JANUARY 2006

Doremus Jessup, editor of the Fort Beulah The Daily Informer, in Sinclair Lewis' famous book "It Can't Happen Here", at its conclusion, after imprisonment and torture escaped and "drove out, saluted by the meadow larks, and onward all day, to a hidden cabin in the Northern Woods where quiet men awaited news of freedom.....still Doremus goes on, into the sunrise, for a Doremus Jessup can never die......
are they waking up atlast?
Senate Blocks Extension of Patriot Act
    By Jesse J. Holland
    The Associated Press

    Friday 16 December 2005

    Washington - The Senate on Friday rejected attempts to
reauthorize several provisions of the USA Patriot Act as infringing
too much on Americans' privacy and liberty, dealing a huge defeat to
the Bush administration and Republican leaders.

    In a crucial vote early Friday, the bill's Senate supporters
were not able to get the 60 votes needed to overcome a threatened
filibuster by Sens. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and Larry Craig, R-Idaho,
and their allies. The final vote was 52-47.

    President Bush, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and
Republicans congressional leaders had lobbied fiercely to make most
of the expiring Patriot Act provisions permanent, and add new
safeguards and expiration dates to the two most controversial parts:
roving wiretaps and secret warrants for books, records and other
items from businesses, hospitals and organizations such as libraries.

    Feingold, Craig and other critics said that wasn't enough, and
have called for the law to be extended in its present form so they
can continue to try and add more civil liberties safeguards. But
Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and House Speaker Dennis
Hastert have said they won't accept a short-term extension of the
law.

    If a compromise is not reached, the 16 Patriot Act provisions
expire on Dec. 31.

    Frist changed his vote at the last moment after seeing the
critics would win. He decided to vote with the prevailing side so he
could call for a new vote at any time. He immediately objected to an
offer of a short term extension from Democrats, saying the House
won't approve it and the president won't sign it.

    "We have more to fear from terrorism than we do from this
Patriot Act," Frist warned.

    If the Patriot Act provisions expire, Republicans say they will
place the blame on Democrats in next year's midterm elections. "In
the war on terror, we cannot afford to be without these vital tools
for a single moment," White House press secretary Scott McClellan
said. "The time for Democrats to stop standing in the way has come."

    But the Patriot Act's critics got a boost from a New York Times
report saying Bush authorized the National Security Agency to
monitor the international phone calls and international e-mails of
hundreds - perhaps thousands - of people inside the United States.
Previously, the NSA typically limited its domestic surveillance to
foreign embassies and missions and obtained court orders for such
investigations.

    "I don't want to hear again from the attorney general or anyone
on this floor that this government has shown it can be trusted to
use the power we give it with restraint and care," said Feingold,
the only senator to vote against the Patriot Act in 2001.

    "It is time to have some checks and balances in this country,"
shouted Sen. Patrick Leahy, ranking Democrat on the Judiciary
Committee. "We are more American for doing that."

WAR ON THE PRESS
Robert W. McChesney, President, Free Press,
www.freepress.net.
Dec. 7, 2005

A host of recent developments have made it clear that the Bush White House is doing battle against the journalistic standards and practices that underpin of our democracy. With its unprecedented campaign to undermine and stifle independent journalism, Bush & Co. have demonstrated brazen contempt for the Constitution and considerable fear of an informed public.

Free Press has launched a campaign to chronicle and combat Bush’s war on the press. Today, we published a new report showing the scope and intensity of the administration’s assault on press freedoms. The growing list of attacks on the press is truly astonishing:

Infiltrating Public Broadcasting
White House loyalists inside the Corporation for Public Broadcasting have launched a crusade to remake PBS, NPR and other public media into official mouthpieces. Kenneth Tomlinson’s tenure at the CPB was characterized by targeting journalists like Bill Moyers who dared to air dissenting voices or prepare investigative reports on the administration.

Tomlinson's goal was clearly to fire a shot across the bow of all public stations so managers would shy away from the sort of investigative journalism that might expose Bush administration malfeasance. Tomlinson resigned in disgrace but left behind a cast of cronies to carry out his partisan crusade. And we still don't know the extent to which Karl Rove and others at the White House orchestrated his efforts.

Manufacturing Fake News
Under Bush administration directives, at least 20 federal agencies have produced and distributed scores of "video news releases" out of a $254 million slush fund set up to manufacture taxpayer-funded propaganda. These bogus and deceptive stories have been broadcast on TV stations nationwide without any acknowledgment that they were prepared by the government rather than local journalists.

The segments — which trumpeted administration “successes,” promoted its controversial line on issues like overhauling Medicare, and featured Americans "thanking" Bush — have been repeatedly labeled "covert propaganda" by investigators at the Government Accountability Office.

Bribing Journalists
The administration has paid pundits to sing its praises. Earlier this year, TV commentator Armstrong Williams pocketed $240,000 in taxpayer money to laud Bush’s education policies. Three other journalists have since been discovered on the government dole; and Williams admits that he has "no doubt" that other paid Bush shills are still on the loose.

The administration has even exported these tactics. According to the Los Angeles Times, the U.S. military is now secretly paying Iraqi newspapers to publish stories written by American troops.

Lying about the Iraq War
The White House saw the battle for domestic popular opinion as one of the main fronts in the war in Iraq. With the help of a compliant media, truth became the first casualty in their campaign to whip up support. But rather than admit to their lies and misinformation, the administration continues to attack those reporting the truth.

As Frank Rich recently wrote in the New York Times, the administration’s "web of half-truths and falsehoods used to sell the war did not happen by accident; it was woven by design and then foisted on the public by a P.R. operation built expressly for that purpose in the White House."

Eliminating Dissent in the Mainstream Media
Bush has all but avoided traditional press conferences, closing down a prime venue for holding the executive accountable. On those rare occasions when he deigned to meet reporters, presidential aides turned the press conferences into parodies by seating a friendly right-wing “journalist,” former male escort Jeff Gannon, amid the reporters and then steering questions to him when tough issues arose.

They have effectively silenced serious questioners, like veteran journalist Helen Thomas, by refusing to have the president or his aides call on reporters who challenge them. And they have established a hierarchy for journalists seeking interviews with administration officials, which favors networks that give the White House favorable coverage.

Gutting the Freedom of Information Act
The administration has scrapped enforcement of the Freedom of Information Act and has made it harder for reporters to do their jobs by refusing to cooperate with even the most basic requests for comment and data from government agencies. This is part of a broader clampdown on access to information that has made it virtually impossible for journalists to cover vast areas of government activity.

Consolidating Media Control
The administration continues to make common cause with the most powerful broadcast corporations in an effort to rewrite ownership laws in a manner that favors monopoly control of information. The Federal Communications Commission will announce plans to rewrite the ownership rules soon – it could happen as early as February – with aims of unleashing a new wave of media consolidation. The administration’s desired rules changes would strike a mortal blow to local reporting and further squeeze journalists.

In a famous 1945 opinion, Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black said that "the First Amendment rests on the assumption that the widest possible dissemination of information from diverse and antagonistic sources is essential to the welfare of the public, that a free press is a condition of a free society." In other words, a free press is the sine qua non of the entire American Constitution and republican experiment.

We started Free Press because our democracy demands a diverse and independent media. The Bush administration’s attack on the foundations of self-government requires a response of similar caliber. I hope you'll join me in the year ahead as Free Press works to hold the administration accountable for all its attacks on journalism and see that such abuses will not be repeated in the future.

Please take a moment to visit our online campaign to defend democracy from the White House assault on the media.

Onward,

Robert W. McChesney
President
Free Press
www.freepress.net

It's Just A Piece of Paper
By John Burl Smith

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, is a Fourth Amendment right granted by the US Constitution.  Last week (12-15-05), US citizens learned that following September 11, 2001 George W. Bush unilaterally
suspended the Constitution (4th Amendment) and became a dictator.  The New York Times revealed and Bush admitted he authorized the National Security Agency (NSA), without probable cause or a court order, to spy on US citizens.  Although he claimed to have the authority to do so, Bush forced the New York Times to keep quiet about his actions for more than a year.

A year after learning of this illegal government operation, the New York Times says, following 9-11, Vice President Dick Cheney called congressionalow leaders of both parties, which included the chairman and ranking members of the Senate and House intelligence committees, to the White House and briefed them on their plans to suspend the 4th Amendment to spy on US citizens.  It
was not until 2003, when Sen. John D. Rockefeller (D-WV) became vice chairman did anyone on the intelligence committee express concern.

Bush claims Congress' resolution supporting the war on terror, a 2002 Justice Department brief claiming "the Constitution vests in the President inherent authority to conduct surveillance of foreign powers or their agents"and a decision by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review allowing cooperation between prosecutors and intelligence officers granted him powers to violate citizens' constitutional rights and spy on them without any court's authorization.  To the contrary, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who oversees the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court, questioned whether information obtained in this manner could be used, since it was illegally obtained.  Some officials believe warrantless wiretaps inside the US are unlawful and unconstitutional; they amount to illegal searches.  However, like the war of aggression in Iraq, Bush proceeded over their cogent objections.

The problem some members of Congress, watchdog groups, immigrants and civil rights advocates have with any search without a warrant is it erodes personal protections guaranteed by 4th Amendment civil liberties and intrudes on privacy rights.  These concerns are at the heart of opposition to the USA Patriot Act, which expanded domestic surveillance by the FBI to collect information from libraries and the Internet.  Moreover, this is another "foot-in-the-door" that makes spying on protestors easier.  It negates the court ban against the government using public and private
databases to spy on US citizens.

As a survivor of COINTELPRO, Bush's contempt for the Constitution surpasses the dirty tricks of Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover. The lack of an outcry from those who profess to believe in "the rule of law" is most troubling. Those who were victims of COINTELPRO see others reliving the nightmare of having their rights violated by government officials, law enforcement officers, prosecutors and judges, while the media spins government concocted stories of conspiracies to commit terrorist acts, fund terrorist groups and disseminate erroneous information. Even though the truth about COINTELPRO is known, many victims are still imprisoned (Mumia Abu Jamal) or on the run (Shakur Assata). Back then, everyone was like George Bush today, "Damn the Constitution, it's just a fucking piece of paper!"
thedish@ga.net