A-Changin' Times (ACT)
Born in the aftermath of 9/11, ACT has become as political as the times.
Now a blog for alternative news, views and rants offered with a twist, a song and a smile. Fair and balanced.

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize [sic] with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.
 — Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan Copyright 1963
(1991 Special Rider)

"A-Changin' Times: taking the best from the past to make the most of the present and to create a better future."

"What marching through the streets was to the Sixties, walking through the halls of Congress is now."

 — Marianne Williamson

You're visiting a website that incorporates a blogging feature, not "just" a blog.

Blog entries follow, most recent entries at the top

Friday, October 03, 2003

	:: DUG853		10/03/2003 04:12:00 PM

U.S. Uses Terror Law to Pursue Crimes from Drugs to Swindling

    By Eric Lichtblau
    New York Times
    Saturday 27 September 2003
   
Washington -- The Bush administration, which calls the USA Patriot Act perhaps its most essential tool in fighting terrorists, has begun using the law with increasing frequency in many criminal investigations that have little or no connection to terrorism.

    The government is using its expanded authority under the far-reaching law to investigate suspected drug traffickers, white-collar criminals, blackmailers, child pornographers, money launderers, spies and even corrupt foreign leaders, federal officials said.

    Justice Department officials say they are simply using all the tools now available to them to pursue criminals -- terrorists or otherwise.

But critics of the administration's antiterrorism tactics assert that such use of the law is evidence the administration is using terrorism as a guise to pursue a broader law enforcement agenda. [Emphasis added.]

CONTINUE

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	:: Nora		10/03/2003 07:08:00 AM

U.S. Supreme Court Should Review and Reject Secret Detentions

Statement from Human Rights Watch:

Washington, D.C., September 30 -- The U.S. Supreme Court should overturn a lower court decision allowing the Justice Department to keep secret the names of over 1,000 people arrested in the United States following the September 11 attacks, Human Rights Watch has said. A group of civil, immigrant and human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, filed a petition [29 September] in the Supreme Court asking the high court to hear the case.

"The use of secret arrests is a matter of tremendous importance for human rights in the United States and around the world," said Wendy Patten, U. S. Advocacy Director for Human Rights Watch. "Given the Justice Department's refusal to release the names of the detainees, it is up to the Supreme Court to declare that secret arrests have no place in a democracy."

Human Rights Watch and other advocacy groups sought the release of the names of hundreds of people arrested on immigration and material-witness warrants in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. The groups filed their request with the Department of Justice under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in October 2001. The Justice Department denied that request, and plaintiffs filed suit.

Yesterday, 21 co-plaintiffs asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a June decision by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, ruling that the Justice Department did not have to release the names or other information requested. In a split decision, the appeals court held that all of the information sought was statutorily exempt from disclosure because it was information compiled for law enforcement purposes, and disclosure "could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings."

Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, Center for National Security Studies v. Ashcroft, are contesting that decision and are urging the Supreme Court to hear the case both on FOIA and First Amendment grounds. At stake is the public's right to know what actions the government has taken - a guarantee of openness and accountability that is all the more important when the government action involves deprivation of liberty. By cloaking its arrest powers in secrecy, the Bush Administration has prevented the public from judging whether those powers were properly exercised or widely abused.

There is mounting evidence that the rights of hundreds of non-citizens were abused in the aftermath of September 11. In August 2002, Human Rights Watch released a 95-page report, entitled "Presumption of Guilt" that documents cases of prolonged detention without charge, denial of access to release on bond, interference with the right to counsel, and unduly harsh conditions of confinement. In June 2003, the Justice Department's Inspector General issued a 198-page report with the results of its internal investigation into the treatment of the September 11 detainees held on immigration charges. The Inspector General's report confirmed abuses previously reported by Human Rights Watch, and also identified a pattern of physical and verbal abuse by some correctional staff at a federally run facility in Brooklyn, New York.

"The blanket of secrecy surrounding these detentions has contributed to these abuses," said Patten. "We urge the Supreme Court to hear this appeal to resolve important constitutional and statutory questions and, in turn, protect the most basic of rights."

International observers will be watching this case closely. Over the past two years, numerous governments throughout the world have enacted laws that unduly expand government powers of detention and surveillance. Some governments have pointed to the erosion of civil liberties in the United States after September 11 to deflect criticism of their own rights abuses.

MORE on human rights issues in the United States

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	:: DUG853		10/03/2003 01:56:00 AM

Bush's Unofficial Official Secrets Act
How the Justice Department Has Pushed to Criminalize The Disclosure of Non-Security Related Government Information
By John W. Dean

Friday, Sep. 26, 2003


Except in a few highly egregious circumstances relating to national security information (espionage and atomic secrets), the U.S. Congress has, in the past, never made it a crime to leak information to the news media.

As a result, for over two hundred years, our government has operated without an "official secrets act."

In contrast, Great Britain and other nations have long criminalized the disclosure of government information.

But there's a crucial difference between them and us:

They lack an equivalent of our First Amendment.

Despite the free speech costs, President George W. Bush has created the equivalent of an official secrets act for America -- and it is only growing stronger.

Indeed, by cobbling together provisions from existing laws, Bush's Justice Department has effectively created one of the world's most encompassing, if not draconian, official secrets acts.

If Attorney General John Ashcroft has his way, we will see many more prosecutions of this ilk. Ashcroft has told Congress he wants a "comprehensive, coordinated, Government-wide, aggressive, properly resourced, and sustained effort" to deal with "the problem of unauthorized disclosures."

It's important to watch Ashcroft's lips here:

He said "unauthorized" disclosure -- not, say, disclosures of classified information relating to national security, which would be a very different matter.

Plainly, he is targeting anyone who leaks information the Bush Administration would rather not have made public -- even when security is in no way at risk.

During the Clinton Administration, an effort was made to actually enact official secrets legislation. But Scott Armstrong -- the Executive Director of the Information Trust, a secrecy watchdog in Washington -- realized what was occurring, and mounted a major lobbying effort to get Clinton to veto it, and he did.

This time, however, it is already too late, for Ashcroft has outfoxed the watchdogs.

Rather than pressing for new legislation that might spark similar controversy, he has decided to twist and distort laws already on the books to create the equivalent of such legislation.

However, these laws were never intended to criminally prosecute such conduct. [Emphasis added.]

CONTINUE

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Thursday, October 02, 2003

	:: DUG853		10/02/2003 03:02:00 PM

FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH -- Actions to take to make a difference

Verified Voting - Campaign To Demand Verifiable Election Results

The 'Voter Confidence Act' - HR 2239

Representative Rush Holt and over 30 cosponsors have introduced a bill that would require a voter-verifiable audit trail on every voting system.

It's called the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003 (H.R. 2239).

If we can get this bill passed, we won't have to fight, state by state and county by county, to preserve democratic elections.

We urgently need to get H.R. 2239 passed.

CONTINUE

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Wednesday, October 01, 2003

	:: Nora		10/01/2003 04:45:00 PM

BITS AND BOBS FROM THE ROVING BLOGGER

Postcards for every occasion

Have you seen the Buzzflash "Are you better off?" postcards with graphs comparing the performances of Bush Sr., Clinton, and GW? They're a telling illustration of some vital statistics! View (and buy some if you wish) here


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A Year Later, Judge Won't Let Jury Go Home
By Barbara Grady

OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters): The judge just won't let them off the hook -- not the defendants, but the jury that says it is hopelessly deadlocked.

A criminal trial of three dismissed Oakland police officers accused of falsely arresting and beating suspects has become a marathon unusual even by the often plodding standards of American criminal justice ...

Many observers expect the ultimate verdicts to reverberate widely throughout Oakland, a city suffering from drug gang violence. But the community's trust in police is dismally low after a documented pattern of police riding roughshod over residents in the city's tougher neighborhoods.

The suspected incidents of police brutality, planting of evidence, false arrests, and falsifying reports were also the subject of civil proceedings that resulted in a City of Oakland settlement of $10.9 million to 119 victims.

[So what's the problem with the jury? Whatever it is, I don't see how it's going to reach a conclusion when it couldn't do so in the past 12 months! - N]

Read the full story here


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Plus ça change ...

From Pip Wilson's "AlmostPropheticQuotes" ezine, 30 September:

"We, the Government, have vital information which we cannot disclose. It is upon this knowledge that we make decisions. You, who are merely private citizens, have not access to this information. Any criticism you make of our policy, any controversy about it in which you may indulge will therefore be uninformed and valueless. If, in spite of your ignorance, you persist in questioning our policy, we can only conclude that you are disloyal."
Harold Thorby, Australia's defence minister in 1938

Source


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Whisky of Mass Destruction

[You have to smile at this one. But then you ask yourself, is this where precious tax dollars are going? - N]

How the US spied on a tiny island distillery
by Jim McBeth, at "The Scotsman"

In the wavering image of a webcam, the figures moved with the sinister intent of those whose mission is mayhem. Thank heavens 'Ursula' was watching ...

If the slightest possibility exists that Bruichladdich distillery on Islay is a threat to world peace, we need to know.

For it has been revealed that Ursula, a spy with the US Defence Threat Reduction Agency -- 'Our mission to safeguard the US and its allies from weapons of mass destruction' -- has been monitoring the island distillery.

Full story

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Tuesday, September 30, 2003

	:: DUG853		9/30/2003 09:51:00 PM

9/11 Flights and Military Bases

This is a representation of the flight-paths taken by the planes-turned-missiles on 9/11 and it shows how close they all flew to military bases before making it to impact.

[I'm not wondering anymore. --DUG]

Click Here

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	:: DUG853		9/30/2003 09:42:00 PM

Since 1997, More Than 22,000 People Have Deserted the US Army

"My Freedom of Information Act request regarding deserters yielded the following documents from the US Army."

Link To The Story

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