includes not only those who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2011, but also “a person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including anyone who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.”

Critics say problems with this language include the vagueness of the terms “substantial support”, “belligerent act”, or “directly supported”…

Update- 21 Dec 2011
Jonathan Turley, law professor at George Washington University Law School, on Washington Journal, Dec. 19, 2011, discussing privacy and indefinite detention:

Part 1: surveillance, privacy, GPS tracking, “citizens have no expectation of privacy,” drones in US…

Part2: President asserts power to assassinate Americans on his discretion, arrest Americans without charge or review indefinitely, privacy vrs possible terrorism, privacy vrs anonymity

Part3: necessity of independent judiciary, people need to organize as a citizenry

Update- 20 Dec 2011

Diane Feinstein has introduced, with other Senators,  a new bill- the Due Process Guarantee Act of 2011- to clarify the unclearly worded indefinite detention clause in the MDAA, Military Defense Authorization Act of 2011. That Act, known also as S 1867 and HR 1540, passed the Senate on Dec. 1, 2011 and the House on Dec. 14, 2011.

Learn more about this new Due Process Guarantee bill on Thomas and track it on GovTrack.us, when it gets assigned a number. Email and call  Senator Feinstein,   Senator Boxer and Representative Woolsey and ask them to support it!

Here is some of the wording:

10  ‘‘(b)(1) An authorization to use military force, a dec-

11   laration of war, or any similar authority shall not author

12   ize the detention without charge or trial of a citizen or
13   lawful permanent resident of the United States appre

14  hended in the United States, unless an Act of Congress
15   expressly authorizes such detention.
16   ‘‘(2) Paragraph (1) applies to an authorization to use
17   military force, a declaration of war, or any similar author
18   ity enacted before, on, or after the date of the enactment
19   of the Due Process Guarantee Act of 2011.’’

More on recent history of Senator Feinstein and the issue of  indefinite detention:

Every accused citizen deserves a trial - San Francisco Chronicle, Dec 12, 2011

Editorial: A fight for rule of law, even for terror suspects - San Francisco Chronicle, Dec 1, 2011

Feinstein, Rand Paul fight indefinite detentions – San Francisco Chronicle, Nov. 30, 2011

*   *   *

The US Senate has approved the Defense Authorization Act, S-1867, 93-7, without any amendment exempting US citizens from its coverage.

Holding US citizens without being charged or without a trial and using the military on US soil is against American historical precedent and against our American principles. It’s also against the Constitution!

See which Senators voted for and against it at gov.track.us. Note Senators Boxer and Feinstein voted FOR it.

As of  Dec 14, Obama has said that he will NOT veto it, whereas previously he has said he would veto it.

Call Pres Obama and demand that he veto it.

Pres Obama’s Comment line: 202-456-1111. Email President Obama

See more about the specifics of the bill:

Three myths about the detention bill, Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com, Dec. 16, 2011

Obama to sign indefinite detention bill into law, Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com, 15 Dec 2011

Politics Over Principle, New York Times Editorial, 15 Dec 2011

Sen Mark Kirk, R Illinois, on why Senators shouldn’t vote for it (Kirk ended up voting FOR it…)

ACLU: Senators Demand the Military Lock Up of American Citizens in a “Battlefield” They Define as Being Right Outside Your Window

Excerpts:

In support of this harmful bill, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) explained that the bill will “basically say in law for the first time that the homeland is part of the battlefield” and people can be imprisoned without charge or trial “American citizen or not.” Another supporter, Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) also declared that the bill is needed because “America is part of the battlefield.”

UPDATE: Don’t be confused by anyone claiming that the indefinite detention legislation does not apply to American citizens. It does. There is an exemption for American citizens from the mandatory detention requirement (section 1032 of the bill), but no exemption for American citizens from the authorization to use the military to indefinitely detain people without charge or trial (section 1031 of the bill). So, the result is that, under the bill, the military has the power to indefinitely imprison American citizens, but it does not have to use its power unless ordered to do so.

Watch goings-on at Congress at Thomas.gov.

Voice your disapproval of the Defense Authorization Act, S1867, which allows the military to operate in the US, detaining, without charge or trial, individuals who they deem to be “terrorists.”

Phone numbers of Senators

Call your Senators today and express outrage!

Senator Boxer (CA): 1-202-224-3553

Senator Feinstein (CA): 1-202-224-3841

Senator Levin (D-Michigan): 1-202-224-6221

Senator McCain (R-Arizona): 1-202-224-2235

Really Senators, do we have to watch you every minute?

Occupy Oakland Press Conference, Dec . 9, 2011(video)

From Occupy Oakland:

Port Shutdown Updates… One Day Away!

December 10, 2011

• Organizers are hearing from ILWU rank and file of local 10 in the Bay Area that they are being told by their local president NOT to cross the picket line on Monday. This is a major victory and is in line with the long history of the ILWU respecting community picket lines
• Oakland Educators Association has endorsed the 12.12.11 call to Blockade the Ports and will be participating in the action. Read their statement here.
• Iraq Veterans Against the War has also endorsed the action and will be participating. Read their statement here.

Further Reading:

Numerous articles have been posted online explaining the context for the blockade and the relationship with organized labor.

Counterpunch: From Camps to Ports: Wall Street on the Waterfront

Salon.com: Occupy Vs Big Labor

Occupied Oakland Tribune: A Reply to Cal Winslow on the West Coast Port Shutdown

Workers World: Solidarity of Labor Above All Else

Occupy Marin

Have We Become a Police State?

by Jan R. Markle

22 Nov 2011

Disturbing images of recent clashes all over the country between police in riot gear and peaceful assemblies of Occupy Movement protestors can’t help but indelibly occupy our minds.

26 journalists have been arrested, 10 during an Occupy Wall Street protest in NYC, Nov 15, despite wearing visible press credentials. NY City council members, students, women, seniors, a priest, a pregnant woman (who since miscarried) and even a woman in a wheel chair, have been targets of the police at various Occupy protests.

The most recent video of Lt. John Pike strolling casually while pepperspraying peaceful UC Davis students sitting with their heads bowed has gone viral and has sparked outrage and demands that the police brutality stop.

Most viewers of these images can’t help but ask, have we lost the right to peaceably assemble?

First amendment to the Constitution:

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.

“The right to petition government for redress of grievances is the right to make a complaint to, or seek the assistance of, one’s government, without fear of punishment or reprisals.” -Wikipedia.org

Randy L. Rasmussen, Occupy Portland, 17 Nov 2011

Update 24 Nov 2011:

UC Davis Pepper-Spray Incident Reveals Weakness Up Top, by Matt Taibbi, Taibblog, Rolling Stone, 22 Nov 2011

Excerpt:

…most of us are insisting that the law should apply equally to everyone, while the people running this country for years now have been operating according to the completely opposite principle that different people have different rights, and who deserves what protections is a completely subjective matter, determined by those in power, on a case-by-case basis.

The roots of the UC-Davis pepper-spraying, by Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com, 20 Nov 2011

Excerpt:

The intent and effect of such abuse is that it renders those guaranteed freedoms meaningless. If a population becomes bullied or intimidated out of exercising rights offered on paper, those rights effectively cease to exist.

U.S. now a Police State? Or fully weaponized Military State?, by Brad Fiedman, The Brad Blog, 18 Nov 2011, update: 19 nov 2011

More from the Web

Too Much Violence and Pepper Spray at the OWS Protests: The Videos and Pictures, by Garance Franke-Ruta, Sr. Editor, The Atlantic, 19 Nov 2011.

“Gas mask? In a Rally? In America? I didn’t like the sound of it!“[video], – Daniel Ellsberg, UC Berkeley Occupy Protest, Nov 17, 2011.

How Painful Is Pepper Spray?, by Meredith Melnik, Time Healthland, 22 Nov 2011.

“Shoot me! I’m recording you! Shoot me!”-videographer Neil Rivas, in response to officers pulling their guns after beating Kayvan Sabehgi, Iraq War veteran, and rupturing his spleen, Nov.2, 2011.

“Beat Poets, not beat poets!”

Our own former Poet Laureate of the US and current professor of Poetry and Poetics at UC Berkeley, Robert Haas, relates his and his wife’s experiences of being beaten while at a protest on the UC Berkeley campus. 70 years old this year, with a PhD in English from Stanford, one wouldn’t exactly deem Haas enough of a threat to police to require a violent response.

 Poet-Bashing Police, by Robert Haas, NY Times, 19 Nov 2011.

LIFE, I found myself thinking as a line of Alameda County deputy sheriffs in Darth Vader riot gear formed a cordon in front of me on a recent night on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, is full of strange contingencies.  The deputy sheriffs, all white men, except for one young woman, perhaps Filipino, who was trying to look severe but looked terrified, had black truncheons in their gloved hands that reporters later called batons and that were known, in the movies of my childhood, as billy clubs.

The first contingency that came to mind was the quick spread of the Occupy movement. The idea of occupying public space was so appealing that people in almost every large city in the country had begun to stake them out, including students at Berkeley, who, on that November night, occupied the public space in front of Sproul Hall, a gray granite Beaux-Arts edifice that houses the registrar’s offices and, in the basement, the campus police department.

It is also the place where students almost 50 years ago touched off the Free Speech Movement, which transformed the life of American universities by guaranteeing students freedom of speech and self-governance. The steps are named for Mario Savio, the eloquent undergraduate student who was the symbolic face of the movement. There is even a Free Speech Movement Cafe on campus where some of Mr. Savio’s words are prominently displayed: “There is a time … when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part. You can’t even passively take part.”

Earlier that day a colleague had written to say that the campus police had moved in to take down the Occupy tents and that students had been “beaten viciously.” I didn’t believe it. In broad daylight? And without provocation? So when we heard that the police had returned, my wife, Brenda Hillman, and I hurried to the campus. I wanted to see what was going to happen and how the police behaved, and how the students behaved. If there was trouble, we wanted to be there to do what we could to protect the students.

Once the cordon formed, the deputy sheriffs pointed their truncheons toward the crowd. It looked like the oldest of military maneuvers, a phalanx out of the Trojan War, but with billy clubs instead of spears. The students were wearing scarves for the first time that year, their cheeks rosy with the first bite of real cold after the long Californian Indian summer. The billy clubs were about the size of a boy’s Little League baseball bat. My wife was speaking to the young deputies about the importance of nonviolence and explaining why they should be at home reading to their children, when one of the deputies reached out, shoved my wife in the chest and knocked her down.

Another of the contingencies that came to my mind was a moment 30 years ago when Ronald Reagan’s administration made it a priority to see to it that people like themselves, the talented, hardworking people who ran the country, got to keep the money they earned. Roosevelt’s New Deal had to be undealt once and for all. A few years earlier, California voters had passed an amendment freezing the property taxes that finance public education and installing a rule that required a two-thirds majority in both houses of the Legislature to raise tax revenues. My father-in-law said to me at the time, “It’s going to take them 50 years to really see the damage they’ve done.” But it took far fewer than 50 years.

My wife bounced nimbly to her feet. I tripped and almost fell over her trying to help her up, and at that moment the deputies in the cordon surged forward and, using their clubs as battering rams, began to hammer at the bodies of the line of students. It was stunning to see. They swung hard into their chests and bellies. Particularly shocking to me — it must be a generational reaction — was that they assaulted both the young men and the young women with the same indiscriminate force. If the students turned away, they pounded their ribs. If they turned further away to escape, they hit them on their spines.

NONE of the police officers invited us to disperse or gave any warning. We couldn’t have dispersed if we’d wanted to because the crowd behind us was pushing forward to see what was going on. The descriptor for what I tried to do is “remonstrate.” I screamed at the deputy who had knocked down my wife, “You just knocked down my wife, for Christ’s sake!” A couple of students had pushed forward in the excitement and the deputies grabbed them, pulled them to the ground and cudgeled them, raising the clubs above their heads and swinging. The line surged. I got whacked hard in the ribs twice and once across the forearm. Some of the deputies used their truncheons as bars and seemed to be trying to use minimum force to get people to move. And then, suddenly, they stopped, on some signal, and reformed their line. Apparently a group of deputies had beaten their way to the Occupy tents and taken them down. They stood, again immobile, clubs held across their chests, eyes carefully meeting no one’s eyes, faces impassive. I imagined that their adrenaline was surging as much as mine.

My ribs didn’t hurt very badly until the next day and then it hurt to laugh, so I skipped the gym for a couple of mornings, and I was a little disappointed that the bruises weren’t slightly more dramatic. It argued either for a kind of restraint or a kind of low cunning in the training of the police. They had hit me hard enough so that I was sore for days, but not hard enough to leave much of a mark. I wasn’t so badly off. One of my colleagues, also a poet, Geoffrey O’Brien, had a broken rib. Another colleague, Celeste Langan, a Wordsworth scholar, got dragged across the grass by her hair when she presented herself for arrest.

I won’t recite the statistics, but the entire university system in California is under great stress and the State Legislature is paralyzed by a minority of legislators whose only idea is that they don’t want to pay one more cent in taxes. Meanwhile, students at Berkeley are graduating with an average indebtedness of something like $16,000. It is no wonder that the real estate industry started inventing loans for people who couldn’t pay them back.

“Whose university?” the students had chanted. Well, it is theirs, and it ought to be everyone else’s in California. It also belongs to the future, and to the dead who paid taxes to build one of the greatest systems of public education in the world.

The next night the students put the tents back up. Students filled the plaza again with a festive atmosphere. And lots of signs. (The one from the English Department contingent read “Beat Poets, not beat poets.”) A week later, at 3:30 a.m., the police officers returned in force, a hundred of them, and told the campers to leave or they would be arrested. All but two moved. The two who stayed were arrested, and the tents were removed. On Thursday afternoon when I returned toward sundown to the steps to see how the students had responded, the air was full of balloons, helium balloons to which tents had been attached, and attached to the tents was kite string. And they hovered over the plaza, large and awkward, almost lyrical, occupying the air.

Move Your Money
Bank Transfer Day

Sat, Nov 5, 2011

Move your money from a big bank to a community credit union.
Nov. 5 is the date for transferring your money or
declaration of intent to do so.

Move Your Money Project on Facebook

West Marin Move Your Money

Sign petition and join other community members requesting Redwood Credit Union to open a branch or ATM  in Point Reyes.
Sign declaration of intent to move your money, come to
photo shoot:
Saturday, Nov 5
12 noon
(Point Reyes Commons, across from Wells Fargo)

Occupy Marin
Move Your Money Rally,
and
General Assembly

Nov 5, Noon-4 pm
Public square next to B of A,
4th St. San Rafael

MoveOn.org of Marin is also sponsoring the
Move Your Money demonstration in San Rafael
at the public square on 4th Street at 12 noon.

]]> http://transitionwestmarin.wordpress.com/2011/11/03/move-your-money/feed/ 1 transitionwestmarin bankcrimeshouldn'tpay http://transitionwestmarin.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/strike-in-oakland/ http://transitionwestmarin.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/strike-in-oakland/#comments Sun, 30 Oct 2011 06:22:19 +0000 transitionwestmarin http://transitionwestmarin.wordpress.com/?p=4449 ]]>

occupyoakland.org/strike

photo by Brindl Markle

Photo by Jan R. Markle

Oct. 23, 2011, Point Reyes Station

Occupy Point Reyes,  in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, New York City, San Francisco, and other cities and towns across the US and worldwide,  meets Sunday mornings, 11 am at the Commons, across the street from the Wells Fargo bank.

Visit occupypoint reyes.org to:

• read what went on during the last  meeting

• join a working group (Banking, Policy (i.e. Glass-Steagall Act of 1933), Outreach/Education, Environmental , ‘Connect Your Personal Feelings to Current Events’

• sign a petition to plan to move your money to a credit union with 150 other West Marin residents on Nov. 5, 2011

Next meeting: Oct. 30, 11 am, Point Reyes Commons, across from Wells Fargo.

There will be a discussion of where do we go from here and what can we do on a local level?

RSVP please 663-1380 or email binggong at sonic dot net. Bring flashlights.

The Occupy Everywhere movement is now happening
in over 80 countries with more than 1350 cities in the US!!

In one week Occupy SF grew from about 400 to about 4000 people.  There are folks sleeping at the Federal Reserve  and there are events every day throughout the city.  The march to City Hall on Saturday’s Global Day of Solidarity was described as fun, positive and inspiring by Point Reyes representatives with witty and handmade signs, music and lively debate about solutions.

Occupy SF is also working to take money out of large financial institutions.  Bing Gong has a sign up sheet for anyone interested in carpools for the next collective actions in SF.  For more information visit www.occupysf.com.

Take Our Money Back 

In our first meeting last week, we decided to focus on taking our money out of the international commercial banking institutions like Wells Fargo in Point Reyes.  We are considering alternatives such as Redwood Credit Union and small community banks, as well as models from the Slow Money movement for local investments.
Bing Gong has started a petition of West Marin residents who are willing to switch to Redwood Credit Union with a local presence, branch, or ATM in the future.  Please contact binggong at sonic dot net for more information.

Redwood Credit Union is a full service institution, a cooperative, and
a credit union which services North Bay counties. They are insured with the US government.  With a $10-$15 banking account, customers become shareholders with oversight about revenue distribution.
Redwood Credit Union is not for profit, which means revenues are invested in the local North Bay communities and/or revenues return to “shareholders” as low fees and credit rates.

MMOB,“Mainstreet Moms,” have several testimonies about the positive
relationship they have with Redwood Credit Union.  Individuals have creative approaches such as a small account at Wells Fargo for access to emergency cash or check cashing, while the rest of their money is with RCU.  Our neighbors have volunteered to run deposits to Petaluma every week until we can conjure a local branch or ATM.

Right now, RCU is opening 6-10 new accounts every day, as the Occupy movement encourages people to take control of their money nationwide in credit unions and publically-controlled institutions.

November 5th is a national date for removing our money from these banks.  This date may not work for everyone, but we encourage as many people as possible to act now to create momentum!!

We need a Working Group to investigate more banking options.  We need more facts about RCU and Bank of Marin.  We need representatives to announce their findings at our General Assembly meetings.  Please contact [West Marin Commons] Soapbox if you are interested in participating in this Working Group.