GOP Congressman-wannbe-senatorTodd Akin was asked why he voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act at a town hall on Thursday. Akin's response suggests that a) he doesn't understand what federal law was prior to the Ledbetter Act, b)he doesn't understand what's in the Ledbetter Act, c) he's a misogynistic cretin who thinks it should be legal for employers to discriminate against women and d)that he will say he believes anything the GOP backer Koch brothers tell him to.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: You voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. Why do you think it is okay for a woman to be paid less for doing the same work as a man?

AKIN: Well, first of all, the premise of your question is that I'm making that particular distinction. I believe in free enterprise. I don't think the government should be telling people what you pay and what you don't pay. I think it's about freedom. If somebody wants to hire somebody and they agree on a salary, that's fine, however it wants to work. So, the government sticking its nose into all kinds of things has gotten us into huge trouble.

It's been illegal to discriminate against women by paying them less since 1960s. The Ledbetter Act just made it easier for women to sue if they find out they're being discriminated against. Because, see, where Akin says that "If somebody wants to hire somebody and they agree on a salary, that's fine, however it wants to work," the reality is that employers don't generally say to women, "Hey, I'm going to pay you less than I'm paying men doing the same job as you." They just pay less, and keep quiet about it, because they're breaking the law. Which means it would be bad for them if the women they were discriminating against found out about it because there are consequences for breaking the law.

The only "freedom" Akin is talking about here is the freedom of businesses to break the law. Which he thinks is fine, because he doesn't think that equal pay should be the law, even in largely unenforceable theory. Just like he doesn't think there should be a minimum wage for anyone.

Note also how in this case "the government sticking its nose into all kinds of things" is not a good thing, according to Akin, but when it comes to women's vaginas more intrusive government is just fine.

DemocracyNow! video discussion of the new evidence in the Terry Williams case. Williams was scheduled to be executed on October 3, 2012.

A state judge granted a stay of execution on Friday for Terry Williams, a death row inmate facing lethal injection in just five days, after ruling that prosecutors hid crucial mitigating evidence from defense attorneys before his trial nearly 30 years ago.

Williams faced death for killing Amos Norwood, a 51-year-old chemist, in Philadelphia in 1984. What the jury in that case did not know is that Norwood had sexually abused Williams and had allegedly violently raped him the night before. Furthermore, Williams had suffered years of physical and sexual abuse by older males. Most recently, evidence has emerged that prosecutors tried to make robbery seem like the motive for the murder, even though Williams’ co-defendant knew about the sexual abuse.

At trial, the lead prosecutor called Norwood an "innocent man" and told jurors that Williams committed the murder "for no other reason than that a kind man gave him a ride home." Williams was three months past his 18th birthday at the time of the killing.

Via:

Both accomplice Marc Draper, a policeman's son, and the trial prosecutor, Andrea Foulkes, gave new testimony before Sarmina in recent days. Draper said that he was promised a chance at parole if he told jurors the Norwood slaying was a robbery, not a sex-related crime.

He testified accordingly, but is serving a life term for felony murder. He said he did not understand that lifers in Pennsylvania are never eligible for parole.

Several Norwood jurors said they also misunderstood that when they sentenced Williams to death. Five jurors now support his bid for clemency, as does Norwood's widow.

Foulkes denied promising Draper a shorter sentence, or withholding evidence from jurors or the defense.

Under Saramina's ruling, Williams will get a new hearing before a jury to determine whether he should be executed or not. The judge did not overturn Williams' guilty verdict in the Norwood murder. If Williams prevails in court, he will serve life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Lawyers with the Federal Community Defenders Office in Philadelphia said the sex-abuse evidence might have steered the jury toward a life sentence, if not a different verdict on guilt.

Then Philadelphia District Attorney Ronald Castille -- who signed off on Williams' death penalty case -- now serves as chief justice of the state Supreme Court, which may now ultimately decide Williams' fate.

Bank of America announced on Friday that it will pay $2.43 billion to settle a class-action lawsuit with shareholders following its acquisition of Merrill Lynch in 2008. The $50 billion deal came within days of Merrill Lynch’s collapse, effectively preventing the bank from going bankrupt. Bank of America denied the lawsuit’s allegations that its executives made misleading statements about both firms’ financial health at the time, but has said it will institute new corporate governance policies as part of the settlement. The costly suit will result in a $1.6 billion blow to the bank’s third-quarter earnings, the results of which will be reported on Oct. 17th.

Dallas Morning News:

"For all the talk about whether Mitt Romney should distance himself from George W. Bush -- and the policies of the last GOP White House -- a new survey shows that the former president actually has better favorability ratings than the Republican nominee."

The most recent Bloomberg poll shows Bush with a 46% to 49% favorable rating as compared to Romney's 43% to 50%.

The 10 hours and 35 minutes of video footage shot by the NYPD during the raid of Zuccotti Park that was released by Anonymous on Monday gives a more expansive view of what happened on the morning of November 15, 2011, albeit in a more sanitized form. Much of the footage, which also includes clips from the Duarte Square action and the re-opening of the park the following evening, is heavily edited, especially scenes that include arrests. Still, some of it is informative and contradicts the statements or positions made by city officials defending the raid, most notably, that Occupy's Library was dismantled and destroyed by Brookfield employees, and that reports of press harassment and arrests were part of a "myth."

Via:

The first four minutes of this footage shows protester Ted Hall giving a monologue as police in riot gear watch, but the remaining time shows police notifying Occupy's medical tent that they must leave. An officer tells the doctor on duty that he must leave, but that EMS will take care of his patients. The doctor declines, and refuses to leave his two patients. A long standoff ensues, as several officers believe that one of the protesters stole a scalpel. A nurse ensures them that they haven't. That nurse, "Nurse Jane," wrote about the experience here. She describes the medical tent as "the most amazing clinic I've ever worked in!"

Eventually, the tent is ripped by police knives, and everyone is forced out. Nurse Jane is seen speaking with another officer, explaining to him her concerns (11:40 mark), and notes that it doesn't help that there is a man filming her. "That would be me," the TARU officer from behind the camera replies.

The Gothamist has downloaded the footage into seven videos (including the one above) and breaks down each into note worthy events, you can view them all here.

Non-violent students at UC Davis protesting tuition hikes in November 2011 were sprayed with pepper-spray by campus police.

The University of California has agreed to pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit filed by demonstrators who were pepper-sprayed during an Occupy protest at UC Davis last fall, according to a preliminary settlement filed Wednesday.

Under the proposed settlement, each of the 21 protesters named in the complaint will receive $30,000 and an additional $250,000 for their attorneys to split.

A Letter from Quebec:They Villified Us,Then We Won.

Elderly veterans facing foreclosure: Robert Moses is 92, an African American and a World War II Navy veteran.

Don Baird is a couple of weeks shy of his 90th birthday, is scheduled for heart surgery next week, and is also a World War II veteran.

Aside from being former servicemen, both men also share one other thing: they are about to lose the homes they owned, each for more than four decades, to foreclosure.

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RT.com's Abby Martin takes a look at the facial recognition technology being used to data-mine protestors and track you.

The Illuminator - Occupy's Bat Signal - comes to Trump Tower to project the truth about Donald Trump's efforts to bulldoze the 99% and a Scottish environmental legacy to build a golf course for elite jet-setters.

Justin Wedes, from the OWS Media Team, narrates.

Good morning, today is September 28, 2012 and TGIF! Only 39 days left until election day!

Democracy Now! premieres "The United States of ALEC," a special report by legendary journalist Bill Moyers on how the secretive American Legislative Exchange Council has helped corporate America propose and even draft legislation for states across the country. ALEC brings together major U.S. corporations and right-wing legislators to craft and vote on "model" bills behind closed doors. It has come under increasing scrutiny for its role in promoting "stand your ground" gun laws, voter suppression bills, union-busting policies and other controversial legislation. Although billing itself as a "nonpartisan public-private partnership," ALEC is actually a national network of state politicians and powerful corporations principally concerned with increasing corporate profits without public scrutiny. Moyers’ special will air this weekend on Moyers & Company, but first airs on Democracy Now! today. "The United States of ALEC" is a collaboration between Okapi Productions, LLC and the Schumann Media Center.

A full transcript is available online here.

Speaking via videolink from the Ecuadorean embassy in London, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange addressed a side meeting of the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday evening. In his remarks, Assange gave thanks to the United Nations for its treaties on political asylum and denounced the U.S. treatment of alleged Army whistleblower Bradley Manning. Assange also accused President Obama of exploiting the Arab Spring and called on the U.S.to end its persecution of WikiLeaks and its supporters.

Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange may have been designated an "enemy of the state" by the United States. U.S. Air Force counterintelligence documents show military personnel who contact WikiLeaks or its supporters may be at risk of being charged with "communicating with the enemy," a military crime that carries a maximum sentence of death. The designation is the same legal category as al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

The report came just before Julian Assange spoke via videolink to a side meeting of the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday. Assange spoke from inside the Ecuadorean embassy in London. Ecuador granted him diplomatic asylum to prevent Assange from being extradited to Sweden over sex crime accusations. Assange is seeking asylum because he fears extradition to Sweden may lead to his transfer to the United States, where, he is concerned, he could potentially face charges relating to WikiLeaks.

Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow! also speaks with Julian Assange’s attorney Michael Ratner after the UN Speech.

Full transcript of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange addressing a side meeting of the U.N. General Assembly Wednesday night is below the fold.

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