The BBC announced Friday that it will not acquiesce to requests to ban the song "Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead!" from its airwaves. The song, sung by Munchkins celebrating the death of the Wicked Witch of the West in the movie, shot up the charts after former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's death. A BBC spokesman explained the decision by saying the company could not justify not playing a song at the top of the singles charts.

Via:

While acknowledging that the broadcast could offend Mrs. Thatcher’s family and supporters, Mr. Cooper added, “To ban the record from our airwaves completely would risk giving the campaign the oxygen of further publicity and might inflame an already delicate situation.”

Mrs. Thatcher herself made famous use of the same metaphor in 1985, shortly after the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 by Islamist militants, when she argued:

"We must try to find ways to starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend. In our societies we do not believe in constraining the media, still less in censorship. But ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, a code under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists’ morale or their cause while the hijack lasted?"

As Mitt Romney would say: "what's sauce for the goose is now sauce for the gander."

The NYPD has a "stop and frisk" program that allows them to grab black people off the street, slam them up against walls, and beat the bejesus out of them. They claim that this keeps crime down in the city, and deny allegations of racial profiling.

Earlier this month, a Manhattan Federal Court judge said that the NYPD must quit stopping and frisking people outside of private apartment buildings in the Bronx, because it's unconstitutional. Ray Kelly, naturally, was not pleased.

Now, that very same judge says that the NYPD can resume that same stop and frisk program temporarily, because stopping this unconstitutional program would be too much trouble for the cops.

The NY Daily News reports:

"Manhattan Federal Court Judge Shira Scheindlin lifted the order [halting the stop and frisk program] Tuesday after she agreed with city lawyers who said the immediate halt of some "Clean Halls" trespass stops would impose an undue burden on the NYPD, requiring some form of "notification to and/or training of" thousands of NYPD officers and their supervisors."

I never considered the undue burden of "notification" before (Facepalm). I think I'll pose this dilemma to a group of people that I email with and see if they have any ideas for a solution to this problem. But first I've got to finish copying and faxing these documents. Oops, another text message first. Busy, busy...

[Image via Flickr]

By Abrahm Lustgarten, ProPublica

When the Obama administration temporarily banned BP from federal contracts Wednesday, it pointed to BP's "lack of business integrity" and conduct relating to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill.

The sanction, however, has been years in the making.

BP has been criminally convicted in four previous cases — including a 2005 explosion in Texas that killed 15 workers — and the EPA has been considering broader debarment proceedings against the company since at least 2005. The agency had actually been nearing a decision on a contract ban in January 2010, just a few months before the Deepwater Horizon tragedy unfolded, killing 11 workers and sending more than 200 million gallons of oil into the sea.

"This is not just about the Deepwater Horizon, but about a whole lot of things and a whole lot of parts of BP," said a former government official familiar with the debarment process. "It wasn't just narrowly scoped... they are looking at it as a systemic corporate-wide issue."

A limited suspension of government contracts for a specific facility or subsidiary operations, called suspension and debarment, is standard practice after a criminal conviction.

BP pleaded guilty on Nov. 15 to federal criminal charges of manslaughter and lying to Congress and agreed to pay more than $4 billion in fines relating to the Deepwater Horizon accident, which killed 11 workers and sent more than 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Three of the company's managers have also been criminally charged.

But the broad sanctions announced Wednesday target the BP corporation writ large — the British-based parent company and 21 international subsidiaries are included — and reflect a mistrust for BP's operations that has been growing over more than a decade.

In this case, experts close to the case say, the timing of the government's announcement was significant.

It came just hours before the government sold new rights to drill in the Gulf of the Mexico and seems intended to prevent BP, the largest leaseholder in the Gulf, from expanding its operations there until all of its problems are resolved.

"Suspensions are always timed to prevent something from happening," said Jeanne Pascal, a former EPA debarment attorney who led the government's investigation into BP from 1997 until she retired in 2010.

"A debarment says you have chronic bad behavior, and we think you present chronic risk for the government and that you will continue this behavior," said Pascal. "The immediate need was the issuance of new leases (Wednesday) in the Gulf of Mexico."

Wednesday's actions represent the government's effort to protect its fiscal resources and protect the public economic interest by not using taxpayer money to support actions that could cost the government more money later on.

After several past BP accidents, including two oil spills in Alaska and close calls at several U.S. refineries, private consultants and government investigators have pointed to wide-ranging problems within the company's culture. The critics have warned that BP has consistently prioritized speed and profit-making over safety and regulatory compliance.

The type of suspension ordered Wednesday is a part of what the government calls a "discretionary" debarment, which means it is considering this broader "corporate culture of noncompliance" and longer history.

While the EPA is the lead agency, its debarment decision affects the Department of Interior and Department of Defense, among other agencies. BP is among the U.S.'s largest corporate contractors and supplies more than $1 billion a year worth of fuel to the military.

The temporary suspension order issued Wednesday is the first step in a still-to-be-made decision about whether BP should be formally debarred, or banned entirely from contracts for a specified length of time.

For now, EPA officials tell ProPublica that the suspension could last anywhere from two to 18 months, depending on the final terms of the Department of Justice's plea agreement with BP. If the civil suits against BP remain unresolved, the suspension could stay in place longer.

As part of its criminal plea announced earlier this month, BP agreed to hire ethics and safety monitors for its Gulf operations and regularly evaluate its facilities for safety and environmental compliance. If the court approves the plea agreement, those terms would become a part of BP's probation, and thus a term of the suspension and debarment proceedings, an EPA spokesperson told ProPublica.

A spokesperson assigned to speak on behalf of BP told ProPublica that the company had not intended to bid on new Gulf leases in Wednesday's sale, and was not aware of the EPA's suspension decision until after their bids were due. But a Nov. 15 press release and filings with the SEC both suggest the company knew a ban could be coming.

BP was not explicitly banned from participating in the sale of new rights to drill in western Gulf of Mexico waters Wednesday, but would not have been allowed to win any leases if it had competed for them, a Department of Interior official said.

Since the 2010 spill in the Gulf, the government has granted BP more than 50 new leases in the Gulf of Mexico. BP is the single largest investor and leaseholder in the Gulf, where it currently operates seven drilling rigs.

"BP has invested more than $52 billion in the United States," the company said in a statement, "more than any other oil and gas company and more than it invests in any other country." It emphasized that it employs 23,000 people in the U.S. and said it supports nearly a quarter of a million American jobs.

So far, BP has spent more than $14 billion on cleanup and settlement costs related to the Gulf spill, and expects to pay more than $37 billion — including in criminal and civil settlements — by the time it is finished. In addition, the company has stated a renewed focus on safety and reorganized its corporate operations to increase safety and environmental accountability.

"I believe BP is genuine and sincere" in its efforts, said Tommy Beaudreau, director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, in a press conference held Wednesday after the government's lease sale.

BP also emphasized that it is working speedily towards a resolution with the government.

"BP has been in regular dialogue with the EPA and has already provided both a present responsibility statement of more than 100 pages and supplemental answers to the EPA's questions," it said in a statement. "The EPA has informed BP that it is preparing a proposed administrative agreement that, if agreed upon, would effectively resolve and lift this temporary suspension."

Suevon Lee contributed reporting to this story.

Questions on the latest BP news? Join our live chat November 29 at 1 p.m. ET, with reporter Abrahm Lustgarten. 

By Cora Currier, ProPublica

For many years, Bush administration officials have said that the CIA waterboarded only three terror suspects. Despite nearly endless revelations and investigations about the U.S.'s treatment of detainees, there has never been evidence contradicting those claims. But that changed earlier this month.

Human Rights Watch recently released a report detailing the accounts of 14 Libyan men who claim they were detained and, in some cases, subject to harsh interrogations by the U.S. before being transferred back to Libyan prisons, where they also faced abuse.

One man, Mohammed Al-Shoreoiya, provided a detailed account of being waterboarded "many times" while in U.S. custody in an Afghan prison between 2003 and 2004. Another man described a similar form of water torture, conducted without a board.

None of the men's accounts could be confirmed, but as the New York Times noted, the detainees did not seek out Human Rights Watch, and their descriptions of their treatment, including waterboarding, are consistent with CIA procedural documents that have been made public.

The CIA first confirmed waterboarding in February 2008, when then-CIA director Michael Hayden told a Senate committee that "only three detainees" had been waterboarded — Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zabaydah, and Abd Al Rahim al-Nashiri. No one, he said, had been subjected to the process since 2003. That claim has been repeated by former President George W. Bush and top officials from his administration. Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has also noted that the military did not waterboard.

A spokesman for the CIA told ProPublica that "the Agency has been on the record that there are three substantiated cases in which detainees were subjected to the waterboarding technique under the program."

Here are top Bush administration officials stating, again and again, only three detainees were waterboarded [emphasis added]:

George W. Bush

Of the thousands of terrorists we captured in the years after 9/11, about a hundred were placed into the CIA program. About a third of those were questioned using enhanced techniques. Three were waterboarded.

– November 2010, in his memoir, Decision Points.

President Bush also repeated the line in interviews that fall with the Times of London and Fox News.

Dick Cheney, former vice president

It is a fact that only detainees of the highest intelligence value were ever subjected to enhanced interrogation. You've heard endlessly about waterboarding. It happened to three terrorists.

-- May 21, 2009: Dick Cheney, in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute.

In 2009, Cheney made the same claim in another speech and in interviews with the Washington Times, CNN and CBS. In 2011, he mentioned it again in a speech at AEI.

Donald Rumsfeld, former defense secretary

[Michael Hayden] looked at all the evidence and concluded that a major fraction of the intelligence in our country on al Qaeda came from individuals, the three, only three people who were waterboarded... no one was waterboarded at Guantanamo by the U.S. military. In fact, no one was waterboarded at Guantanamo, period. Three people were waterboarded by the CIA, away from Guantanamo and then later brought to Guantanamo.

-- May 3, 2011, in an interview with Fox News.

Rumsfeld repeated the line that year in interviews with CNN, CBS, the Associated Press, Charlie Rose and in a speech in February 2012.

Michael Hayden, former CIA director

Let me make it very clear and to state so officially in front of this committee that waterboarding has been used on only three detainees. It was used on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, it was used on Abu Zubaydah, and it was used on Nashiri. The CIA has not used waterboarding for almost five years. We used it against these three high-value detainees because of the circumstances of the time.

–Feb. 5, 2008, in testimony to a Senate committee.

Hayden also reiterated the three-person figures in a memo circulated that month to CIA employees and on Meet the Press that March. He repeated it again in an interview with Newsweek in 2009.

John Yoo, former Justice Department official

Waterboarding we think is torture, but it happened to three people. The scale of magnitude is different....We've done it three times."

--June 1, 2008, in an interview with Esquire Magazine.

Yoo also said three people had been waterboarded in a June 2008 congressional hearing.

Karl Rove, senior adviser to Bush

[Coercive techniques] were used against some thirty hard-core terrorist detainees who had successfully resisted other forms of interrogation. Only three were waterboarded.

–March 2010, in his memoir, Courage and Consequences.

Michael Mukasey, former attorney general

The fact is that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was subjected to enhanced interrogation techniques, including waterboarding — he was one of three people who were waterboarded — did disclose the name — the nickname actually, which was the name that this courier actually used — in the course of the questioning that took place after enhanced interrogation techniques.

--May 17, 2011, in remarks at the American Enterprise Institute.

Jose Rodriguez Jr., former director of the National Clandestine Service at the CIA

In fact, only three detainees: Mohammed, Zubaydah and one other were ever waterboarded, the last one more than nine years ago.

-- May 10, 2012: Jose Rodriguez Jr., in an op-ed on CNN.com

Rodriguez also mentioned the figure in interviews this spring with Fox News and the New Yorker.

Bill Harlow, who co-authored Rodriguez' book on interrogations, said that Rodriguez stands by his statement. "These procedures were not done without extensive documentation and authorization, as part of an officially approved program, and all the documentation there shows three individuals," Harlow said.

The other officials we've cited did not respond to requests for comment.

President Obama came into office proclaiming a ban on torture, stating that waterboarding was unequivocally a form of torture, and making the infamous "torture memos" public. But the administration has said no one would be prosecuted for waterboarding or other interrogation methods previously sanctioned by the government, and announced last month it would close the last two investigations into CIA abuse.

A Justice Department spokesman would not comment on whether the government ever investigated the Libyan cases. Laura Pitter, the author of the Human Rights Watch report, said that none of the men she interviewed said they had been contacted by U.S. investigators about their detention.

The CIA spokesman said that he could not comment on specific allegations, but that "the Department of Justice has exhaustively reviewed the treatment of more than 100 detainees in the post-9/11 period — including allegations involving unauthorized interrogation techniques — and it declined prosecution in every case."

In today's Moment of Clarity I tell you that you aren't smart enough. I know you think you are, but you're not. Sorry to break it to you this way. [more at LeeCamp.net]

The Yes Men, along with Occupy Dallas, have struck again:

Two dozen rogue "delegates" disrupted the corporate-sponsored welcome gala for the high-stakes Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade negotiations yesterday with a fake award ceremony and "mic check." Other activists, meanwhile, replaced hundreds of rolls of toilet paper (TP) throughout the conference venue with more informative versions, and projected a message on the venue's facade.

The first action began when a smartly-dressed man approached the podium immediately after the gala's keynote speech by Ron Kirk, U.S. Trade Representative and former mayor of Dallas. The man (local puppeteer David Goodwin) introduced himself as "Git Haversall," president of the "Texas Corporate Power Partnership," and announced he was giving Kirk and other U.S. trade negotiators the "2012 Corporate Power Tool Award," which "Haversall's" partner held aloft.

The crowd of negotiators and corporate representatives applauded, and "Haversall" continued: "I'd like to personally thank the negotiators for their relentless efforts. The TPP agreement is shaping up to be a fantastic way for us to maximize profits, regardless of what the public of this nation—or any other nation—thinks is right."

At that point, the host of the reception took the microphone back and announced that the evening's formal programming had concluded. But Mr. Haversall confidently re-took the microphone and warmly invited Kirk to accept the award.

Kirk moved towards the stage, but federal agents blocked his path to protect him from further embarrassment. At that point, a dozen well-dressed "delegates" (local activists, some from Occupy Dallas) broke into ecstatic dance and chanted "TPP! TPP! TPP!" for several minutes until Dallas police arrived.

Continue reading »

Good morning! It's Wednesday, May 9th. Human rights should not be subject to a "popular vote."

This week has seen some of the most horrific assaults on women's rights and health care for women in decades.

On Wednesday, David Edwards reported on a new measure that passed the Arizona senate that effectively bans abortion after 18 weeks of pregnancy, and can consider a woman to be pregnant 2 weeks before she has even had sex.

Then on Thursday, new restrictions appearing in anti-choice bills around the nation allow for doctors to lie to their female patients if doing so will help them to prevent an abortion.

Via:

In both Kansas and Arizona measures are advancing that exempt doctors from medical malpractice suits should they withhold medical information in order to prevent a woman from having an abortion. These bills also shield doctors from malpractice claims if a woman suffers an injury from a pregnancy as a result of information withheld from her to prevent an abortion. Georgia just snuck a liability shield into their 20-week abortion ban. We can expect more to follow.

Proponents of these "wrongful birth" bills argue they are necessary to stem the tide of lawsuits like one in Oregon where parents sued for costs related to the care of their daughter who was born with Down's Syndrome. In that case the parents argued that the medical professionals were negligent in conducting the genetic testing, and that had they known their daughter would be born with a disability, they would have had an abortion.
...

In practice this means that instead of an objective inquiry into the medical treatment and advice given to a pregnant woman based on what the profession as a whole considers competent medical treatment, the individual beliefs of the doctor will determine if advice given or care rendered was reasonable. In legal terms that changes the inquiry from objective to subjective meaning; there is no real basis to judge conduct against. It will no longer matter what a doctor’s peers believe to be considered good medical care: it will only matter if that particular doctor thought the care would avoid an abortion.
...

That also means that women in states with wrongful birth bills can never be sure the medical information they are receiving is accurate and unbiased, nor can they sue in the event that its wrong or negligent. And that women in states without these bills will have to exercise even more caution and be even greater advocates for their own care as what constitutes good accepted medical practice is no longer easily determinable.

This goes against the grain of the medical profession's modern Hypocratic Oath that says "Above all, I must not play at God," and tosses true "Informed Consent" out the window. As RH Reality Check puts it "Pregnant women will, in effect, be returned to the same legal standing of juveniles or persons under legal guardianship and conservatorship, devoid of the ability to consent to a full course of medical treatment on their own."

A boon for bad doctors, this shield for medical malpractice "strips women of the ability to be compensated for sub-standard medical care rendered to them while pregnant and nothing more." And while right-wing Republicans insist that there is no war on women, the evidence is in the efforts to pass legislation like the medical malpractice shield that essentially says that women's lives have no value, as that is what taking away your right to bring a claim based on the value of that life does to women.

This is absolutely war. Defend your rights, or risk losing them.