statism watch

Don’t lose heart – we remember.

Related: China begins internet ‘blackout’ ahead of Tiananmen anniversary | Tibet’s best friend? China, of course | Monks taken for ‘re-education’ before Tibet uprising anniversary | Psychiatric treatment used to ’silence’ Chinese critics | Beijing peasants bullied, beaten off of family farms by state-developer blocs | Rounded up into torture camps: the ‘undesirables’ China doesn’t want you to see | Beijing Taxis Are Bugged ‘For Driver Safety’ | Journalists beaten for reporting on separatist attacks in China | Chinese citizens dutifully file protest applications in Beijing, suffer detention | Mass Arrests as Beijing Prepares for Olympics | China creates mobile execution vans, organ theft suspected

Tania Branigan, The Guardian
June 3, 2009

It is 20 years since Ding Zilin stood by her gate and waited for her son. “What came were students with tattered clothes and dishevelled hair, shouting ‘they are killing people, they are shooting at people,’” she recalled.

“The more we watched, the more terrified and desperate we felt … At about five in the morning we saw a car with a flat wooden board on it and a child’s body on the board. When I saw the body of that child I felt my son’s fate was the same, and he would not come back again.”

Her son, Jiang Jielian, 17, was one of hundreds who died that day, shot dead by the People’s Liberation Army on the streets of Beijing. Some believe the death toll in the crackdown on the Tiananmen Square democracy protests stretches into thousands. But no one knows for sure, and Ding’s attempts to list the dead have resulted in two decades of harassment.

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That’s appropriate, considering it’s going to fund economic terrorism, or (if you prefer) asymmetric economic warfare against the world’s citizenry as the largest banks consolidate their power.

Flashback: A Bigger, Bolder Role Is Imagined For the IMF | UK PM reveals G20 plan to boost IMF by $1 trillion, hails new world order (again) | World Bank President Admits Agenda For Global Government | UN & IMF Back Agenda For Global Financial Dictatorship | IMF may need to “print money”, act as “world’s central bank” as crisis spreads

Steve Watson, Infowars.net
June 3, 2009

Passage would see more billions in tax dollars handed to European banks

Democrats in Congress have agreed to provide a $100 billion credit line to the International Monetary Fund, tagging it onto the war supplemental intended for operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq.

The measure would also increase the U.S. member contribution to the IMF by $8 billion and authorize the United States to back the IMF’s plan to sell 400 tons (12.97 million ounces) of gold, according to lawmakers’ aides quoted in a Reuters report.

This would fulfil Obama’s pledge to the G20 in April, to contribute toward a $500 billion boost for the IMF, which it says will go toward “helping poorer nations” during the economic downturn.

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Flashback: Showdown in NSA Wiretap Case: Judge Threatens Sanctions Against Justice Department | NSA Surveillance Exploding, Americans Wiretapped Beyond Congressional Limits | Put NSA in Charge of Cyber Security, Or the Power Grid Gets It | Following Bush lead, Obama moves to block challenge to wiretapping program | NSA Dominance of Cybersecurity Would Lead to ‘Grave Peril’, Ex-Cyber Chief Tells Congress | Obama tries to kill lawsuit challenging wiretapping program, fails | New law to give police access to online exchanges | Whistleblower: NSA even collected credit card records | RCMP to helm a Canadian “cyber-security strategy” | Big brother to track all emails, internet history and telephone calls under UK plan | Bush approves surveillance bill | Sweden approves wiretapping law | Secretive Canadian spy agency to get $62-million HQ | Whistle-Blower: Feds Have a Backdoor Into Wireless Carrier — Congress Reacts

David Kravets, Wired.com
June 3, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge on Wednesday dismissed lawsuits targeting the nation’s telecommunication companies for their participation in President George W. Bush’s once-secret electronic eavesdropping program.

In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker upheld summer legislation protecting the companies from the lawsuits. The legislation, which then-Sen. Barack Obama voted for, also granted the government the authority to monitor American’s telecommunications without warrants if the subject was communicating with somebody overseas suspected of terrorism. [Ed. Note: Not true, they're hoovering up everything.]

Bush acknowledged the so-called Terror Surveillance Program in December 2005, and claimed as chief executive, his war powers gave him the authority to spy without court authorization. [Ed. Note: There was never a declaration of war by congress. Can't have it both ways, fascist.]

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It was good to hear Jesse Brown holding the Conference Board’s feet to the fire the other day on TVO’s Search Engine… plugplug

Flashback: Think tank plagiarizes, pulls report on Canadian piracy | France passes ‘three strikes’ Internet surveillance law | Pirate Bay lawyer calls for retrial after judge confirms ties to copyright groups | ISOHunt points out Google, Yahoo torrent engines too | Obama Administration Claims Copyright Treaty Involves State Secrets | Do We Need a New Internet? | Latest Round of Closed-Door ACTA Copyright Negotiations Wrap Up

Cory Doctorow, BoingBoing.net
June 3, 2009

The Conference Board of Canada’s sellout on copyright just keeps on getting worse. To recap: the Conference Board is a supposedly neutral research outfit that was asked by the Canadian copyright industries to write a report on file-sharing and piracy in Canada. They hit up the Ontario government for $15,000 to fund an event where the findings of the report would be presented.

Then they hired an independent researcher who concluded that there wasn’t anything particularly wrong with Canadian file-sharing. They threw away his research.

Then they plagiarized dodgy press-materials produced by the leading US copyright lobby group, quoting lengthy passages that were factually wrong.

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In case you’ve forgotten what a bang-up job Brown has been doing, we submit the following for your consideration. Brown should be quitting over a lot more than these expense indiscretions, such as helming a number of the most authoritarian measures to come down the pike since England has re-envisioned itself as a surveillance society. A brief sampling – biometric ID cards, the ‘Master the Internet’ tracking/datamining initiative, the creation of a STASI-style class of citizen police and informants, detention without charge, arbitrary stop and search (and fingerprinting!) powers for the police on the street, the criminal DNA database with 1.1 million children registered, Big Brother cameras, … it goes on and on. Canadians might be surprised to learn of some of these initiatives, and not least because of their similarity to certain ideas being kicked around in Ottawa or implemented outright. It could shine a light on the dissolution of our own sovereignty in favour of these Orwellian measures and how they are being pushed at an international level.

Flashback: Gordon Brown chooses pulpit as latest platform to push New World Order | Gordon Brown’s amazing patent cure-all globalization deal | UK: Civil servants attacked for using anti-terror laws to spy on public | Gordon Brown seeks sweeping reforms to give IMF global ’surveillance role’ | UK House of Lords warns over ’surveillance state’ | Gordon Brown calls for new world order to beat recession | Baron Rothschild tags along with Gordon Brown, expects new world order | Brown urges terror plan support | Britain is slithering down the road towards a police state

Frank Prenesti, Matt Falloon, Reuters
June 3, 2009

LONDON – A second British cabinet minister announced she was resigning today, undermining Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s authority and raising doubts about his political future.

Communities minister Hazel Blears’ decision to quit, on the eve of European and local elections in which Brown’s Labour Party faces a rout, followed a similiar move by Britain’s first female interior minister and pre-empted a widely expected cabinet reshuffle.

Blears and Jacqui Smith are the highest profile casualties of disclosures about outlandish, taxpayer-funded expenses claims made by members of parliament at a time when recession is forcing hundreds of thousands out of work.

Both had been tipped for the axe in any reshuffle.

“Today I have told the prime minister that I am resigning from the government,” Blears, who is responsible for local government affairs, said in a statement.

Hard-hit by the expenses scandal, Labour trails the opposition Conservatives by up to 20 points with a parliamentary election due by mid-2010. Brown has pinned any hope of bouncing back on a swift improvement in Britain’s shrinking economy.

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Anyone remember the ‘Young Spies’ in Orwell’s 1984? Those tireless little informants for the police state in cub-scout style uniforms? How does this differ in any substantive way?

Flashback: UK Schoolkids Protest CCTV, Hidden Microphones in Class | Scouts Train to Fight Terrorists, and More | ‘AmeriCorps’ Domestic Paramilitary Propaganda Ad | Lunchtime lockdown to promote healthier eating: T.O. school plan | UK Home Secretary unveils civilian anti-terrorism security force | Schools seek more police as crime drops | Canadian Junior Hockey team gets ‘military training’ | ‘Our People’ stand up for Putin | Vladimir Putin sets up nationalist Russian Youth brigade

The Daily Mail
June 3, 2009

Hundreds of children as young as ten are being urged to spot potential terrorists and shop them to police.

Up to 2,000 are to attend a safety event where a film will tell pupils that extremist views can develop at school.

But critics condemned the initiative as a nightmare extension of the Big Brother state.

Concerns were also raised that children could become subject to police monitoring if their fellow pupils misinterpreted innocent remarks or play.

The Lancashire Police film is being shown in Blackburn as part of its long-running Streetwise event which includes demonstrations on fire safety, water hazards and first aid.

A spokesman said the reference to terrorism could encompass any extremist, including animal rights activists, and not just Islamist fundamentalism.

He said: ‘It’s something we need to be aware of across the country.

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Good work, Ms. Shepherd. Your tireless efforts to keep shining sunlight into the dark holes of the American gulag should be recognized by your profession. As an aside, it’s particularly telling that the US is now holding Chinese political dissidents. In fact, one could be forgiven for thinking the US is remaking itself after the model of the Chinese authoritarian regime. Obama’s election changed nothing.

Flashback: Obama administration: Guantanamo detainees have ‘no constitutional rights’ | Psychiatric treatment used to ’silence’ Chinese critics | Doubt Arises in Account of pre-Olympic ‘Uighur’ Attack in China | CSIS faces review in Khadr case | Rounded up into torture camps: the ‘undesirables’ China doesn’t want you to see | ‘You don’t care about me,’ Omar Khadr sobs in interview tapes | Chinese Torture Techniques Inspired Interrogations at Guantánamo

Michelle Shepherd, Toronto Star
June 3, 2009

WASHINGTON – A Guantanamo Bay detainee committed suicide late Monday just hours after two Chinese Muslim captives staged the detention centre’s first public protest, increasing the pressure on U.S. President Barack Obama to outline his plan of how he will close the offshore prison.

Yemeni Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih, 31, is the first prisoner to die since the White House changed hands four months ago. His suicide follows weeks of criticism from both ends of the political spectrum over the fate of the remaining 240 Guantanamo detainees.

News of the suicide was emailed to the media just as a flight bringing journalists from Guantanamo landed in Maryland. The press had been at the U.S. naval detention centre for the war crimes court hearing of Canadian Omar Khadr.

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Schools are becoming little prisons. Are these the sort of social conditions we want to train and condition the next generation to accept? Hey, teachers! Leave those kids alone!

Flashback: Lunchtime lockdown to promote healthier eating: T.O. school plan | Schools seek more police as crime drops | Police presence in high schools makes the grade | Has your child been CAFed? How the Government plans to record intimate information on every child in Britain | Parents, children to be fingerprinted at initial 250+ nursery schools in UK | Frequent school lockdowns raise questions | CCTV cameras spying on hundreds of classrooms | Armed Police to Roam Toronto High Schools | School removes CCTV cameras from children’s toilets after furious protest from parents

Leia Clancy, Sam Goodman, The Guardian
June 3, 2009

Our school’s installation of TV cameras to watch our lessons is an insult – a fact many adults failed to grasp when we protested

Earlier this year, on a school day like any other, we shuffled into our politics class at 11.20 on a Monday morning. What we didn’t notice straight away were four tinted CCTV domes hanging from the ceiling including a huge monitor dome staring right at us. Confusion and anger broke out among us. A teacher casually stated that they were for teacher training purposes. After a thought of “God, George Orwell was right”, some of us angrily packed up and left – we weren’t comfortable working in a classroom with cameras.

It turned out that our entire class was angry or confused over the cameras. Out of a class of 18 students, 17 felt uncomfortable with the idea and decided to boycott the room until the issue, and the students, were addressed. This was a difficult decision as we were three months away from exams and we had five lessons a fortnight in the room. The student body was supportive and a petition gained over 130 signatures from the sixth-form.

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Good job, CBC, for exposing blatant corruption and conspiracy… and it’s being spun, hilariously, as a good thing by eHealth. Also, one might do well to question why there is such a big rush on to develop centralized electronic databases of your health information, anyways. Why not take your time and do it right?

Flashback: Ontario eHealth approved 4.8 million in no-bid contracts | Electronic immunization records needed: Toronto health official

CBC News
June 3, 2009

Executives at two companies awarded untendered contracts from eHealth Ontario had close personal connections to the CEO and board chairman, CBC News has learned.

The provincial agency, tasked with creating an electronic health record system, has been under fire over nearly $5 million doled out in untendered contracts during the first months after its creation in September 2008.

New information shows an intricate web of connections between eHealth and at least two of the consulting firms — Accenture Inc. and Courtyard Group — that were granted more than $3.3 million in contracts never subjected to competitive bids as the agency was first set up.

Sources also told the CBC that some senior officials in the Health Ministry opposed the appointment of Sarah Kramer as eHealth CEO on the grounds that she wasn’t qualified to run the $2-billion agency.

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