PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet (by Fight for the Future)
Editor emeritus Stephen Squibb appears on Countdown with Keith Olbermann from Current.TV - Tuesday, October 11, 2011 - to talk about Occupy Boston. He starts around 9:40.
(video via thinkingliberal)
“Why is Washington so obsessed with Assange?”
“It is power taking its revenge. Assange has made government transparency a moral issue and made people aware that classification and secrecy serve to hide government crimes and deception. This has empowered whistleblowers.”
“Won’t there be other whistleblowers?”
“Not without Wikileaks. Formerly, whistleblowers would release documents to the media. However, whistleblowers have learned that the law that was enacted to protect them is not obeyed in the post-9/11 environment, and the media has learned that the First Amendment has lost much of its authority. It has become too dangerous for whistleblowers to step forward. Moreover, whistleblowers have learned that even the New York Times first checks with the government before the paper prints a leak. Remember, the Times sat for one year on the leak from NSA that the Bush administration was violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and spying on Americans without obtaining warrants from the FISA court. The Times published only after Bush was reelected. Wikileaks is the only way whistleblowers can get the word out.”
“You mean if the government convicts Assange, it is the end of Wikileaks?”
“Yes. If Assange is convicted of spying, then ipso-facto a successor would be a spy. The ability of whistleblowers to bring accountability to government is about to disappear.”
Commie double team! Young Che and young Castro. Before the beardy, cigar smoking, Cola drinking days.
Susana Baca, the acclaimed singer and soul of Afro-Peruano music, became the first black cabinet minister of independent Peru when she was sworn in as minister of culture on Thursday by the country’s new president, Ollanta Humala. Baca, 67, is revered for mixing Andean and African rhythms and has played a key role in the revival of Afro-Peruano music and dance — folkloric traditions long sidelined in Peru.



