Here's a quick analysis of the possible impact of the USDOJ antitrust decision:

The acquisition by ES&S of Diebold's Premier Election Solutions has been (supposedly) nixed by the US Department of Justice on antitrust grounds.

However, the DOJ erred by not acting promptly to protect the Premier Elections operation from being gutted by ES&S.

The Dept. of Justice claims that the deal flew under the radar so they couldn't stop the pillaging of Premier in time. That's not the case. The records will show that the Dept. of Justice had received -- and acknowledged -- formal complaints in time to put a protective halt on the mass firings of Premier employees.

HERE'S WHY THIS ERROR IS SO SIGNIFICANT:

The USDOJ failed to act to protect the assets of Diebold's Premier Elections unit, resulting in the problem that they now cannot mandate full divestiture of Premier by ES&S, and instead have ordered ES&S to remove itself from Premier's current locations only partially -- or perhaps, not at all.

March 6, 2010, By Joan Brunwasser

For a long time, I've been fascinated by the MRFF, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, especially after I read founder Mikey Weinstein's book. I recently learned that best-selling author and former evangelical Frank Schaeffer is on their advisory board. I interviewed him several months ago, so I invited him back today. Welcome to OpEdNews, Frank. Let's start at the very beginning. Can you tell our readers what MRFF is?

MRFF's role is to ensure that our government does indeed adhere to the spirit as well as the letter of the Constitution; that it leads by example when it comes to not allowing the military to become a place where religion takes residence as if in a church! Mikey Weinstein, who founded it, has a passion to protect us from the pitfall of allowing fundamentalists to hijack our military in order to 1) convert soldiers and 2) use our military as a platform for missionary work world-wide.

SOURCE: OpEdNews

February 23, 2010 By Joan Brunwasser

More Ellsberg: The Pentagon Papers and John Dean, Then and Now

My guest today is "the most dangerous man* in America" whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg. When you released the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times, you knew that you could be facing life in prison. Luckily, that turned out not to be the case. But, if you were to have done comparable actions since the passage of the Patriot Act, they would have tossed you in prison and thrown away the key. That's a sobering, concrete example of where we are almost forty years later. Do you ever think about that?

Good question. Actually, although (unknown to me and almost everyone else) the prior law was on my side in 1971-73, I came pretty close to spending 115 years in prison then. With good behavior, I would have gotten out (after 35 years) in 2008. It took a lot of luck, and a handful of individuals who told the truth (John Dean about the burglary, someone in the FBI about the electronic overhearing) to overcome the attempts of the president to bribe my judge with the directorship of the FBI.

And even before the Patriot Act, the trend of legal opinions--the terrible judgments in the Samuel Loring Morison case in 1984, an increasing disregard of legislative history which had weighed against using the Espionage Act as an Official Secrets Act--was against the chances for a future leaker of classified information. The Patriot Act itself didn't affect this situation that much. It doesn't include an Official Secrets Act--almost by oversight--though another 9-11 could almost surely get us one, even from Obama.

However, the Patriot Act and related legislation do have the effect of legalizing most of the actual crimes against me by Nixon. Sneak-and-peek entries and burglaries of a doctor's office, in search of information to use against a "terrorist suspect"? (i.e., someone like me who opposes and resists a president's terrorism). Legal, now. Warrantless wiretaps? Legal. Use of CIA against an American citizen? Legal.

SOURCE: OpEdNews

February 17, 2010 Annette Vander Ploeg: We Were First Responders to Haiti's Earthquake

By Joan Brunwasser

Welcome to OpEdNews, Annette. Last month, you were either in the right place at the right time or the wrong place at the wrong time. Please tell our readers why you were in Haiti in the first place.

I was one of 23 people who were on a team sponsored by Little by Little, (liitlebylittlehaiti.org) a nonprofit foundation focusing on pediatric medical care. Started by Sue Walsh, a nurse practitioner who teaches at UIC, groups of medical personnel (and non-medical, like myself) have been going several times a year for five years. This was my first year. We had been there a week, planning on leaving the 13th when the quake hit on the 12th.

Deprivation of rights under color of law is a well-recognized, if not frequently prosecuted crime. Indeed, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has a comprehensive explanation and some interesting statistical data, including a list of the most common categories in which these crimes occur:

• excessive force;

• sexual assaults;

• false arrest and fabrication of evidence;

• deprivation of property; and

• failure to keep from harm.

However, that's not the topic I want to address today. I want to focus on what I call "deprivation of rights under cover of law." But, first it seems important to consider what "deprivation" means.

SOURCE: Alternet.org

BY Chris Hedges

The Obama Brand: Feel Good While Overlords Loot the Treasury and Launch Imperial Wars | Brand Obama makes us hopeful. We like our president and we believe he's like us. But we're being duped into doing a lot of things that are not in our interest.

January 25, 2010

Editor's Note: The following is an adapted excerpt from Chris Hedges' book, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle (Nation Books, 2009) that first appeared in Tikkun magazine.

Barack Obama is a brand. And the Obama brand is designed to make us feel good about our government while corporate overlords loot the Treasury, armies of corporate lobbyists grease the palms of our elected officials, our corporate media diverts us with gossip and trivia, and our imperial wars expand in the Middle East. Brand Obama is about being happy consumers. We are entertained. We feel hopeful. We like our president. We believe he is like us. But like all branded products spun out from the manipulative world of corporate advertising, this product is duping us into doing and supporting a lot of things that are not in our interest.

SOURCE: OpEdNews

ebruary 1, 2010

Roger Shuler on Recent Supreme Court Decision

By Joan Brunwasser

Roger Shuler is an Alabama journalist and The Legal Schnauzer blogger. Welcome back to OpEdNews. The big news of late is the recent Supreme Court decision striking down limits on corporate campaign contributions. Everyone feels strongly about it. How about you, Roger?

My primary interest is how it possibly reflects on the apparent political prosecutions of the George W. Bush Justice Department. In the Paul Minor case in Mississippi, Minor's attorneys have already raised the Citizens United v. FEC ruling in their motion for reconsideration with the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.All sidesseem to agree that a quid pro quo--something for something deal--remains illegal. But Minor's attorneys argue that there was no quid pro quo in his case, and the jury instruction did not require one. Therefore, based on Citizens United, the prosecution and conviction that Minor faced was aviolation of his First Amendment rights.

SOURCE: WMUR

Anti-Gay Group Outnumbered By Counter-Protesters
3 Members Of Group Raise Signs Outside Concord High School

POSTED: 12:14 pm EST January 4, 2010

CONCORD, N.H. -- Members of a Kansas group advocating hatred of gays were far outnumbered by counter-protesters outside Concord High School on Monday.

The group the Westboro Baptist Church had planned a demonstration against New Hampshire's new same-sex marriage law. Only three members of the group appeared outside Concord High School, where they were met by students, staff and members of the community.

Because of the group's strong views and inflammatory rhetoric, police were present, but at the high school it remained a war of words and signs, much to the relief of the principal, who said he feared some sort of verbal confrontation.

"The awkward part is that this was planned for the first day back, so there was no real opportunity to the kids beforehand," said Principal Gene Connolly.

SOURCE:BlueHampshire

200 Years and Counting--Adultery in New Hampshire Still a Crime

by: hannah

Mon Dec 21, 2009 at 07:27:51 AM EST

But, not much longer, if Representatives Horrigan, D-Durham, and McGuire, R-Epsom can get the Legislature to approve the bill they have filed to repeal the criminal statute. The Associated Press story has been picked up coast to coast and border to border. So, in an effort to avoid repetition, let me suggest a slightly different perspective on what's appropriate for the coercive powers of the state to address and what not.

Read More

SOURCE: OpEdNews

December 17, 2009

Healthcare: First They Came for the Banksters

By Thom Hartmann

With apologies to Pastor Niemoeller:

First they came for the banksters, and showered them with money and put them in the Administration in a way that was not change we could believe in.

Then they came for the military industrial complex, and sent more and more of our children to die in faraway lands that had never attacked us in a way that was not change we could believe in.

And now they've sold out our hope for a national health care system not run by millionaire gangsters in suits. And who is left to speak for us?

President Obama is playing the Bill Clinton game of throwing people a bone and telling them it's steak. Perhaps he's doing it because he thinks it's his only choice; perhaps it's because he's surrounded himself with Bill Clinton advisors (and Hillary as Secretary of State); whatever the reason, while it worked for Clinton, it won't work for Obama.

SOURCE: Salon.com

By Glenn Greenwald

In September, I interviewed Rep. Alan Grayson about the unconstitutionality of Congress' attempt to de-fund ACORN, and a couple of weeks later, examined Supreme Court precedent -- principally the 1946 case of U.S. v. Lovett -- that left little doubt that the Congressional war on ACORN violated the Constitutional ban on "bills of attainder."  Yesterday, in a lawsuit brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights, Federal District Judge Nina Gershon of the Eastern District of New York found Congress' de-funding of ACORN unconstitutional and enjoined its enforcement.  This is a major victory not only for ACORN, but also for the Constitution.

In a failed state, the government’s priorities are totally separate from those of the people. The US can’t afford health care or a bailout for jobless homeowners, but it can afford a pointless war and multi-million dollar bonuses for banksters who wrecked the economy.

SOURCE: Counterpunch.com

The Twin Frauds of Obama

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

Goldman Sachs senior executives are arming themselves with New York gun permits, according to Alice Schroeder on Bloomberg.com. The banksters “are now equipped to defend themselves if there is a populist uprising against the bank.”

One can understand why the banksters are worried. The company, now known as Gold Sacks, has a large responsibility for the financial crisis and the fraudulent “securities” that wrecked the world economy and Americans’ pensions. A former Gold Sachs CEO had control of the US Treasury during the Bush regime from which he diverted $750 billion to bail out the banks, thus supplying them with free capital. Gold Sachs made $27,000 million during the first three quarters of 2009 and is paying out massive bonuses, leaving the busted taxpayers with the debt and interest charges.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

SOURCE: Constitutional Accountability Center

As we await the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, expected any day now, Constitutional Accountability Center (CAC) has continued to build on the scholarly research discussed in our brief filed with the Court:  whether corporations have the same rights as individuals, particularly when it comes to influencing electoral politics in this country.

The result of this work is this discussion draft, tentatively titled “A Capitalist Joker”: Corporations, Corporate Personhood, and the Constitution, which we intend to release more formally in January as the latest installment in our Text & History Narrative Series.  The text of our Constitution never mentions corporations and, as our narrative explains, this was deliberate: the framers wrote and the American people ratified the original Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the three Civil War amendments — the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth — to secure the inalienable rights of “We the People” — living human beings.   Governments create corporations and give them special privileges to fuel economic growth, but with these special privileges come greater government oversight.  Indeed, in the early 20th Century, the American people added the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Amendments to the Constitution, at least in part, to ensure greater governmental control over corporations and less corporate influence over our democracy.

SOURCE: Legal Schnauzer

How has the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) changed now that George W. Bush is gone and President Barack Obama is in charge?

It hasn't changed, says former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman. And that's distressing news for progressives who hoped to see accountability for the Bush officials who used the DOJ as a political weapon.

It's particularly distressing for Siegelman, who is perhaps the most high-profile victim of a Bush-era political prosecution. But what other conclusion can Siegelman reach? He recently saw U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan, an Obama appointment, file a brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court not to hear the Siegelman case.

In so many words, Kagan is saying, "The Bush DOJ, probably at Karl Rove's direction, got the Siegelman case right based on the facts and the law." That is an outrage, and Siegelman seemed to have a hard time controlling his anger in a recent interview with TPM Muckraker. Reports TPM:

"There's really been no substantial change in the heart of the Department of Justice from the Bush-Rove Department of Justice," Siegelman tells TPMmuckraker in an interview.

Siegelman, a Democrat, served roughly nine months in prison after his 2006 bribery conviction. He was ordered released pending appeal in March 2008. The case, which has been dogged by allegations of politicization and prosecutorial misconduct -- including links to Karl Rove -- centers on what the government called a pay-to-play scheme in which Siegelman appointed a large donor to a state regulatory board.

Siegelman has asked the Supreme Court to consider the definition of bribery, arguing that he merely engaged in routine political transactions. But, in the Nov. 13 filing that raised Siegelman's hackles, Obama's solicitor general argued that "corrupt intent" had been established in the trial.

This is what happens when you privatize your government

WTO STILL PARTIES LIKE IT'S 1999
on 10th Anniversary of the Battle in Seattle
Bankers' scheme to re-open finance casino worldwide

Monday, November 30, 2009
by Greg Palast for Ring of Fire

GENEVA — Apparently, one meltdown isn't enough for the World Trade Organization. They meet today in Geneva on the tenth anniversary of the "Battle in Seattle," when tens of thousands of people from around the world protested the organization's practices.