EU signs ACTA, global internet censorship treaty
By Rady Ananda
Activist Post
January 26, 2012
Today, the European Union and 22 member states signed the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced. They have now joined the US and seven other nations that signed the treaty last October.
This signing ceremony merely formalized the EU’s adoption of ACTA last month, during a completely unrelated meeting on agriculture and fisheries, reports TechDirt.
Though initiated by the US, Japan is the official depository of the treaty.
Removal of the Three Strikes clause, in which users accused of three counts of piracy would be barred from the internet, paved the way for the EU to adopt ACTA last month.
Related to ACTA, a chapter in the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) “would have state signatories adopt even more restrictive copyright measures than ACTA,” reports the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Both ACTA and TPP were developed without public input and outside international trade groups, like the World Trade Organization and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Leaked cables published by WikiLeaks in 2009 exposed early drafts of ACTA, resulting in a firestorm of controversy. Those cables, coupled with later releases, showed that ACTA negotiations began in 2006 and were controversial even to participating states. An historical summary of the treaty’s progress through December can be found here.
ACTA Violates Magna Carta and US Constitution
Like PIPA and SOPA, two domestic internet censorship bills that prompted major websites to blacken their name or website in a Jan. 18th protest, ACTA allows accusers of copyright infringement to bypass judicial review. Lack of “due process” makes these bills and ACTA unconstitutional and violates the Magna Carta, a charter signed in 1215 on which most Western law is based, including the US Constitution. It is often cited as the most important legal document in the history of democracy.
(The USA PATRIOT Acts, Obama’s assassination program, and the National Defense Authorization Act that allows indefinite detention are among many recent laws passed in the US which directly breach the Magna Carta.)
“The Constitution states only one command twice,” explains Peter Strauss of Cornell University Law School, further elaborating:
The Fifth Amendment says to the federal government that no one shall be ‘deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.’ The Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, uses the same eleven words, called the Due Process Clause, to describe a legal obligation of all states. These words have as their central promise an assurance that all levels of American government must operate within the law (‘legality’) and provide fair procedures.
[T]he bill’s wording is wide open to pursue American sites. Just one example: when describing an infringing site, it starts with those ‘that are accessed through a non-domestic domain name,’ but continues in section (8)(A)(ii) for any site that ‘conducts business directed to residents of the United States.’
Though involved in early ACTA negotiations, Switzerland and Mexico have not yet ratified it. However, “Since the agreement remains open to signature until May 2013, it is possible that other states may make a move to join it as well,” said Maira Sutton of EFF.
Rady Ananda is an investigative reporter and researcher in the areas of health, environment, politics, and civil liberties. Her two websites, Food Freedom and COTO Report are essential reading.
RECENT REPORTS BY RADY ANANDA:
Thyroid cancer, fracking and nuclear power
PIPA vote stalled while US censorship still grows
[related: ENEMY EXPATRIATION ACT- (THE SOPA COVER-UP)]
Biometric ID Schemes Around the World – GRTV Behind the Headlines [video]
Global Research TV
January 23, 2012
TRANSCRIPT AND SOURCES: http://www.corbettreport.com/?p=3783
The Indian government is ramping up efforts to fingerprint and iris scan the entirety of its 1.2 billion citizens in an ambitious scheme to issue national ID cards with biometric details. The plan has so far already enrolled 110 million people and issued 60 million numbers, with the aim of enrolling 200 million by this March and 600 million by 2014.
Find out about the history and consequences of biometric ID this week on GRTV – Behind the Headlines.
Police State International: The globalization of control [video]
Boiling Frogs Video
January 17, 2012
CONTINUE WATCHING: http://ur1.ca/7jp75
TRANSCRIPT AND SOURCES: http://www.corbettreport.com/?p=3739
With the National Defense Authorization Act, the Enemy Expatriation Act, and other startling measures by the US government to crack down on their own population making headlines around the world at the moment, the idea of an American police state is becoming an all too familiar tale. Less examined, however, are the international aspects of this encroaching police state, a high-tech 21st century control grid which adheres to no national boundaries and whose influence is increasingly being felt in countries throughout the so-called “free world.”
Just as the tracking, surveillance, pain-compliance and database technology behind this control grid is manufactured and marketed by multinational corporations who profess no loyalty to any nation state, so too is the police state itself nothing more than an idea for the consolidation and leveraging of power in the hands of a select few at the apex of business, government and finance. This idea in turn can be marketed, adapted and adopted from nation to nation, and that is the exact process that has been developing for decades now.
This is our EyeOpener Report by James Corbett, presenting the internationalization of the police state through the increasingly sophisticated technological control grid, and the collusion of international corporations and institutions to implement a homogenous and interconnected system for tracking, tracing and controlling the citizenry of the world regardless of nationality.
MLK, Occupy and End The Fed [article + videos]
By Kim M.
FreeSLO.com
January 15, 2012
The big difference I see between Martin Luther King Jr. (at the beginning of his career as an activist) and Occupy
Wall Street (at the beginning of their collective “career”) is that everyone knew what MLK wanted, but nobody seems to know what Occupy wants.
The people who drive by screaming, “Get a job!” are a testament to this.
The infamous “OccupySLO Pwns Hecklers” video is a testament to this.
Everyone seems to think Occupy wants a handout.
And maybe some do, but the ones I’ve talked to don’t. In fact, most of the ones I’ve talked to at Occupy SLO are more interested in getting America back on Constitutional track and don’t necessarily 100% endorse the 99% mandates handed down by Occupy Wall Street.
Quite frankly, we here in America now find ourselves in a situation so dire and with so many urgent issues that need to be addressed that it’s almost impossible to decide where to begin.
At the end of his life, MLK became more like Occupy is now in that he began to tackle the giant, amorphous issue of “poverty.” Admirable, but how do you tackle an abstract intangible? It’s like the hazy “war on drugs” and the fuzzy “war on terrorism,” where there is no real, defined enemy and no real, defined goal. How is it possible to win a “war” when nobody knows who they are fighting and when there is no tangible “territory” to take?
This is also a good place to stop and deal with the whole “positive” and “negative” nonsense. Apparently, if you point out a problem (“the emperor has no clothes”), then you’re being negative. But if you ignore the problem (“let’s have a concert and party!”), then you’re being positive and everybody knows it’s better to be positive (gack).
I defy anyone to drive a car without the positive and negative cables properly attached to the battery. Or try using any battery-operated device with all the positive ends facing the same direction. Or, hey, let’s think really big and try to stop planet earth from having positive and negative poles. Ridiculous, huh? Positive and negative are flip sides of the same coin. Night/day. Warm/cold. Problem/solution.
So can we finally knock off the “Let’s be positive” cr@p? Recognize the problem. Propose the solution. See how nicely that works? Positive and negative poles working together in harmony.
The real mandate is to identify real, tangible problems and then identify real, reachable goals.
Everyone (in their right mind) wants to end poverty. Unfortunately, few people want to make the effort to peek and see just exactly what creepy crawly things are under the poverty rock. Against the advice of the founders, we currently have a centrally-planned economy. We have hired a private entity (the Federal Reserve) to lend us our own money at interest.
How can you pay interest on a dollar when all you have is a dollar? Worse, how can you pay back the dollar plus interest when the value of the dollar in your hand keeps going down due to the fact that the dollar-issuer (the Federal Reserve) keeps printing more and more dollars that each have to be paid back with interest?
The tragedy is that very few people understand how our economy really works.
I asked one of the young men in the “Pwn” video what money is and he said, “I don’t know; I’m not an economist.” I asked him why we have inflation and he said, “I don’t know; I’m not an economist.” Wow. These are very basic questions and yet the average college grad can’t answer them.
Our economy is broken. Most people can agree on that.
If the car stops running, no doubt it’s broke. If the economy stops running, no doubt it’s broke. But not everyone knows how to fix a car, just as not everyone knows how to fix an economy.
Most of us would take a broken car to an expert to have it fixed, but where do you take a broken economy? And what do you do if you find out that the mechanic is the same person who broke the car in the first place? Likewise, what would you do if you discover that the same entity that we’ve given the economy over to is the self-same entity which broke the economy?
This is precisely the situation we find ourselves in now.
We’ve identified the problem: The car is broken. We’ve identified the cause: The mechanic did it. The solution is obviously to fire the mechanic and hire an honest one. A mechanic who respects humanity and the rule of law.
This is the same direction that Occupy needs to go:
1) Identify the problem.
2) Identify the culprit (i.e. get to the root of the problem).
3) Identify the solution.
Simple as 1-2-3.
1) The economy is broken.
2) The Fed did it.
3) Fire the Fed and get back to Constitutional basics.
“The dignity of the individual will flourish when the decisions concerning his life are in his own hands, when he has the assurance that his income is stable and certain, and when he knows that he has the means to seek self-improvement. Personal conflicts between husband, wife, and children will diminish when the unjust measurement of human worth on a scale of dollars is eliminated.” — Martin Luther King Jr.
And especially when that scale is constructed of fiat, inflated dollars, issued by banksters and backed by nothing.
[Potent News Editor’s note: Canadians should click HERE and HERE to watch a videos that will identify the similar Canadian situation.]
LINKS:
Who Owns The Federal Reserve?
http://www.globalrese…
Federal Reserve Analyst: Fed Banks Are Private
http://tv.globalresea…
The Federal Reserve Cartel: The Eight Families
http://globalresearch…
How the Federal Reserve Creates Money
http://www.mindcontag…
Federal Reserve Admits “We Have No Gold”
http://tv.globalresea…
First Federal Reserve Audit Reveals Trillions in Secret Bailouts
http://www.sott.net/a…
Grim Economic Prospects for 2012: How the Federal Reserve Overshadows the European Banking System
http://www.globalrese…
End the Fed: Occupy Wall Street Protestor Speaks Out
http://tv.globalresea…
End the Fed, not Capitalism
http://www.infowars.c…
Ron Paul: How To END THE FED
http://www.infowars.c…
JFK / Ron Paul / Martin Luther King Jr.
http://www.youtube.co…
——————————————————–
[hat tip: The Intel Hub]
Free Speech Is On Thin Ice
- Dees Illustration
By Amir Alwani
Potent News
January 13, 2012
Is anybody noticing all the flak journalists are getting for trying to do their jobs lately? Free speech of any kind seems to be under attack. It is fairly common now to see people getting arrested for video-taping police officers. To add insult to injury, SOPA/PIPA threatens free speech and spells RED ALERT to almost everyone willing to look at the facts. Do any of you think you’ll get anywhere by submitting to any of this, sugar coating it, or looking the other way?
Now is the time to make ourselves heard. When someone encroaches on our liberty we have a duty to fight back.
The role of the mainstream media has traditionally been to limit debate and to basically be the mouthpiece of government. Conversely, the role of the responsibly minded media is to take advantage of technology and opportunities to spread important/urgent information – being our eyes and ears when we can’t be there.
In the Arabic language, when you Love someone you call that person “ee-oo-nee” which means my “eyes” (probably because they offer you another perspective which you see as crucial and valuable). Hijacked governments are taking our eyes, leaving us blind, deaf and dumb – politically impotent.
There is a lot to look forward to in the times ahead but we must first deal with history’s immense baggage which is manifesting in all sorts of grotesque ways now, allowing us to see our true colours. I see a lot of beauty in the world but our present situation is also a nightmarish science fiction scenario for many reasons. At this point we are about to marry that scenario’s much uglier cousin. We must speak now or forever hold our peace (pun fully intended). If you have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about at this point, you have some catching up to do.
Those who witnessed the recent NDAA arrests shouldn’t be surprised at all. Here’s a brief glance at the political climate that has endured in the past couple years and what one might be faced with when trying to record a video, cover an event, attend a protest, have one’s voice heard in a public meeting, etc:
June 26 / June 27, 2010
November 22, 2010
January 7, 2011
June 8, 2011
June 24, 2011
August 22, 2011
August 31, 2011
December 16, 2011 – Culture has succumbed to the point where even a priest was practically kicked out of a town hall meeting recently, probably because they merely didn’t like the sound of his voice.
January 9, 2012
So it’s bad, right?
Don’t you think it’s a slippery slope if we keep letting this kind of thing slide? Over a year ago, State Sen. Bruce Patterson was proposing legislation that would introduce government-registered reporters. Mac Salvo wrote,
Once a reporter is licensed, the public would have the comfort of knowing that the writings, opinions, and insights being presented have been thoroughly sifted, filtered and edited to ensure the information is truthful and easy to understand.
The same population of gullible idiots that require government intervention when it comes to smoking cigarettes, drinking sodas, and salt intake, also need to be told what news they can consume.
I’ll be honest, I don’t know what the current state of affairs are regarding this legislation, but I agree with Salvo and here are my thoughts on the matter.
What was being proposed, albeit “voluntary”, was nothing more than government filtration of information. Our awareness is already extremely narrow and many human beings sadly go from the cradle to the grave without ever experiencing true happiness/bliss (except maybe as children). We need all the help we can get but we don’t need the style of help offered to us by government. The argument often used seems more or less like, “there’s a lot of stupid people out there and you can’t trust everybody so allow us to make sure the biggest and brightest get the spotlight and a chance. Have you no heart? For the love of GOD, let us help you by limiting your options and thinking for you. Let us be your God.”
Even if that argument was somewhat accurate – that is, even if the internet or the general arena of written work was in fact full of crap and you, for whatever reason, feared that people would take some unsavory (possibly dangerous) characters seriously – then it might be worthwhile to take a quick glance at Charlotte Iserbyt’s work because it might shed light on the why people are so ignorant these days and why there may be so much crap to filter through (if there even is indeed that much crap floating around shrouding the truth in a sea of mediocrity).
However, I personally don’t think it’s difficult for anybody to sift through the crap, whether it be online, in a physical library, or a newspaper. Furthermore, nobody is putting a gun to anybody’s head and saying, “believe Joe Blow’s blog or else”. It’s our responsibility to come to our own conclusions and if we’re never given the opportunity to practice that discernment and be able to say, “I did this research on my own”, then we are robbed of yet another freedom. If absurd laws like this were in place, nobody anywhere would be able to say they did the research on their own. You would have to say, “I did this research on my own, but every article I came across was preselected and hand-picked by my government” and so your government would be acting as a middle man.
More importantly, at the end of the day the whole idea of free speech is meant specifically for unpopular speech (probably because times of great change are usually led by a minority). Think about it. We need a great change right now. You’re not going to get it with the help of CNN.
Sometimes the presence of a middle man doesn’t work out so well. Why have a “middle-man” between you and reality? Why are so many people so desperate for powerful people, “experts”, and people with degrees to rule over them?
There is no real danger and there never was, except for maybe the danger posed by a psychopathic government’s obsession with control. Writing about what you see in your world is not the same as performing medical surgery or driving a vehicle. The world is not going to fall apart if one guy posts a slightly inaccurate blog every now and then by mistake. When you read a piece of news, you should critically think about it for yourself because you matter in the grand scheme of things. Chances are that your opinion of whatever piece of news comes your way is actually much more aligned with reality and conducive to genuine growth and maturity (for you and our species) than your government’s version of the events (at least when you can think clearly anyway).
If that still doesn’t make sense to you, consider the following. What if you even already have a degree (which some consider a scam in and of itself, by the way). What assurance can you honestly say you have that this “committee” Patterson is talking about, this bureaucratic arm of a monstrously corrupt and rampaging hijacked government will be fair when contemplating your qualifications (or that any future administration wouldn’t abuse those powers)? This is a hijacked government which, by the way, is controlled by a banking cartel which is hellbent on robbing people of their ability to eat real food, breath untainted air, and drink untainted water.
I would bet that if you did your homework you would have zero assurance that any “committee” like this would be looking out for your best interest.
A recent article titled “Mainstream Media To Bully Bloggers Out Of ‘Fair Use'” mentions,
The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Washington Post, along with 28 other news organizations, are launching a company which hopes to further profit on their news reporting, by seeking to make paying customers out of websites or blogs which reproduce their content, either in full or in part.
So even if that Detroit legislator mentioned above didn’t get his way, we can see that the corporate oligarchy’s wheels are in motion and that the fight to suppress free speech is ever present.
When people’s websites get torn down or when reporters get arrested for filming a public event or for filming a police officer abusing his/her authority, the message there is simply. “shut up, slave. We own you.”
Sure, if all your life you’ve had a tendency to conform, you might be shortsighted enough to come up with some sort of rationalization for that kind of assault on your freedom but at the end of the day there is no justification for these pompous acts of domination, and worse, they are intertwined with an entire system of domination that has world depopulation at the heart of its agenda. Seen in this light, World War 3 is also not surprising.
Furthermore, when you look at the fact that many honest small businesses actually had their websites shut down and replaced with Department of Homeland Security logos falsely accusing them of being pedophiles and violating child porn laws that is obviously quite another story. I don’t think that’s a fumble. I find it difficult to believe such a mistake could be made. It is like saying, “Oops, I tripped and fell on the button that falsely accused your website of violating child porn laws”. I mean I can’t say for certain, but I’m pretty sure this is a joke or on purpose.
The solution? Do you even have to ask? What could it be?
Simple: Do not shut up. They can’t shut us all up.
I’m already seeing a huge surge of various names in the alternative news media expanding their operations. We do outnumber those pushing for the global genocidal tyranny.
If you do shut up, the powers that be say, “mission accomplished” and celebrate. Instead, listen to your “gut feeling” and act on it, please. You’d be doing me (and all of us) a huge favor.
Related Articles:
- Hosting Company Says al-Qaeda Website Reason for Removing 73,000 Blogs (July 20, 2010)
- Every email and website to be stored (October 20, 2010)
- Metered internet a colossal failure (January 26, 2011)
- Egypt’s Internet Kill Switch: Coming To America (January 28, 2011)
- Algeria Shuts Down Social Media Websites As Protests Grow (February 14, 2011)
- VeriSign Demands Power To Kill “Abusive” Websites (October 11, 2011)
- Thousands leave GoDaddy over registrar’s support for SOPA (December 30, 2011)
- WordPress Comes Out Against SOPA Internet Censorship Bill (January 11, 2012)
- Reddit to shut-down over SOPA (January 11, 2012)
- Activist Appeals Felony Ruling for Exercising Free Speech (January 13, 2012)
Amir Alwani is a psychonaut who makes metal, electronic and hip-hop music. He is also the founder and editor of the online independent media outlet known as Potent News.
Red Ice Radio – Ian Crane – Depopulation Disasters, Fukushima, E. Coli & Stuxnet (audio)
Red Ice Radio
January 16, 2011
Geo-political researcher, public speaker and former oilfield executive, Ian Crane joins us to talk about questionable manmade disasters over the last 14 months. We begin recapping the BP oil spill in the Gulf and discuss the latest developments. Ian tells us about Robert Calusa who he believes was placed on an oil rig intentionally on April 16, 2010 to help create the spill. He also tells us why and how he thinks the Gulf area has been turned into a laboratory and talks about the “behavioral health” payments issued from BP to residents of the Gulf area. We also discuss miscarriages of women in the Gulf, same as the dolphins and the status on oil-devouring microbes. Then, we talk about Fukushima. Ian shares some ideas about why he thinks Japan was targeted. He links Fukushima to the largest E.coli breakout, resistant to penicillin, in Germany. It seems Germany has been keeping an eye on world events. They’ve also been the forefront resistance against the EU’s plan to use GM crops. Now they’re shutting down pre 1980 nuclear plants and winding down the nuclear program. Has biological warfare been released upon Germany?
British Politician Peddles Globalism at TED
Innovative TED Talks Once Again Tainted by Globalist Salesmen.
by Tony Cartalucci
Land Destroyer Report
January 5, 2012
UK politician Paddy Ashdown, during a recent TED Talk, claims power is shifting from nation-states to a global stage where the lawless global elite will somehow create “sensible” treaty-based global governance, citing the World Trade Organization (WTO) as a prime example. While he chastises the bankers whom he calls “money changers,” he fails to note that they along with other corporate-financier interests, hold dominion over the WTO and indeed all so-called “international institutions.”
Ashdown sees the world as interdependent at an unprecedented level and that tragedy in one nation inevitably affects all others. He also claims that the nation-state is no longer a viable proposition and cites a myriad of contrived global threats, the fraudulent “War on Terror” in particular, as evidence supporting his argument.
He concludes his sales pitch for “global governance” stating that we no longer hold individual or national destinies, but a global, collective destiny. In a way Ashdown’s words are true at face value – but for those reading Agenda 21, the duplicitous plots drawn up within the halls of the Brookings Institution, or for those who watched the global elite destabilize the entire Arab World, commit genocide, and install one puppet regime after another in 2011 with more to come in 2012, it is clear that Ashdown is peddling the global elites’ vision of a one world government where the corporate-financier interests of Wall Street and London hold dominion over mankind within the confines of an inescapable scientific dictatorship.
That Ashdown began his talk warning of World War III and the inevitable reordering the world is about to undergo, should prompt us to again re-read “The Middle East and Then the World” and realize that instead of the revolutionary change Ashdown promises, we are simply getting more of the same – what elites throughout the ages have always aspired toward, global empire and total, full-spectrum domination over all of mankind.
Ashdown isn’t the first British politician to pollute the TED Talks with his globalist sales pitch. British PM Gordon Brown also attempted to spin his talk of global domination as philosophical and technological revolution back in 2009.
Video: Many truly inspirational talks are given before TED, but it is those like Ashdown’s and Brown’s that make many cringe before watching another.
For those interested in disappointing Ashdown’s vision of a global government run by the monied elite, it is essential that we identify these elite, boycott and replace their system entirely, and move toward a “global power shift” that leaves our destiny not in the hands of Ashdown’s global elite, but in the hands of “we the people.”
PN 