Tag Archives: Kafkaesque

Jailed in the U.S. for blogging: Whither the First Amendment?

Posted on by

“The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) maintains a list of jailed news workers around the world. Only one name is listed in the Western Hemisphere: Roger Shuler — a blogger jailed indefinitely in the United States.  Shuler, a blogger whose writing about Alabama lawmakers and judicial power players has regularly invited defamation claims, was arrested in October on a contempt charge relating to a defamation suit filed by the son of a former Alabama governor.  The removal of defamatory blog posts should certainly not be a condition for attaining freedom — least of all in a country where the protection of free speech is constitutionally inscribed.”

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/13/jailed_in_the_u_s_for_blogging_whither_the_first_amendment/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

U.S. FATCA tax law catches unsuspecting Canadians in its crosshairs

Posted on by

“A Calgary woman’s developmentally disabled son is caught in a U.S. tax quagmire that she fears may cost him the money she spent years setting aside for his financial future.  ‘He’s entrapped,’ said Carol Tapanila, the 70-year-old mother. ‘There’s no way out. He is entrapped into U.S. citizenship.’  Her 40-year-old son was born in a Calgary hospital, but automatically received U.S. citizenship because both his parents were American. That simple fact may soon create financial woes for the Tapanila family.  These so-called ‘accidental Americans’ also include an Ottawa woman who was born in the U.S. to Canadian parents and moved back north at one year of age.”

http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/u-fatca-tax-law-catches-unsuspecting-canadians-crosshairs-090310548.html

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

At last, a law to stop almost anyone from doing almost anything

Posted on by

“The bill would permit injunctions against anyone of 10 or older who ‘has engaged or threatens to engage in conduct capable of causing nuisance or annoyance to any person’. The bill also introduces public space protection orders, which can prevent either everybody or particular kinds of people from doing certain things in certain places. It creates new dispersal powers, which can be used by the police to exclude people from an area (there is no size limit), whether or not they have done anything wrong.  One homeless young man was sentenced to five years in jail for begging: an offence for which no custodial sentence exists.”

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/06/law-to-stop-eveyone-everything

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Two Tier Travel Becoming a Reality in the US?

Posted on by

the-daily-bell-top-logo61

“These so-called expedited screenings will allow military personnel to keep their footwear on as well as light outerwear while proceeding through security. Additionally, they can keep their laptop in its case, and keep their compliant liquids/gels bag in a carry-on item at select screening lanes. [..] Capital controls and travel restrictions are typical of authoritarian societies … as is the glorification of the military and the bestowal of additional privileges on those who serve. These are not trends that bode well for American democratic exceptionalism nor for the West in general.  Those who understand will doubtless heed warning signs and take appropriate action.”

http://www.thedailybell.com/news-analysis/34904/Two-Tier-Travel-Becoming-a-Reality-in-the-US/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

First “no-fly” trial to begin this week in San Francisco

Posted on by

“Dr. Ibrahim, a Malaysian citizen, was a doctoral candidate at Stanford University, in the U.S. on a valid student visa, when she tried to fly home to Malaysia with her daughter in 2005.  She was refused passage on a United Airlines flight from San Francisco International Airport, detained, and interrogated by SFO airport police.  Although she was ultimately bound for Malaysia, she had planned to stop over in Hawaii to present a research paper at a conference there. She was denied boarding on a domestic flight from San Francisco to Kona. She was allowed to fly to Kona the next day, and on to Malaysia after the conference a few days late, but her U.S. visa was then revoked.”

http://papersplease.org/wp/2013/12/01/first-no-fly-trial-to-begin-this-week-in-san-francisco/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Executions in US drop close to 20-year low in 2013

Posted on by

“One explanation for the relatively low level of executions is that many drugs used in lethal injections are manufactured in Europe, where some governments opposing capital punishment have banned exporting drugs for executions.  Leading up to Maryland’s decision to abolish capital punishment was the discovery that authorities had convicted and sentenced to death the wrong man in the assault and murder of a 9-year-old girl in Baltimore County. DNA testing not only excluded Kirk Bloodsworth as the killer, but identified the actual perpetrator who is now in prison. Bloodsworth was with the Maryland governor when the measure abolishing the state’s death penalty was signed into law.”

http://www.mariettatimes.com/page/content.detail/id/427621/Executions-in-US-drop-close-to-20-year-low-in-2013.html?isap=1&nav=5018

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Idaho to take over troubled privately run prison

Posted on by

“Idaho will take over the operation of its largest prison from one of the nation’s biggest corrections contractors, abruptly ending an experiment with privatization at a facility that has been plagued by understaffing, multiple lawsuits and allegations of contract fraud. California officials are expanding their use of private prisons to meet a court order to reduce overcrowding.  Oklahoma’s corrections director resigned last year in a dispute over the growing use of prison privatization. Kentucky transferred about 400 female inmates out of a private prison after guards sexually assaulted inmates, and Hawaii transferred female inmates out of the same prison over similar allegations.”

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/usworld/idaho-to-take-over-troubled-privately-run-prison/article_20036d91-f05c-50b3-be6b-062cabe8865e.html

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Handcuffed at USA Border From Canada, Treated like Terrorist

Posted on by

“I asked to speak to an attorney, but he said I couldn’t. Border Control didn’t have to allow it because I was not proven to be a US citizen, because my fingerprints came back as Canadian.  He informed me an ICE agent was on the way; She would determine what to do with me.  An hour or so later, he and the guard who initially handcuffed me came back and questioned me again. I gave her the answers, then informed them again that because of my constitutional rights I was requesting an attorney. They said I had no rights. I said, ‘Okay, so my prints are not coming back as me, and I’m not the guy the computer says I am, so I’m a nobody, huh?’ She said yes, that was the best way to put it.”

http://www.copblock.org/41530/handcuffed-at-usa-border-coming-back-from-canada-on-saturday-drive-treated-like-terrorist-fingerprints-werent-mine/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

America’s Internal Checkpoints

Posted on by

“During a routine trip from San Diego to Phoenix, Pastor Steven Anderson was stopped at an internal immigration checkpoint about 70 miles from the Mexican border.  Anderson is a hero to the members of a growing national cause. A decentralized movement of refuseniks is increasingly fighting back against the Border Patrol’s shocking internal checkpoint system. Through civil disobedience, legal challenges, and generous helpings of YouTube, these ID scofflaws may be getting bloody, but they are actively challenging the constitutionality of a system most Americans don’t realize exists.  More than 70 immigration checkpoints manned by CBP now operate well inside U.S. territory.”

http://reason.com/archives/2013/12/28/americas-internal-checkpoints/print

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Growing acceptance of marijuana no help to pot convicts serving life

Posted on by

“John Richard Knock realizes he’ll likely die in a 12-by-10-foot cell in federal prison.  Locked behind bars on a marijuana trafficking conviction, America’s growing acceptance of the drug is cold comfort to the 66-year-old who was handed two life sentences, plus 20 years — for a first-time conviction.  The sentence makes Knock one of 3,278 prisoners recently identified by the American Civil Liberties Union who are serving life without parole for nonviolent drug and property crimes. Nearly four in every five were convicted of crimes involving drugs, including marijuana.  Recreational use of marijuana is now legal in Colorado and Washington, and 15 other states have also eased restrictions.”

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/12/13/growing-acceptance-marijuana-no-help-to-pot-convicts-serving-life-in-joint/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet