Big Money: 2.5 Billion Dollars, One Suspicious Vehicle, and a Pimpon the Trail of the Ultra-Rich Hijacking American Politics
Kenneth P. Vogel (Author)
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Human Rights
Uganda is in a state of mass hysteria.
Whipped up by demagogic charlatans, the impoverished nation, facing herculean difficulties and teetering on the brink of an economic catastrophe, has passed a law outlawing homosexuality. Not satisfied with Anti-Sodomy Laws already on the books, the government now imposes some of the harshest penalties in Africa on gay and lesbian citizens. The statute is sweeping and includes promotion of publicly accusing any one of being gay.
By reading or loaning this book, you are a Ugandan criminal.
What should the West do and what has the West done to stand up for human rights? What will happen to the Ugandan gay population? Is there hope for repeal? These are moral and political questions that will be addressed, even if by the complicity of silence.
In Britain and the United States, Europe and Canada, the Left and Right Wings of the body politic must search their souls for a response.
For social liberals, a traditionally suppressed minority is being persecuted. As a result, Uganda is stepping backwards into a darker and more dangerous time.
For Conservatives, since the law is a product of the super-state, they too must search for sensible policy. Ugandan Press, Church, Mosque and Government are suppressing personal liberties. Ending foreign aid to Uganda might be a sensible way to both stand for freedom and cut spending.
This 7500 word booklet tells the story of the rights of a minority being crushed for the benefit of politicians and how the press and church/mosque joined in. The question for the West is how to respond.
The men and women in Invisible Hands reveal the human rights abuses occurring behind the scenes of the global economy. These narrators — including phone manufacturers in China, copper miners in Zambia, garment workers in Bangladesh, and farmers around the world — reveal the secret history of the things we buy, including lives and communities devastated by low wages, environmental degradation, and political repression. Sweeping in scope and rich in detail, these stories capture the interconnectivity of all people struggling to support themselves and their families. Narrators include Kalpona, a leading Bangladeshi labor organizer who led her first strike at 15; Han, who, as a teenager, began assembling circuit boards for an international electronics company based in Seoul; Albert, a copper miner in Zambia who, during a wage protest, was shot by representatives of the Chinese-owned mining company that he worked for; and Sanjay, who grew up in the shadow of the Bhopal chemical disaster, one of the worst industrial accidents in history.
This introduction to human dignity explores the history of the notion from antiquity to the nineteenth century, and the way in which dignity is conceptualised in non-Western contexts. Building on this, it addresses a range of systematic conceptualisations, considers the theoretical and legal conditions for human dignity as a useful notion and analyses a number of philosophical and conceptual approaches to dignity. Finally, the book introduces current debates, paying particular attention to the legal implementation, human rights, justice and conflicts, medicine and bioethics, and provides an explicit systematic framework for discussing human dignity. Adopting a wide range of perspectives and taking into account numerous cultures and contexts, this handbook is a valuable resource for students, scholars and professionals working in philosophy, law, history and theology.
The never-before-told full story of the history-changing break-in at the FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, by a group of unlikely activists—quiet, ordinary, hardworking Americans—that made clear the shocking truth and confirmed what some had long suspected, that J. Edgar Hoover had created and was operating, in violation of the U.S. Constitution, his own shadow Bureau of Investigation.
It begins in 1971 in an America being split apart by the Vietnam War . . . A small group of activists—eight men and women—the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI, inspired by Daniel Berrigan’s rebellious Catholic peace movement, set out to use a more active, but nonviolent, method of civil disobedience to provide hard evidence once and for all that the government was operating outside the laws of the land.
The would-be burglars—nonpro’s—were ordinary people leading lives of purpose: a professor of religion and former freedom rider; a day-care director; a physicist; a cab driver; an antiwar activist, a lock picker; a graduate student haunted by members of her family lost to the Holocaust and the passivity of German civilians under Nazi rule.
Betty Medsger's extraordinary book re-creates in resonant detail how this group of unknowing thieves, in their meticulous planning of the burglary, scouted out the low-security FBI building in a small town just west of Philadelphia, taking into consideration every possible factor, and how they planned the break-in for the night of the long-anticipated boxing match between Joe Frazier (war supporter and friend to President Nixon) and Muhammad Ali (convicted for refusing to serve in the military), knowing that all would be fixated on their televisions and radios.
Medsger writes that the burglars removed all of the FBI files and, with the utmost deliberation, released them to various journalists and members of Congress, soon upending the public’s perception of the inviolate head of the Bureau and paving the way for the first overhaul of the FBI since Hoover became its director in 1924. And we see how the release of the FBI files to the press set the stage for the sensational release three months later, by Daniel Ellsberg, of the top-secret, seven-thousand-page Pentagon study on U.S. decision-making regarding the Vietnam War, which became known as the Pentagon Papers.
At the heart of the heist—and the book—the contents of the FBI files revealing J. Edgar Hoover’s “secret counterintelligence program” COINTELPRO, set up in 1956 to investigate and disrupt dissident political groups in the United States in order “to enhance the paranoia endemic in these circles,” to make clear to all Americans that an FBI agent was “behind every mailbox,” a plan that would discredit, destabilize, and demoralize groups, many of them legal civil rights organizations and antiwar groups that Hoover found offensive—as well as black power groups, student activists, antidraft protestors, conscientious objectors.
The author, the first reporter to receive the FBI files, began to cover this story during the three years she worked for The Washington Post and continued her investigation long after she'd left the paper, figuring out who the burglars were, and convincing them, after decades of silence, to come forward and tell their extraordinary story.
The Burglary is an important and riveting book, a portrait of the potential power of nonviolent resistance and the destructive power of excessive government secrecy and spying.
On June 25, 2013, Texas Senator Wendy Davis filibustered for nearly twelve hours in order to block the passage of Senate Bill 5, a bill which would greatly impact access to reproductive healthcare in the state of Texas. Though her filibuster successfully blocked SB5, the bill was repackaged and passed in a second special session as HB2.
This work contains transcripts of almost 64 hours of debate and testimony on the Texas Senate and House floors, starting with Wendy Davis' filibuster of SB5, including the proposed House and Senate amendments for HB2, and ending with powerful citizen testimony on these bills.
Ralph Nader has fought for over fifty years on behalf of American citizens against the reckless influence of corporations and their government patrons on our society. Now he ramps up the fight and makes a persuasive case that Americans are not powerless. In Unstoppable, he explores the emerging political alignment of the Left and the Right against converging corporate-government tyranny.
Large segments from the progressive, conservative, and libertarian political camps find themselves aligned in opposition to the destruction of civil liberties, the economically draining corporate welfare state, the relentless perpetuation of America’s wars, sovereignty-shredding trade agreements, and the unpunished crimes of Wall Street against Main Street. Nader shows how Left-Right coalitions can prevail over the corporate state and crony capitalism.
He draws on his extensive experience working with grassroots organizations in Washington and reveals the many surprising victories by united progressive and conservative forces. As a participator in, and keen observer of, these budding alliances, he breaks new ground in showing how such coalitions can overcome specific obstacles that divide them, and how they can expand their power on Capitol Hill, in the courts, and in the decisive arena of public opinion.
Americans can reclaim their right to consume safe foods and drugs, live in healthy environments, receive fair rewards for their work, resist empire, regain control of taxpayer assets, strengthen investor rights, and make bureaucrats more efficient and accountable. Nader argues it is in the interest of citizens of different political labels to join in the struggle against the corporate state that will, if left unchecked, ruin the Republic, override our constitution, and shred the basic rights of the American people.
These days, it is easy to be cynical about democracy. Even though there are more democratic societies now (119 and counting) than ever before, skeptics can point to low turnouts in national elections, the degree to which money corrupts the process, and the difficulties of mass participation in complex systems as just a few reasons why the system is flawed. The Occupy movement in 2011 proved that there is an emphatic dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs, particularly with the economy, but, ultimately, it failed to produce any coherent vision for social change. So what should progressives be working toward? What should the economic vision be for the 21st century?
After Occupy boldly argues that democracy should not just be a feature of political institutions, but of economic institutions as well. In fact, despite the importance of the economy in democratic societies, there is very little about it that is democratic. Questioning whether the lack of democracy in the economy might be unjust, Tom Malleson scrutinizes workplaces, the market, and financial and investment institutions to consider the pros and cons of democratizing each. He considers examples of successful efforts toward economic democracy enacted across the globe, from worker cooperatives in Spain to credit unions and participatory budgeting measures in Brazil and questions the feasibility of expanding each. The book offers the first comprehensive and radical vision for democracy in the economy, but it is far from utopian. Ultimately, After Occupy offers possibility, demonstrating in a remarkably tangible way that when political democracy evolves to include economic democracy, our societies will have a chance of meaningful equality for all.
Many activists worry about the same few problems in their groups: low turnout, inactive members, conflicting views on racism, overtalking, and offensive violations of group norms. But in searching for solutions to these predictable and intractable troubles, progressive social movement groups overlook class culture differences. In Missing Class, Betsy Leondar-Wright uses a class-focused lens to show that members with different class life experiences tend to approach these problems differently. This perspective enables readers to envision new solutions that draw on the strengths of all class cultures to form the basis of stronger cross-class and multiracial movements.
The first comprehensive empirical study of US activist class cultures, Missing Class looks at class dynamics in 25 groups that span the gamut of social movement organizations in the United States today, including the labor movement, grassroots community organizing, and groups working on global causes in the anarchist and progressive traditions. Leondar-Wright applies Pierre Bourdieu’s theories of cultural capital and habitus to four class trajectories: lifelong working-class and poor; lifelong professional middle class; voluntarily downwardly mobile; and upwardly mobile.
Compellingly written for both activists and social scientists, this book describes class differences in paths to activism, attitudes toward leadership, methods of conflict resolution, ways of using language, diversity practices, use of humor, methods of recruiting, and group process preferences. Too often, we miss class. Missing Class makes a persuasive case that seeing class culture differences could enable activists to strengthen their own groups and build more durable cross-class alliances for social justice.
This book included 2014 updates. In April 2014, the Universities of Michigan, Chicago, Illinois and Brandeis refused to screen or acknowledge nine Muslim, Sikh & Christian women rights leaders, who expose the brutal abuse of women and girls justified in the name of religion, culture or Shariah, on screen in the Honor Diaries documentary, released March 8. Yes you read this correctly. Women students and faculty at American colleges are silencing the heart-breaking abuse of women and actively shutting down Free Speech. Does Freedom of Religion over-rule the abuse of women in its name? How has violence against women become political? Where does religion end and politics begin? How are European Leaders drawing this line? This colorful, pocket sized, easy to read, Show N Tell Book explains what is going on in America. Each page is description of one of 60+ American or European news stories from 2008 – 2014, with a quote, photo, and context provided by over 75 experts. Women’s rights activist and author, Joy Brighton, provides bullet point chapter summaries and green “insight boxes” to help readers connect the dots. This book is written for busy Americans who are concerned that political correctness is backfiring in America. But, they only have 10 minutes while drinking coffee or in the “loo”, to flip through a book, before their day starts. This is your FLIP book. In a nutshell, Islam is a religion, protected under the U.S. First Amendment. Sharia-ism is the political movement of Radical Islam and is not protected under the First Amendment. Sharia-ism is about control, not destruction. Sharia-ism seeks total control over women, religion, speech & politics. In fact, Sharia-ists are determined to control anyone who refuses to follow their rules. Only a small piece of Sharia-ism involves terrorism. Because if you want to control something, why blow it up? In the past 5 years, European nations, including Great Britain, France, Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Belgium, Denmark, and Sweden, have taken legal action to de-rail Sharia-ism. To the contrary, U.S. elite are enabling the growth of Sharia-ism out of ignorance, intimidation or self-interest. Fortunately, a growing number of Congress and State Governors, educated by the grass roots and freelance journalists are taking action against Sharia-ism. So what can you do to get involved? Start with 10 minutes of “flipping” through this book.
Fighting for Peace brings to light an important yet neglected aspect of opposition to the Iraq War—the role of veterans and their families. Drawing on extensive participant observation and interviews, Lisa Leitz demonstrates how the harrowing war experiences of veterans and their families motivated a significant number of them to engage in peace activism.
Married to a Navy pilot herself, Leitz documents how military peace activists created a movement that allowed them to merge two seemingly contradictory sides of their lives: an intimate relation to the military and antiwar activism. Members of the movement strategically deployed their combined military–peace activist identities to attract media attention, assert their authority about the military and war, and challenge dominant pro-war sentiment. By emphasizing the human costs of war, activists hoped to mobilize American citizens and leaders who were detached from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, bring the wars to an end, and build up programs to take care of returning veterans and their families.
The stories in Fighting for Peace ultimately reveal that America’s all-volunteer force is contributing to a civilian–military divide that leaves civilians with little connection to the sacrifices of the military. Increasingly, Leitz shows, veterans and their families are being left to not only fight America’s wars but also to fight against them.