Freedom

From the vaults! Rich Rich Juzwiak's awesome remixing of MLK's "Let Freedom Ring" speech titled, MLK in the house. Stick around long enough and you'll also find in the playlist MLK's actual speech, courtesy of the MLK Library.

Okay, sometimes you gotta help even lawyers. This worthy event comes from the NY Bar Assn.:

As an expression of solidarity with our beleaguered colleagues at the Pakistani bar, the New York City Bar Association, the New York State Bar Association, and the New York County Lawyers' Association, in conjunction with other organizations, invite you to attend a public rally in front of the New York County Courthouse, 60 Centre Street on Tuesday, November 13, from 1:00-1:30 p.m.

The crude and brutal suspension of law and the legal system in Pakistan, and the repression of judges and lawyers there, require that we take a moment from our own busy schedules and demonstrate our concern.

Because the images from Pakistan show the violent repression of Pakistani lawyers wearing their customary dark suit and white shirt, we request that you appear on Tuesday in similar attire, though this is not required. What is important is a strong show of support.

We hope to see you there.

[Editor's note: Formatting edited and diary promoted by mole333]

Human Rights In Africa
5th January
By Leo Igwe

In November I traveled to the Gambia to represent the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) at the 40th Ordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) in Banjul (November 15-29, 2006). It was my first time to participate in an event organized by this regional body. ACHPR was established in 1987 to promote and protect human and people’s rights in Africa.
For almost two decades after independence African leaders did not pay serious attention to human rights issues on the continent. They focused mainly on liberation, decolonisation, and eradicating apartheid. Hence the continent witnessed flagrant human rights abuses and violations as recorded during the regimes of Mobutu Sese Seko, Kamuzu Banda, Jean Bedel Bokassa, Idi Amin etc.

In 1979 the then OAU (now AU) Assembly Heads of State and Government took an important step in the history of human rights in Africa. They met in Monrovia and adopted a resolution calling on its Secretary General to form a Committee of experts that would draft an African Charter on Human and People’s Rights. The Committee produced a draft, which was adopted at the 1981 meeting of the OAU Heads of State and Government in Nairobi. The Charter came into force on 21 October 1986. and this date is now celebrated as an African Human Rights Day.

"…the Tableau is one of only two witch treatises that addressed the issue of witches as women. There were two aspects of their feminity which de Lancre emphasized in his discussion of witches: their sexuality…and women's 'natural inclination' for sorcery (de Lancre Tableau p. 89). This natural inclination was not rooted in women's physically weaker state. In fact, jurists such as Bodin had previously commented on having witnessed 'that women suffer torture more continuously than men' (de Lancre Tableau p. 89). Women's affinity for sorcery was based on women's extreme nature—her pursuit of her appetites, her desire for revenge, and her need for novelty, all distinguished her from the more balanced male."
Lorraine Berry, "Destabilizing Categories: Jews, Witches, and the Christian Male," Aestel 4 (1996)

Are we aware what lies at the end of the road opened up by the normalization of torture? A significant detail of Mr. Mohammed’s confession gives a hint. It was reported that the interrogators submitted to waterboarding and were able to endure it for less than 15 seconds on average before being ready to confess anything and everything. Mr. Mohammed, however, gained their grudging admiration by enduring it for two and a half minutes. "Knight of the Living Dead" By SLAVOJ ZIZEK

I had been planning to blog on the subject of “Juxtaposition” for months – and after searching for many months and months (more than 2) for Scully’s line to Mulder to that effect, I have struck out. As full season DVD sets are pushing $100, I’m just going to have to wait. Unless of course the left over FEMA Patio Relief fund for California gets reallocated for cranial wandering projects – that is.

From my feeble memory, Scully said to Mulder, “the weaving together of seemingly unrelated pieces of information to form a rational conclusion to explain the unexplainable of which was lost by any normal means of analysis”.

I stretched it a bit I think – but it’s pretty close - such is poetic license when doing quasi creative writing. As soon as someone or I can dig up the dialogue I will correct the aforementioned linguistics. I am to the point where certain lines from certain shows hold a reverence for me as though lyrics from our favorite songs. This quote from Ms. Scully is one of them – for the not so faint of heart there are others – but I will save those for another day. The point is Scully knew, perhaps like no other, the gift of tenacity Mulder had for his quest. The unrelenting search for the truth to his questions.

The truth is out there.

If I want to be aware of the extra-toed frogs (and extra legged) from the Savanna River Weapons complex (did I mention the deformed turtles and snakes that wander off the reservation and breed with the straights?) or the Dioxin discharges of the Tittabawassee River and subsequent effects to the habitat of the river basin, not to mention the Saginaw Bay (did I mention this is just upstream from the inlet to the municipal water supply of the entire Detroit Metropolitan Area?) 0r that nearly every resident in the State of Michigan has PCB residue in their bodies from the sealant sprayed on the feed silos that made it’s way into the dairy feed and subsequently the milk and subsequently we Michigan residents. If I want to drink my Espresso and dance on the keyboard and try and make sense of it all – and share it with you – this is my dance.

The organization Reporters Without Borders has come up with its 2005 rankings of nations based on freedom of the press.

Our Founding Fathers would not be pleased.

At the top of the list are Finland, Iceland, Ireland and the Netherlands, all tying for #1 in Freedom of the Press. I am surprised by Ireland, I have to admit, though for no particular reason that I can think of. Finland, Iceland and the Netherlands are no suprise whatsoever.

What fascinates me are the others in the top 10. Norway and Switzerland are up there, no big surprise, as is Portugal. But the biggest surprise among the top ten are the number of former Soviet Bloc nations: Czech Republic, Estonia, Slovakia, Hungary, Latvia (one of my ancestral homes!), and Slovenia. Bravo to these nations for coming so far so fast. Russia itself does not fare so well, coming in 147, right above Yemen, the Gambia and Tunisia and below, get this, the "Democratic Republic" of the Congo and Somalia! Coming on the same day I read about the vandalism of a synagogue in Vladavastok, coming on the heals of a skinhead gathering, I can't help but think Russia is slowly failing in its experiments with democracy.

The bottom of the list is no surprise at all: China, Burma (sic), Cuba, Eritrea, Turkmenistan, and, rock bottom, North Korea at 168. I almost think North Korea has turned every possible measure of failure into a goal: starvation of its population, cult worship of living people, absolute censorship of pretty much everything. "Burma" (now actually called Myanmar) and Turkmenistan are about the shittiest nations (in terms of human rights) we actually have friendly dealings with, and our close friendship with these two nations pretty much belies any claim we have to advancing democracy. Sure, we condemn Cuba and North Korea, but Myanmar, Turmkenistan and, in terms of trade, China are among our best buddies.

In West Virginia thre is a cohabitation law, which makes it a misdemeanor for unmarried people to "lewdly and lasciviously associate" and live together. This law is being challenged by a lawsuit, filed by the ACLU on behalf of an inmate whose parole was delayed because of his plan to cohabit with his fiance.

Well, I have lewdly and lasciviously associated and lived together with women before I was married. And enjoyed it very much, thank you. And I considered it none of the government's business that I did so. However, I always had the option of marrying who ever I wanted to lewdly and lasciviously associate with.

Since gays are not allowed the same right to marry eachother that I have, this cohabitation law seems to clearly discriminate against gays, preventing them from lewdly and lasciviously associating with eachother legally.

But really, the fundamental question here is what business is it of the government to care who lewdly and lasciviously associates with who? When will we get the governmemt out of our bedrooms? Oh, yeah. When we get rid of Republican control over our government.

Don't you love it when American right wing nutjobs start crawling even further right and bump right into their avowed enemies?

Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called Tuesday for a purge of liberal and secular teachers from the country's universities, urging students to return to 1980s-style radicalism.

"Today, students should shout at the president and ask why liberal and secular university lecturers are present in the universities," the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during a meeting with a group of students.

David Horowitz, publisher of FrontPage magazine, and whose archive of articles is available online, has long advocated for something he calls "an academic bill of rights." Essentially, the academic bill of rights argues in language that would make the sophists blush with pleasure, that universities are not teaching, they are indoctrinating, and therefore, "intellectual balance" should be brought to bear. It's carefully worded to indicate that no professor should be hired or fired based on political views. It all sounds so reasonable. And then, when you click on Professor Horowitz's blurbs for his most recent book, The Professors, you find this: