http://www.fantasylandmedia.org
Each week, we cover the stories that are just left out of the US propaganda machine. News that the people in charge, the corporations and your government want to keep from the public eye.
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TechDirt.com:
"The saga of Lavabit founder Ladar Levison is getting even more ridiculous, as he explains that the government has threatened him with criminal charges for his decision to shut down the business, rather than agree to some mysterious court order. The feds are apparently arguing that the act of shutting down the business, itself, was a violation of the order...
That same article suggests that the decision to shut down Lavabit was over something much bigger than just looking at one individual's information -- since it appears that Lavabit has cooperated in the past on such cases. Instead, the suggestion now is that the government was seeking a tap on all accounts...
It sounds like the feds were asking for a full on backdoor on the system, not unlike some previous reports of ISPs who have received surprise visits from the NSA."
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130816/14533924213/feds-threaten-to-arrest-lavabit-founder-shutting-down-his-service.shtml
-->The NSA holds all the cards when it comes to snooping on American citizens. It can even close down businesses that don't cooperate. One business that often cooperates with the NSA is The NY Times, that didn't print this story.
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Guardian UK:
"The US government's plan to use technology to create and manage fake identities for social interaction with terrorists is as appalling as it is amusing. It's appalling that in this era of greater transparency and accountability brought on by the internet, the US of all countries would try to systematize sock puppetry. It's appallingly stupid, for there's little doubt that the fakes will be unmasked. The net result of that will be the diminution, not the enhancement, of American credibility.
But the effort is amusing as well, for there is absolutely no need to spend millions of dollars to create fake identities online. Any child or troll can do it for free. Millions do. If the government insists on paying, it can use salesforce.com to monitor and join in chats. There is no shortage of social management tools marketers are using to find and mollify or drown out complainers. There's no shortage of social-media gurus, either.
Tools are quite unnecessary, though. Just get yourself a fake email account, Uncle Sam, and you can create and manage anonymous and pseudonymous identities across most any social service."
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/mar/17/us-internet-morals-clumsy-spammer
-->The NY Times didn't cover this story, although our newspaper of record is always ready to print stores about other governments' attempts to influence social media.
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Guardian UK:
"People sending email to any of Google's 425 million Gmail users have no 'reasonable expectation' that their communications are confidential, the internet giant has said in a court filing.
Consumer Watchdog, the advocacy group that uncovered the filing, called the revelation a 'stunning admission.' It comes as Google and its peers are under pressure to explain their role in the National Security Agency's (NSA) mass surveillance of US citizens and foreign nationals.
'Google has finally admitted they don't respect privacy,' said John Simpson, Consumer Watchdog's privacy project director. 'People should take them at their word; if you care about your email correspondents' privacy, don't use Gmail.' "
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/aug/14/google-gmail-users-privacy-email-lawsuit
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Fantasyland Media:
http://www.fantasylandmedia.org
Each week, we cover the stories that are just left out of the US propaganda machine. News that the people in charge, the corporations and your government want to keep from the public eye.
------
Common Dreams:
"Confirming what many people have suspected, Foreign Policy reports Tuesday that the CIA at one point kept a file on scholar and political activist Noam Chomsky.
According to Foreign Policy, the CIA has denied this claim for years. A series of Freedom of Information Act requests to the CIA turned up the same response: 'We did not locate any records responsive to your request.'
However, a FOIA request sent to the FBI from Foreign Policy through attorney Kel McClanahan has returned with a memo between the FBI and the CIA that experts say confirms the existence of a CIA file on Chomsky. ...
What's more is the fact that the CIA has not provided a copy of Chomsky's file through the legally binding Freedom of Information Act requests. According to Theoharis, this means that the file was likely illegally destroyed at one point."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/08/13-12
-->The CIA breaking the law in spying on America's best know intellectual and dissident? The NY Times treats its readers to endless stories about Chinese dissidents. Why not expose what is happing in the US? Our newspaper of record didn't report this lawbreaking by the CIA.
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Guardian UK:
"A leader of the US congressional insurrection against the National Security Agency's bulk surveillance programs has accused his colleagues of withholding a key document from the House of Representatives before a critical surveillance vote.
Justin Amash, the Michigan Republican whose effort to defund the NSA's mass phone-records collection exposed deep congressional discomfort with domestic spying, said the House intelligence committee never allowed legislators outside the panel to see a 2011 document that described the surveillance in vague terms.
The document, a classified summary of the bulk phone records collection effort justified under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, was declassified by the Obama administration in late July."
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/12/intelligence-committee-nsa-vote-justin-amash
-->The NY Times didn't cover this story. Ever supportive of the emerging US police state, The NY Times covers up such embarrassing revelations by not printing them.
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Guardian UK:
"Beverly McGuire saw the warning signs before the town well went dry: sand in the toilet bowl, the sputter of air in the tap, a pump working overtime to no effect. But it still did not prepare her for the night last month when she turned on the tap and discovered the tiny town where she had made her home for 35 years was out of water. ...
Across the south-west, residents of small communities like Barnhart are confronting the reality that something as basic as running water, as unthinking as turning on a tap, can no longer be taken for granted. Three years of drought, decades of overuse and now the oil industry's outsize demands on water for fracking are running down reservoirs and underground aquifers. And climate change is making things worse.
In Texas alone, about 30 communities could run out of water by the end of the year, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality."
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/aug/11/texas-tragedy-ample-oil-no-water
-->Hardly any of our national media can be bothered by what fracking and global warming are doing to rural communities. Hay, it's all about how wonderful new oil discoveries are in the Continental United States. The NY Times, which refused to cover this story, is often little more than the mouthpiece of corporate America.
Each week, we cover the stories that are just left out of the US propaganda machine. News that the people in charge, the corporations and your government want to keep from the public eye.
------
Common Dreams:
"Confirming what many people have suspected, Foreign Policy reports Tuesday that the CIA at one point kept a file on scholar and political activist Noam Chomsky.
According to Foreign Policy, the CIA has denied this claim for years. A series of Freedom of Information Act requests to the CIA turned up the same response: 'We did not locate any records responsive to your request.'
However, a FOIA request sent to the FBI from Foreign Policy through attorney Kel McClanahan has returned with a memo between the FBI and the CIA that experts say confirms the existence of a CIA file on Chomsky. ...
What's more is the fact that the CIA has not provided a copy of Chomsky's file through the legally binding Freedom of Information Act requests. According to Theoharis, this means that the file was likely illegally destroyed at one point."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/08/13-12
-->The CIA breaking the law in spying on America's best know intellectual and dissident? The NY Times treats its readers to endless stories about Chinese dissidents. Why not expose what is happing in the US? Our newspaper of record didn't report this lawbreaking by the CIA.
------
Guardian UK:
"A leader of the US congressional insurrection against the National Security Agency's bulk surveillance programs has accused his colleagues of withholding a key document from the House of Representatives before a critical surveillance vote.
Justin Amash, the Michigan Republican whose effort to defund the NSA's mass phone-records collection exposed deep congressional discomfort with domestic spying, said the House intelligence committee never allowed legislators outside the panel to see a 2011 document that described the surveillance in vague terms.
The document, a classified summary of the bulk phone records collection effort justified under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, was declassified by the Obama administration in late July."
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/12/intelligence-committee-nsa-vote-justin-amash
-->The NY Times didn't cover this story. Ever supportive of the emerging US police state, The NY Times covers up such embarrassing revelations by not printing them.
------
Guardian UK:
"Beverly McGuire saw the warning signs before the town well went dry: sand in the toilet bowl, the sputter of air in the tap, a pump working overtime to no effect. But it still did not prepare her for the night last month when she turned on the tap and discovered the tiny town where she had made her home for 35 years was out of water. ...
Across the south-west, residents of small communities like Barnhart are confronting the reality that something as basic as running water, as unthinking as turning on a tap, can no longer be taken for granted. Three years of drought, decades of overuse and now the oil industry's outsize demands on water for fracking are running down reservoirs and underground aquifers. And climate change is making things worse.
In Texas alone, about 30 communities could run out of water by the end of the year, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality."
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/aug/11/texas-tragedy-ample-oil-no-water
-->Hardly any of our national media can be bothered by what fracking and global warming are doing to rural communities. Hay, it's all about how wonderful new oil discoveries are in the Continental United States. The NY Times, which refused to cover this story, is often little more than the mouthpiece of corporate America.
Fantasyland Media: (for 8/1/13)
http://www.fantasylandmedia.org
Each week, we cover the stories that are just left out of the US propaganda machine. News that the people in charge, the corporations and your government want to keep from the public eye.
------
Common Dream
"Army private Bradley Manning received an outpouring of support over the weekend as people around the world launched rallies, vigils, and civil disobedience actions demanding the release of the whistleblower...
From London to Seoul to San Francisco, organizers in over 40 cities across the globe launched solidarity actions Saturday, as Manning awaits sentencing from the judge overseeing his case. The actions included protests at US embassies throughout Europe, a large banner drop in Florida, and a flash mob in San Francisco, organizers told Common Dreams.
RT reports 40 protests in German cities alone, with the largest German rally in Frankfurt. 'It is very heartwarming to see people support him, but it is not a surprise, and support is growing day after day,' Farah Muhsin of the Bradley Manning Support Network told Common Dreams."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/07/29-1
-->The NY Times follows the Pentagon's script so closely on Bradley Manning that our newspaper of record didn't report this worldwide support.
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Common Dreams:
"Chicago human rights advocates are demanding a United Nations investigation into the human rights abuses stemming from the closure of 49 public schools throughout the city.
The Midwest Coalition for Human Rights—a coalition of over 50 social justice organizations, service providers, and university centers, sent a 'letter of allegation' to the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights in Switzerland, written by University of Chicago law professor Sital Kalantry with wide community input.
The letter charges that the mass school shutdown stands in direct violation of multiple human rights treaties of which the US is a signatory, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
The closures violate prohibition of discrimination, because 'African American children make up 42% of the students in Chicago’s public schools, but 80% of the children impacted by the school closures are African American,' the letter declares."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/07/29-5
-->The NY Times would never question the neoliberal assault on public education, and didn't print this story. In fact, The NY Times has never published a story critical of corporate efforts to privative all of our nation's schools.
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Tribune/LA Times:
"One year ago, the Environmental Protection Agency finished testing drinking water in Dimock, Pa., after years of complaints by residents who suspected that nearby natural gas production had fouled their wells. The EPA said that for nearly all the 64 homes whose wells it sampled, the water was safe to drink...
In an internal EPA PowerPoint presentation obtained by the Tribune/Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau, staff members warned their superiors that several wells had been contaminated with methane and substances such as manganese and arsenic, most likely because of local natural gas production.
Critics say the decision in July 2012 by EPA headquarters in Washington to curtail its investigation at Dimock over the objection of its on-site staff fits a troubling pattern at a time when the Obama administration has used the sharp increase in natural gas production to rebut claims that it is opposed to fossil fuels.
In March 2012, the EPA closed an investigation of methane in drinking water in Parker County, Texas, although the geologist hired by the regulator confirmed that the methane was from gas production. In late June, the EPA dropped a study of possible contamination of drinking water in Pavillion, Wyo., despite its earlier findings of carcinogens, hydrocarbons and other contaminants in the water."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-epa-dimock-20130728,0,4847442.story
-->Is Obama's EPA as dishonest as he is? Readers of The NY Times will never know, since fracking always gets positive coverage on its pages. The NY Times didn't cover these incidents of the EPA distorting reports to favor the fracking industry.
Each week, we cover the stories that are just left out of the US propaganda machine. News that the people in charge, the corporations and your government want to keep from the public eye.
------
Common Dream
"Army private Bradley Manning received an outpouring of support over the weekend as people around the world launched rallies, vigils, and civil disobedience actions demanding the release of the whistleblower...
From London to Seoul to San Francisco, organizers in over 40 cities across the globe launched solidarity actions Saturday, as Manning awaits sentencing from the judge overseeing his case. The actions included protests at US embassies throughout Europe, a large banner drop in Florida, and a flash mob in San Francisco, organizers told Common Dreams.
RT reports 40 protests in German cities alone, with the largest German rally in Frankfurt. 'It is very heartwarming to see people support him, but it is not a surprise, and support is growing day after day,' Farah Muhsin of the Bradley Manning Support Network told Common Dreams."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/07/29-1
-->The NY Times follows the Pentagon's script so closely on Bradley Manning that our newspaper of record didn't report this worldwide support.
------
Common Dreams:
"Chicago human rights advocates are demanding a United Nations investigation into the human rights abuses stemming from the closure of 49 public schools throughout the city.
The Midwest Coalition for Human Rights—a coalition of over 50 social justice organizations, service providers, and university centers, sent a 'letter of allegation' to the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights in Switzerland, written by University of Chicago law professor Sital Kalantry with wide community input.
The letter charges that the mass school shutdown stands in direct violation of multiple human rights treaties of which the US is a signatory, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
The closures violate prohibition of discrimination, because 'African American children make up 42% of the students in Chicago’s public schools, but 80% of the children impacted by the school closures are African American,' the letter declares."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/07/29-5
-->The NY Times would never question the neoliberal assault on public education, and didn't print this story. In fact, The NY Times has never published a story critical of corporate efforts to privative all of our nation's schools.
------
Tribune/LA Times:
"One year ago, the Environmental Protection Agency finished testing drinking water in Dimock, Pa., after years of complaints by residents who suspected that nearby natural gas production had fouled their wells. The EPA said that for nearly all the 64 homes whose wells it sampled, the water was safe to drink...
In an internal EPA PowerPoint presentation obtained by the Tribune/Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau, staff members warned their superiors that several wells had been contaminated with methane and substances such as manganese and arsenic, most likely because of local natural gas production.
Critics say the decision in July 2012 by EPA headquarters in Washington to curtail its investigation at Dimock over the objection of its on-site staff fits a troubling pattern at a time when the Obama administration has used the sharp increase in natural gas production to rebut claims that it is opposed to fossil fuels.
In March 2012, the EPA closed an investigation of methane in drinking water in Parker County, Texas, although the geologist hired by the regulator confirmed that the methane was from gas production. In late June, the EPA dropped a study of possible contamination of drinking water in Pavillion, Wyo., despite its earlier findings of carcinogens, hydrocarbons and other contaminants in the water."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-epa-dimock-20130728,0,4847442.story
-->Is Obama's EPA as dishonest as he is? Readers of The NY Times will never know, since fracking always gets positive coverage on its pages. The NY Times didn't cover these incidents of the EPA distorting reports to favor the fracking industry.
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