Adam Kokesh Exercises Freedom of Speech Despite University of Alabama Police
We need more outspoken Veterans like Adam Kokesh. Here he openly ridicules the hypocrisy of our employees the police who have apparently forgotten their oaths to uphold the Constitution and with it our right to freedom of speech.
Police State Crackdown on Occupy Oakland (Video)
Abby Martin of Media Roots went to Occupy Oakland at 4:00 a.m. to cover the second police raid and crackdown against the peaceful protesters at Frank Ogawa Plaza.
The footage shows the intensity in the air leading up to the raid and the insane amount of police presence that showed up to destroy the encampment. Mayor Jean Quan’s legal adviser resigned at 2 a.m. in protest to the heavy police response.
FBI Crime Maps Now ‘Pinpoint’ Average Muslims
Spencer Ackerman reports on WIRED’s Danger Room:
It started out as a crimefighting tool. But over the years, an FBI effort known as “geo-mapping” evolved into something more expansive — a method to track Muslim communities, without any suspicion of a crime being committed.
Last month, Danger Room revealed that the FBI was training its agents that religious Muslims tended to be “violent” and that Islamic charity is merely a “funding mechanism for combat.” In response, both the FBI and the Justice Department promised full reviews of their training materials. But the geo-mapping effort indicates that the FBI may have more than just a training problem: The suspicion of ordinary Muslims promoted in those lectures may be spilling over into its counterterrorism tactics.
Last week, the American Civil Liberties Union acquired some of the FBI geo-maps (.pdf), like the one pictured after the jump, through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Although many of the…
1st Circuit Appeals Court Upholds Right To Record Police In Public
A resounding victory for the First Amendment. However, outside of the four-state jurisdiction of the First Circuit, the police state lives on. The Citizen Media Law Project gets giddy:
In the case of Glik v. Cunniffe, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has issued a unanimous opinion in support of the First Amendment right to record the actions of police in public.
For those of you not familiar with Simon Glik’s case, Glik was arrested on October 1, 2007, after openly using his cell phone to record three police officers arresting a suspect on Boston Common. In return for his efforts to record what he suspected might be police brutality — in a pattern that is now all too familiar — Glik was charged with criminal violation of the Massachusetts wiretap act, aiding the escape of a prisoner and disturbing the peace.
Unlike most arrestees, Glik, with the assistance of the ACLU,…
Big Alternative Medicine Threatens Suit Against Skeptical Blogger
The alt-med controversy is often framed as a David-and-Goliath clash between small-time distributors of natural heath products, on one hand, and “big pharma” on the other. It is worth considering, however, that alt-med has become a lucrative industry in its own right, capable of engaging in the same abuses often associated with powerful pharmaceutical companies.
In Europe, draconian libel laws are increasingly being used to intimidate bloggers who question the validity of specific alt-med products or modalities. The most recent case involves the multinational homeopathy manufacturer Boiron and an amateur blogger in Italy. Steven Novella at Science-Based Medicine writes:
There have been many cases now of big companies or organizations, or wealthy individuals, threatening to sue or actually suing a blogger for libel. The most famous case is that of Simon Singh who was sued by the British Chiropractic Association over comments he made in an article. Simon braved through the expensive and exhaustive…
Calls to Assassinate the President is Protected Speech, Says 9th Circuit Court
Walter E. Bagdasarian.
Stephen C. Webster writes in the Raw Story:
A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that calling for someone to kill the President of the United States cannot be classified as a threat because standing law does not prohibit “predictions or exhortations” to violence.
In a 2-1 decision, judges on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that California resident Walter E. Bagdasarian was engaging in free speech when he wrote that Obama “will have a 50 cal in the head soon,” then called on someone to “shoot the nig.”
Bagdasarian published his comments on a Yahoo finance website in the weeks leading up to the 2008 presidential election. He was arrested weeks later, after one of the other commenters reported a potential threat to the Secret Service. During a search of his residence, authorities discovered that he did indeed possess a .50 caliber rifle.
“These statements are particularly repugnant because they directly…
Free Speech Moment: Declare War on Christianity Not Drugs!
Site Note: From time to time, Disinfo.com does post an article for the sole purposes of the speaker intended on exercising their First Amendment rights. If you are curious about this new venture, contact us through the site with the subject line “free speech moment”, and of course, all comments are welcome.
HFS, Christians have denied and continue to deny non-Christians the right to pursue happiness. Christians oppress homosexuals and their right to marry and pursue happiness. Christians are attempting to thwart legal marijuana use. It’s time we deny them their rights for they have clearly shown they abuse those rights to oppress non-Christians.
If Germany can keep out Scientology then America should be able to boot out Christianity!
ISN, 666
Jilted Boyfriend Announces Ex-Girlfriend’s Abortion On Billboard
Via Fox News:
ALAMOGORDO, NM— A New Mexico man’s decision to lash out with a billboard ad saying his ex-girlfriend had an abortion against his wishes has touched off a legal debate over free speech and privacy rights.
The sign on Alamogordo’s main thoroughfare shows 35-year-old Greg Fultz holding the outline of an infant. The text reads, “This Would Have Been A Picture Of My 2-Month Old Baby If The Mother Had Decided To Not KILL Our Child!”
Fultz’s ex-girlfriend has taken him to court for harassment and violation of privacy. A domestic court official has recommended the billboard be removed.
But Fultz’s attorney argues the order violates his client’s free speech rights.
“As distasteful and offensive as the sign may be to some, for over 200 years in this country the First Amendment protects distasteful and offensive speech,” Todd Holmes said.
The woman’s friends say she had a miscarriage, not an abortion, according to a…
Dancing at the Memorial of a Slave Owner
Photo: Prisonblues (CC)
Saturday, around 50 people held a demonstration through dance at the Jefferson Memorial in southern Washington, D.C., which overlooks the Potomac River. Over 2,000 people had testified on Facebook that they would show up, but these testimonials apparently turned out to be the Internet’s letting off steam.
A week before, U.S. Park Police arrested five protesters for silently dancing in the memorial, which they did in response to the April 12, 2008 arrest of Mary Oberwetter, a 28-year-old D.C. resident, who was eventually charged with “interfering with agency functions.”
The video of recent arrests received in its first 24 hours well over 100,00 views and, at the time of this writing, nearly 900,000. Russia Today journalist and 2010 House Candidate Adam Kokesh, a self-described Ron Paul Republican, found himself thrown to the ground and, briefly, even choked, last weekend for dancing, as he said, in celebration of the principles of…
Arrested For Dancing at the Jefferson Memorial (Video)
I wonder how Thomas Jefferson would have felt about this. Via the Huffington Post:
The dancers were protesting an appeals court ruling handed down last week that the national monuments are places for reflection and contemplation — and that dancing distracted from such an experience.
In 2008, Mary Brooke Oberwetter and a group of friends went to the Jefferson to commemorate the president’s 265th birthday by dancing silently, while listening to music on headphones. Park Police ordered the revelers to disperse and arrested them when they did not.
Oberwetter sued on free speech grounds, but the appeals court ruled last week that her conduct was indeed prohibited “because it stands out as a type of performance, creating its own center of attention and distracting from the atmosphere of solemn commemoration” that Park Service regulations are designed to preserve.
Saturday’s protest was staged during the day, on Memorial Day weekend, in order to draw maximum attention:
Congressman Peter King Resurrects McCarthyism: This Time Around the “Communists” are Muslim
Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:
Peter King’s brand new version of the HUAC hearings and the glory days of the McCarthy era is set to begin Thursday, when King will hold hearings deciding whether or not American Muslims have been “radicalized.” King told CNN’s State of the Union “We’re talking about the affiliates of Al Qaeda who have been radicalizing, and there’s been self-radicalization going on within the Muslim community, within a very small minority, but it’s there. And that’s where the threat is coming from at this time.”
King justified his witch hunt, titled “The Extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and that Community’s Response” by citing three terrorist incidents in the U.S. instances involving Muslims – the tragic shooting at Fort Hood in 2009 and two bomb plots in New York. King said “People in this country are being self-radicalized, whether it’s Major Hasan or whether it’s Shahzad or…
U.S. Supreme Court Rules ‘Hurtful Speech’ of Westboro Baptist Church is Protected Under First Amendment
Warren Richey writes in the Christian Science Monitor:
Supreme Court Justice Alito is the lone dissenter in the 8-to-1 ruling on free-speech principles, saying the conduct of the Westboro Baptist Church ’caused petitioner great injury.’
In an important reaffirmation of free speech principles, the US Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that noxious, highly offensive protests conducted outside solemn military funerals are protected by the First Amendment when the protests take place in public and address matters of public concern.
The high court ruled 8 to 1 that members of the Topeka, Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church are entitled to stage their controversial antigay protests even when they cause substantial injury to family members and others attending the funeral of a loved one.
“Speech is powerful. It can stir people to action, move them to tears of both joy and sorrow, and – as it did here – inflict great pain,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in…
Wisconsin Police Would ‘Absolutely’ Use Force On Protesters If Ordered
Stephen C. Webster writes on Raw Story:
Amid the largest protests Madison, Wisconsin has seen in decades, newly elected Republican Gov. Scott Walker last week issued a stark message to public labor unions occupying the capitol building: we have options, and using the National Guard against protesters is among them.
Since then, a myrad of rumors have circulated through crowds gathered at the state capitol, united in protest of a bill that would strip public unions of their collective bargaining rights. One rumor, which had not yet come to pass, even suggested that like Egypt’s former dictator did in Tahrir Square, Gov. Walker may call in police to forcibly clear out the capitol.
And according to a Wisconsin police union president, whether the police agree or disagree with their governor’s politics, they would “absolutely” carry out any order given to them … even if that order included using force against their fellow Americans gathered…
FBI Sued For Surveillance Of Muslims
Fox News reports:
A former FBI informant who infiltrated a California mosque violated the constitutional rights of Muslims by conducting “indiscriminate surveillance” because of their religion, according to a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday.
The lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles was filed by the ACLU of Southern California and the Los Angeles office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. It named the FBI and seven of its agents and supervisors, the Washington Post reported.
The lawsuit alleges ex-FBI informant Craig Monteilh was ordered by his supervisors to target Muslims for surveillance, violating their First Amendment right to freedom of religion. The lawsuit seeks class-action status, unspecified damages and a court order instructing the FBI to destroy or return the information Monteilh collected.
Monteilh infiltrated an Orange County mosque and helped build a case against an Afghan-born man who was arrested on terrorism-related charges in 2009.
The lawsuit claims that Monteilh’s handlers, FBI agents Kevin…
Rachel Maddow Breaks Down Mubarak’s Disinformation Campaign
Some of the best reporting I’ve heard from Rachel Maddow. Could Mubarak’s tactics work in the U.S.?
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
BU ACLU: ‘When Criticizing Rhetoric, Remember Freedom of Speech’
Today I received an interesting email from the Boston University ACLU (text below). It’s also on their Facebook Page:
Jared Lee Loughner, charged with Saturday’s shootings, has invoked his right to silence, leaving us ignorant of his motives. Sources disagree on his politics — an acquaintance calls him an “extreme” liberal; a government memo links him to a “racial-realist” journal (one that denies any ties to him). His online writings point to an unhinged mind. But though much remains unclear, people are withdrawing some of their first theories, which rashly labeled the shootings a Tea Party / Republican plot.
Replacing those accusations is a broader look at how the shooter may have responded to intense political rhetoric. Critics again blame the right-wing, mainly Sarah Palin, whose PAC last year produced an image with crosshairs on congressional seats such as Giffords’. It was only a slight escalation from the usual manner of treating politics…
Atheists Assaulted for Objecting to Prayer (Video)
On April 29, 2010, activists Mitch Kahle and Kevin Hughes were assaulted by Ben Villaflor, the Senate Sergeant-At-Arms, and State Sheriff’s Deputies, for objecting to unconstitutional Christian prayers used to begin each session of the Hawaii State Legislature. Hughes was injured in the attack and was taken to the hospital for x-rays and treatment. Kahle was arrested and prosecuted, but was ultimately vindicated when Judge Leslie Hayashi found Kahle “NOT GUILTY” and ruled that: “The Senate’s [Christian] prayers violate the constitutional separation of church and state.”
U.S. Supreme Court Takes On Westboro Baptist Church Hate Case
Jess Bravin reviews the upcoming docket of the U.S. Supreme Court, starting with a case relating to the Westboro Baptist Church, infamous for its “God Hates” placards, for the Wall Street Journal:
Free speech stands front and center in the Supreme Court term beginning next week, in a pair of cases testing the First Amendment’s reach in the digital age.
On Oct. 6, the justices will weigh whether the First Amendment protects a Kansas church’s campaign to publicize its beliefs by picketing military funerals with vulgar placards and insulting fallen soldiers’ survivors in online screeds.
The father of a fallen Marine is seeking damages for emotional distress from the church, which believes that God is killing American soldiers to punish the U.S. for its tolerance of homosexuality.
A month later , the court is to consider whether states can bar minors from buying violent videogames, on the theory that these games cause damage to…
Al Franken, Senator, On Dangers Of Corporate Control Of Media (Video)
Sen. Al Franken (D.-Minn.) told more than 2,000 bloggers and organizers attending the Netroots Nation conference in Las Vegas on July 24, 2010, that our media system is at risk everywhere we turn – from our free speech online to the growing power of companies who own a massive number of media outlets.
