How Much Do Protests Matter? A Freakonomics Quorum
by Stephen J. Dubner
freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com
August 20, 2009

Iran’s citizens take to the streets en masse after a disputed election. Gay men in Salt Lake City hold a kissing protest. Members of the Westboro Baptist Church voice their anti-just-about-everything views to military funerals and elsewhere.

Beyond the media attention they inevitably garner, what do protests actually accomplish?

We rounded up a few people who have thought a lot about this topic — Chester Crocker, Bernardine Dohrn, Donna Lieberman, Juan E. Méndez, David S. Meyer, and Howard Zinn — and asked them how much protest matters in this day and age, and why.

Here are their answers. (more…)

Propaganda.com
by Evgeny Morozov
The New York Times Op Ed
March 29, 2009

This year’s report on “enemies of the Internet” prepared by Reporters Without Borders, the international press advocacy group, paints a very gloomy picture for the freedom of expression on the Web. It finds that many governments have stepped up their attacks on the Internet, harassing bloggers and making it harder to express dissenting opinions online.

These are very disturbing trends. But identifying “Internet enemies” only on the basis of censorship and intimidation, as Reporters Without Borders has done, obfuscates the fact that these are only two components of a more comprehensive and multi-pronged approach that authoritarian governments have developed to diffuse the subversive potential of online communications.

Many of these governments have honed their Internet strategies beyond censorship and are employing more subtle (and harder to detect) ways of controlling dissent, often by planting their own messages on the Web and presenting them as independent opinion.

Their actions are often informed by the art of online “astroturfing,” a technique also popular with modern corporations and PR firms. While companies use it to engineer buzz around products and events, governments are using it to create the appearance of broad popular support for their ideology.

Their ultimate ambition may be to transform the Internet into a “spinternet,” the vast and mostly anonymous areas of cyberspace under indirect government jurisdiction. The spinternet strategy could be more effective than censorship — while there are a plenty of ways to access blocked Web sites, we do not yet have the means to distinguish spin from independent comment. (more…)

Outside Agitator
by Larissa MacFarquhar
The New Yorker
December 8, 2008

Naomi Klein and the new new left

Related links:
Audio: A discussion on Naomi Klein and “The Shock Doctrine.”

The marquee outside the Bloor Cinema, in Toronto, advertised “The Last Mistress” at four, “Naomi Klein—the Shock Doctrine” at seven, and “Little Shop of Horrors” at nine-thirty. It was a warmish night. The falafel shop next door was doing a brisk business. A line of people holding tickets to the Naomi Klein event stretched to the end of the block and around the corner. Outside the entrance to the cinema, a middle-aged man and an elderly woman paced up and down selling copies of Socialist Action for a dollar. (The September issue included articles about capitalism’s contradictions, class war in Bolivia, and a commentary by Mumia Abu-Jamal—a regular feature.)

“We apologize for starting late, but it’s typical activist time, so I’m sure you’re used to it,” a young woman organizer said from the stage. The young woman wore a black necklace, black jeans, and black hoop earrings. She urged the audience to fight racism and poverty, and to work for education, international solidarity, justice for immigrants and refugees, and solidarity with Palestine and with the Mohawk of Tyendinaga and the Algonquin of Barriere Lake, on whose behalf the fund-raiser that night was being held. She squinted into the lights. “I’m glad you can’t see the audience from here,” she said, “because I don’t think I’ve ever spoken in front of eight hundred and fifty people except at a protest, and then you can always dissolve into a chant.” She consulted her notes. “To a different audience—to those that hold capital and power in this society—Naomi Klein’s words and her ideas are seen as a serious threat,” she said. “Her words are a source of inspiration . . . for those of us who were and are being radicalized by the anti-globalization, anti-colonial, and anti-poverty movements and the demands to change the system totally and completely.” (more…)

Submitted by Deborah:

Where Have All The Protests Gone?
by David Segal
The Washington Post via CommonDreams.org
September 24, 2008

New York – A brief survey of current events:

The stock market has gone nuts, and the federal government is treating Wall Street with experimental cures that will cost nearly $1 trillion. An unpopular foreign war, now in its sixth year, has resulted in more than 4,100 American deaths. For the first time in history, the presidential campaign includes an African American candidate for president and a Republican female candidate for vice president.

Taken together, these data points give this moment in American history a once-in-a-great-while feel of Something Large. But if this is truly a pivot in time, its most peculiar feature may be how un-peculiar it feels. For all the social and political upheaval, for all the 60-point headlines and for all the bipartisan calls for change, there is plenty of unease — but a very notable lack of unrest.

It’s as though the gods of turmoil threw a party and nobody came. When was the last time you saw a street protest? Or a burning effigy? Or a teach-in? Or a boycott? It’s kind of odd: We have the sense that this is an emergency, but open the window and give a listen. There aren’t any sirens.

How come? (more…)

Last tree-sitters come down from Calif. redwoods
by Evelyn Nieves
1010WINS
September 23, 2008

Scotia, Calif. (AP) — After more than 20 years of protests, the last two people living in the giant redwoods of Northern California were climbing down for good, convinced by the new owners of the forest that the ancient trees would be spared from the saw.

Still, the tree sitters looked rather lost.

Having lived nearly 200 feet off the ground for 11 months, Nadia Berg – who calls herself Cedar – seemed unsure of her footing on the lush forest floor of Humboldt County’s Nanning Creek grove. Cedar had made herself at home in a tree dubbed Grandma, a massive double redwood joined at the base, and had grown accustomed to the whistles and whispers and ways of the woods.

“Being here, for me, hasn’t been a sacrifice,” said the 22-year-old Alberta native, still in her harness after rappelling down Grandma last week for the final time. “I feel so honored that I could be here for the trees.”

Berg’s neighbor, Billy Stoetzer, a 22-year-old activist from the Missouri Ozarks, came down last week, too, after living for nearly a year in a hammock-like shelter in the branches of Spooner, a 300-foot mammoth at least 1,500 years old.

With that, the great timber wars of the North Coast came to an end. (more…)

10,000 people marching in Minnesota? Here are images from day one, day two and day three of the protests at the GOP Convention in Minnesota, by Charlie Nye from his Indystar blog, September, 2008:

Here’s video of Amy Goodman of Democracy Now being cuffed and arrested after asking officers why two of her producers had been arrested: (more…)

The Big Idea: The Thinking Behind the News — If Obama Loses
by Jacob Weisberg
Slate.com
August 23, 2008

Racism is the only reason McCain might beat him.

What with the Bush legacy of reckless war and economic mismanagement, 2008 is a year that favors the generic Democratic candidate over the generic Republican one. Yet Barack Obama, with every natural and structural advantage in the presidential race, is running only neck-and-neck against John McCain, a sub-par Republican nominee with a list of liabilities longer than a Joe Biden monologue. Obama has built a crack political operation, raised record sums, and inspired millions with his eloquence and vision. McCain has struggled with a fractious campaign team, lacks clarity and discipline, and remains a stranger to charisma. Yet at the moment, the two of them appear to be tied. What gives?

If it makes you feel better, you can rationalize Obama’s missing 10-point lead on the basis of Clintonite sulkiness, his slowness in responding to attacks, or the concern that Obama may be too handsome, brilliant, and cool to be elected. But let’s be honest: If you break the numbers down, the reason Obama isn’t ahead right now is that he trails badly among one group, older white voters. He does so for a simple reason: the color of his skin. (more…)

The MIT OCW August 2008 Newsletter is promoting a course originally offered in 2007 called How to Stage a Revolution

Course Description:
21H.001, a HASS-D, CI course, explores fundamental questions about the causes and nature of revolutions. How do people overthrow their rulers? How do they establish new governments? Do radical upheavals require bloodshed, violence, or even terror? How have revolutionaries attempted to establish their ideals and realize their goals? We will look at a set of major political transformations throughout the world and across centuries to understand the meaning of revolution and evaluate its impact. By the end of the course, students will be able to offer reasons why some revolutions succeed and others fail. Materials for the course include the writings of revolutionaries, declarations and constitutions, music, films, art, memoirs, and newspapers.

For the last four years, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has made all of it’s courses free to the public. Through the Open Course Ware program, anyone, anywhere can download entire courses, syllabi, readings, lecture notes, videos, exams and more at any time. No registration is required. To date OCW has posted 1,800 courses ranging from Introduction to Aerospace Engineering and Design to Writing on Contemporary Issues: Imagining the Future. Watch a video about this amazing resource here.

New evidence suggests Ron Suskind is right
by Joe Conason
Salon
August 8, 2008

What was an Iraqi politician doing at CIA headquarters just days before he distributed a fake memo incriminating Saddam Hussein in 9/11?

If Ron Suskind’s sensational charge that the White House and CIA colluded in forging evidence to justify the Iraq invasion isn’t proved conclusively in his new book, The Way of the World, then the sorry record of the Bush administration offers no basis to dismiss his allegation. Setting aside the relative credibility of the author and the government, the relevant question is whether the available facts demand a full investigation by a congressional committee, with testimony under oath.

When we look back at the events surrounding the emergence of the faked letter that is at the center of this controversy, a strong circumstantial case certainly can be made in support of Suskind’s story.

That story begins during the final weeks of 2003, when everyone in the White House was suffering severe embarrassment over both the origins and the consequences of the invasion of Iraq. No weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq. No evidence of significant connections between Saddam Hussein’s regime and the al-Qaida terrorist organization had been discovered there either. Nothing in this costly misadventure was turning out as advertised by the Bush administration. (more…)

Submitted by an Art of the Prank reader, August 12, 2008:

Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich has been encouraging the House to issue Articles of Impeachment against President George W. Bush.

A message from Congressman Dennis Kucinich on July 22, 2008:

video by Chad Ely

Americans who cherish our Democracy and the Constitutional principles upon which it was founded can stand up, speak out, and take action by signing the official petition by going to http://kucinich.us/

Realistically there is virtually no chance of an actual impeachment, however this petition clearly will show that Americans cherish our Democracy and� want our government to adhere to Constitutional principles and return to the rule of law.

From the Center for Media and Democracy PRWatch.org, August 12, 2008

Dear Friend of CMD:

Today, we struck a blow against propaganda, and for transparency and accountability.

In early 2002, the Pentagon began cultivating retired military officers who frequently serve as media commentators to help make the case for invading Iraq. The pundit program continued — promoting the Bush administration’s stance on the Guantanamo Bay detention center, warrantless wiretapping and other controversial issues — until New York Times reporter David Barstow exposed its existence in April 2008.

Thanks to Blake Hall of our IT staff and senior researcher Diane Farsetta, now you and anyone with web access can search the massive cache of military documents detailing the Pentagon’s illegal attempts to shape U.S. public opinion. The New York Times first obtained the documents. After the Times reported on the covert pundit program, the Pentagon posted the documents online in a desperate attempt at damage control. But the documents weren’t text searchable, making systematic analysis of this important information nearly impossible.

But we’ve now cracked the Pentagon’s code and made the 8,000 pages of Pentagon documents fully text searchable, posting them all on our SourceWatch website, for journalists, researchers and concerned citizens. (more…)

Russian hacker ‘militia’ mobilizes to attack Georgia
by Gregg Keizer
Computerworld.com
August 12, 2008

Volunteers, botnet owners join forces to knock sites offline, say researchers

Security researchers today disputed claims that a well-known Russian hacker-hosting network is responsible for cyberattacks against sites belonging to Georgia, the former Soviet republic that has been battling Russian military forces since Friday.

Rather than blame the notorious Russian Business Network — as researcher Jart Armin did over the weekend — other researchers said today that it appears that the attacks originated from a “hacker militia” of Russian botnet herders and volunteers.

“They mobilize themselves without a need for a central location to do so, distribute the targets, discuss the attack approaches, come up with a plan on the coordination, and you have everyone participating,” Bulgarian security researcher Dancho Danchev said in an instant messaging interview early today. (more…)

Solzhenitsyn, Literary Giant Who Defied Soviets, Dies at 89
by Michael T. Kaufman
The New York Times
August 4, 2008

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, whose stubborn, lonely and combative literary struggles gained the force of prophecy as he revealed the heavy afflictions of Soviet Communism in some of the most powerful works of the 20th century, died late on Sunday at the age of 89 in Moscow.

His son Yermolai said the cause was a heart ailment.

Mr. Solzhenitsyn outlived by nearly 17 years the Soviet state and system he had battled through years of imprisonment, ostracism and exile.

Mr. Solzhenitsyn had been an obscure, middle-aged, unpublished high school science teacher in a provincial Russian town when he burst onto the literary stage in 1962 with “A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich.” The book, a mold-breaking novel about a prison camp inmate, was a sensation. Suddenly he was being compared to giants of Russian literature like Tolstoy, Dostoyevski and Chekhov. (more…)

Letter from China: Angry Youth
The new generation’s neocon nationalists.
by Evan Osnos
The New Yorker
July 28, 2008

On the morning of April 15th, a short video entitled “2008 China Stand Up!” appeared on Sina, a Chinese Web site. The video’s origin was a mystery: unlike the usual YouTube-style clips, it had no host, no narrator, and no signature except the initials “CTGZ.” [The video is embedded at the end of this post.]

It was a homespun documentary, and it opened with a Technicolor portrait of Chairman Mao, sunbeams radiating from his head. Out of silence came an orchestral piece, thundering with drums, as a black screen flashed, in both Chinese and English, one of Mao’s mantras: “Imperialism will never abandon its intention to destroy us.” Then a cut to present-day photographs and news footage, and a fevered sprint through conspiracies and betrayals—the “farces, schemes, and disasters” confronting China today. The sinking Chinese stock market (the work of foreign speculators who “wildly manipulated” Chinese stock prices and lured rookie investors to lose their fortunes). Shoppers beset by inflation, a butcher counter where “even pork has become a luxury.” And a warning: this is the dawn of a global “currency war,” and the West intends to “make Chinese people foot the bill” for America’s financial woes. (more…)

Posted by André Gattolin:

John Jordan sent me this note this morning. It smells like a May 68 spirit, revisited at the time of climate apocalypse:

Dear creative resisters, art activists, rebel dreamers, climate crime busters and caravaners,

The Future is Not What It Used to Be – A weekend of Creative Construction for the Camp for Climate Action Caravan – East London 14th-15th June.

From Saturday 14th to Sunday 15th June, we are holding a weekend workshop to begin the process of building the creative elements of the Camp for Climate Action’s Caravan.

The Caravan (27th July – 3rd August) is part of the build up to this year’s Climate Camp and will be traveling by foot, sea and bike from Heathrow Airport to Kingsnorth power station where the Camp will be set up.

Invitation to the Camp for Climate Action at Kingsnorth Power Station
August 3-11 2008

(more…)