Kate Beckinsale, Judy Greer and Andrea Savage "spread" the message that the one thing women really want in their vagina is the government.

Open Thread below...

[Caution, Language may not be suitable for work.]

Lee Camp: The US has 5% of the world's population and 25% of the world's prisoners. Why is this happening?

Full message from the video:

Dear brothers and sisters. Now is the time to open your eyes!

In a stunning move that has civil libertarians stuttering with disbelief, the U.S. Senate has just passed a bill that effectively ends the Bill of Rights in America.

The National Defense Authorization Act is being called the most traitorous act ever witnessed in the Senate, and the language of the bill is cleverly designed to make you think it doesn't apply to Americans, but toward the end of the bill, it essentially says it can apply to Americans "if we want it to.

Bill Summary & Status, 112th Congress (2011 -- 2012) | S.1867 | Latest Title: National Defense Authorization Act for.

This bill, passed late last night in a 93-7 vote, declares the entire USA to be a "battleground" upon which U.S. military forces can operate with impunity, overriding Posse Comitatus and granting the military the unchecked power to arrest, detain, interrogate and even assassinate U.S. citizens with impunity.

Even WIRED magazine was outraged at this bill, reporting:

Senate Wants the Military to Lock You Up Without Trial

...the detention mandate to use indefinite military detention in terrorism cases isn't limited to foreigners. It's confusing, because two different sections of the bill seem to contradict each other, but in the judgment of the University of Texas' Robert Chesney — a nonpartisan authority on military detention — "U.S. citizens are included in the grant of detention authority."

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Good morning! It's Monday, May 7, 2012. What's on your mind today?

Occupy Detroit gets a home base:

With its comfy sofas, kitchen and sunlit windows, the brick building at 5900 Michigan Ave. in Detroit that opened this year could pass for a spacious café.

But a banner high on the wall that reads "We are the 99%" signifies this is a different type of place, one that's become the center for activists in metro Detroit. After leaving their encampment in Grand Circus Park in November, Occupy Detroit has found a new home in the heart of southwest Detroit.

Across the street from a grocery store, the two-floor 12,000-square-foot building with a tall ceiling was refurbished by activists and is a striking symbol of the movement's attempts to establish a solid base in the region for its activities. "OCCUPY," it reads on the windowpanes outside.

Awesome news!

Social Security is not going broke. I repeat, Social Security is not going broke.

Which federal program took in more than it spent last year, added $95 billion to its surplus and lifted 20 million Americans of all ages out of poverty? Why, Social Security, of course...

Tom Morello, Worldwide Rebel Tour, performing "Night Watchman."

Tom Morello has done it again. Always looking to support the Occupy Movement in one way or another, he has now released a free 30-minute documentary , (did I mention it's free?) in celebration of May Day. Directed by Bobby Roth and filmed at Henson Studios in Los Angeles last August, the film features interviews with Morello juxtaposed with live performances of “Black Spartacus Heart Attack Machine,” “Save The Hammer For The Man,” “It Begins Tonight,” and “World Wide Rebel Songs.” The film is sure to inspire fans both in and out of the Occupy Movement.

Says Morello, "Remember that old Coca-Cola commercial? ‘I’d like to teach the world to sing/in perfect harmony'? It’s like that. But with class warfare."

Tom Morello was also honored for his activism:

The Rage Against The Machine star has been one of the most fervent supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which began in New York last year (11), and has traveled across the U.S. and Canada, and even to London to perform for demonstrators calling for an end to corporate greed.

He also led hundreds of protesters in a musical march through the streets of the Big Apple on May Day (01May12) for the so-called Occupy Guitarmy event, and his campaign work earned him special recognition for public service at the 2012 Hillman Prizes ceremony.

Morello was presented with the award by singer and fellow civil rights activist Harry Belafonte, Jr. at the prizegiving in New York on Tuesday night (01May12), but the rocker admitted he didn't think he'd make it to the event when Occupy demonstrators clashed with police earlier that day.

From ThinkProgress: Wall Street CEOs Personally Lobby Federal Reserve To Weaken New Financial Regulations.

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The city of Cleveland will not renew Occupy protesters' permit allowing a permanent encampment. The group has maintained an encampment in downtown Cleveland since October of last year.

Cleveland Mayor Jackson's chief of staff, Ken Sillman, said that the decision not to renew the permit was made before the FBI's arrest of five men who planned to blow up an Ohio bridge.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio questioned the timing of the permit revocation, saying it was concerned Jackson's announcement was an attempt to connect the entire Occupy movement to the bomb plot.

"Individuals are responsible for their own actions, not the groups they affiliate with," ACLU of Ohio Legal Director James Hardiman said in a statement. "City officials should not be in the business of condemning an entire group of people based on the actions of others."

Bill Dobbs, a spokesman for Occupy in New York, also said the arrests have nothing to do with the Occupy movement that began last fall.

"This incident has nothing to do with Occupy Wall Street, which explicitly stands for non-violence," he said. "Before there's a rush to judgment, facts need to come out. Those charged are entitled to a fair trial and due process."

[Via, Via]

More members of Occupy Wall Street are coming forward to allege that police carrying old bench warrants for minor violations such as public urination, open container or riding a bicycle on a sidewalk, so that they could interrogate occupiers about May Day activities.

Experts say that while executing old warrants is legal, even old warrants, but the tactic becomes illegal when done solely to investigate political activity.

Via:

Officers visited up to six homes the day before the May 1 protests, but Shawn Carrié found himself getting questioned the evening of the protest. He was coordinating all internal communications for the Occupy movement on May Day. At about 9 p.m., he was walking near Wall Street, heading home.

“And somebody comes up to me and says, ‘Shawn?’ And just grabs my arm and nine dudes surround me,” said Carrié.

He said nine plain clothes officers wearing NYPD jackets asked if he had anything sharp in his pockets. He shook his head no. He said they started pulling possessions out of his clothes, including his cell phone, his wallet and keys.

Within seconds, he said, they bound his hands with zip ties, but didn't explain why. Then the officers placed him in a red van waiting nearby that was marked with an NYPD sticker, he said.

Carrié says that after being taken to police headquarters in Lower Manhattan, he was taken to a room where he was questioned about what he was doing that day, and then placed alone in a cell for 13 hours. In court the next day, he learned that he was arrested because of two outstanding warrants from 2007 for "violations related to a public urination incident." To make matters worse, the warrants were for another Shawn Carrié. Police had snatched the wrong guy off the street.

Read the full article by Alisa Chang here, inluding the legal experts opinions, and NYPD Commissioner Commissioner Ray Kelly's remarks on the use of the warrants.

On 12 May people around the world will rise up again responding to the global call for action. In London, protesters will visit those who gambled with their futures and deliver their very own personal messages to them.

Via:

"Our city has lost its pride. It’s been stolen. Our politicians, regulators and those who were meant to be looking after things sold us out. Who is benefiting?"

So begins Occupy London's call to action, issued for May 12, when "people around the world will rise up again responding to the global call for action that marks the birth of the indignados movement."

The video they've created is an invitation to occupy London, home to plenty of 1 percenters, the banksters "who gambled with our pensions and savings, created financial nonsense to make money out of thin air, paid hundreds of thousands to wine and dine with our ‘elected’ representatives, were bailed out, evaded billions in taxes and secured 40% of the world’s wealth for themselves.

"On 12 May, we’ll deliver our very own personal messages to them. Be creative: come dressed as your least favorite banker, tax evader, corporate tycoon, politician, vampire squid, and company CEO. Bring stickers, monopoly money, caution tape, placards, faux awards, pots, pans, bullhorns, conches, tents, stereos, war horns or any other “random acts of kindness” you like."

This post-May Day action is still in the planning stages, so if you have any ideas for guerilla theatre or other creative direct action, go here.

Can you imagine a more difficult challenge than to find a way to provide free health-care in a nation with the second-largest population in the world, where over 40 percent of the people live below the poverty level and there is no government-funded welfare system or safety net?

At India's Narayana Hrudayalaya, meaning "Temple of the Heart," one of the world's top cardiac surgeons, Dr. Devi Shetty, determined to make a difference, making a profit and offering free medical care go hand-in-hand.

"The essence of life is helping people," Shetty says. "We are in a profession where people come, [and] they are not coming to buy a car or a house or a new suit. They are coming here to save their life. And when they come and tell us that they have no money we know if we refuse they are going to die. So if a hospital is not able to help people who come to its doorstep, we believe they should not be doing that job."

How does he do it?

Al Jazeera:

"We decided to adopt all the business principles of Walmart or Henry Ford - the one thing in common is the economy of scale," Shetty explains.

At the Narayana, approximately 40 per cent of patients pay a reasonable price for their treatment, a small percentage - those who "want the frills of executive rooms" - pay a premium, a majority pays less than the market rate and 10 to 20 per cent pay virtually nothing. For the latter category, the hospital's charitable wing raises money to help compensate for the material costs of their treatment.

In any other hospital, those who could not afford to pay their medical bills would simply be sent away until they came up with the cash, but at the Narayana the hospital's charity wing helps them to find the money.

While the charismatic Shetty and his ideals are a draw card, it is the fact that he can offer the surgery cheaper than anyone else that is the main attraction.

In the first episode of Indian Hospital, we follow the story of Akbar and Qurr - a couple who have gone from one state hospital to another trying to save the life of their nine-month-old first-born child, Hatersham.

There will be five more episodes of "Indian Hospital" on Al Jazeera, see the schedule with dates and show times listed here.

Mitt Romney struggles to convince voters that he understands the problems of the 99 percent, fails...

Mitt Romney says he learns about what it’s like to struggle in a difficult economy by sitting down and chatting with regular people. But the Republican presidential candidate doesn’t want anybody to see it — and his campaign won’t say who he meets with or when the meetings occur.

In interviews and on the campaign trail, Romney regularly says that he learns about the struggling economy by talking to people affected by it. Earlier this week, he said he meets with families “almost every day.” On Friday, Romney said the talks are “off the record” — and that he agrees to keep private the names of the people he meets with.

I wonder if Ann Romney sits in on these secret meetings with regular people? If so, do you think she wears $990 t-shirts in an effort to "dress down"?