The Cause Of Freedom

The Cause Of Freedom

Current events in the stuggle for freedom and human rights

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How to create an Angry American

“A clever montage of Bush administration falsehoods and denials regarding the Iraq War.” ~ Juan Cole, President of the Global Americana Institute


Feds disrupt skinhead plot to assassinate Obama

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer Lara Jakes Jordan, Associated Press Writer Mon Oct 27, 7:53 pm ET

WASHINGTON – Two white supremacists allegedly plotted to go on a national killing spree, shooting and decapitating black people and ultimately targeting Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, federal authorities said Monday.

In all, the two men whom officials describe as neo-Nazi skinheads planned to kill 88 people — 14 by beheading, according to documents unsealed in U.S. District Court in Jackson, Tenn. The numbers 88 and 14 are symbolic in the white supremacist community.

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Terror attack on US soil?

On Friday, September 26, the end of a week in which thousands of copies of Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West — the fear-mongering, anti-Muslim documentary being distributed by the millions in swing states via DVDs inserted in major newspapers and through the U.S. mail — were distributed by mail in Ohio, a “chemical irritant” was sprayed through a window of the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton, where 300 people were gathered for a Ramadan prayer service. The room that the chemical was sprayed into was the room where babies and children were being kept while their mothers were engaged in prayers. This, apparently, is what the scare tactic political campaigning of John McCain’s supporters has led to — Americans perpetrating a terrorist attack against innocent children on American soil.

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Russia says to send battleship to Caribbean Sea

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia will send a nuclear-powered battleship to the Caribbean for a joint naval exercise with Venezuela, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

The maneuvers later this year will be the first Russia has conducted in Washington’s traditional sphere of influence since the end of the Cold War.

Married at 9, slain by parents at 17

DESPAIR among human rights workers in Pakistan over a rash of so-called “honour killings” intensified yesterday when it was disclosed that a girl forced into marriage with a 45-year-old man at the age of nine had been killed by her parents because she asked for an annulment.

The girl, 17, who had been fighting a lonely but successful legal battle, was coming out of court in the Punjabi city of Sahiwal after being granted the annulment by a judge when she was surrounded by a group of men and shot in view of police.

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The Afghan women jailed for being victims of rape

In Lashkar Gah, the majority of female prisoners are serving 20-year sentences for being forced to have sex. Terri Judd visited them and heard their extraordinary stories.

Beneath the anonymity of the sky-blue burqa, Saliha’s slender frame and voice betray her young age.Asked why she was serving seven years in jail alongside hardened insurgents and criminals, the 15-year-old giggled and buried her head in her friend’s shoulder.

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Canonical Joins The Linux Foundation

Commercial sponsor of Ubuntu ® looks to support cross-industry collaboration and promotion to fuel Linux growth

The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization dedicated to accelerating the growth of Linux, today announced that Canonical has become a member of the Foundation.

Canonical is the commercial sponsor of Ubuntu, a popular version of the Linux operating system, and supports a wide range of other open source projects including Bazaar, Storm and Upstart. Ubuntu has become a popular choice for the server and desktop as well as for the rapidly emerging areas of netbooks and mobile Internet devices.

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Alan Shore’s Closing Argument: On ABC’s Boston Legal, “Stick It! (Season 2, Episode 19)

The transcript of the speech :

Alan Shore: When the weapons of mass destruction thing turned out to be not true, I expected the American people to rise up. Ha! They didn’t.

Then, when the Abu Ghraib torture thing surfaced and it was revealed that our government participated in rendition, a practice where we kidnap people and turn them over to regimes who specialize in torture, I was sure then the American people would be heard from. We stood mute.

Then came the news that we jailed thousands of so-called terrorists suspects, locked them up without the right to a trial or even the right to confront their accusers. Certainly, we would never stand for that. We did.

And now, it’s been discovered the executive branch has been conducting massive, illegal, domestic surveillance on its own citizens. You and me. And I at least consoled myself that finally, finally the American people will have had enough. Evidentially, we haven’t.

In fact, if the people of this country have spoken, the message is we’re okay with it all. Torture, warrantless search and seizure, illegal wiretappings, prison without a fair trial – or any trial, war on false pretenses. We, as a citizenry, are apparently not offended.

There are no demonstrations on college campuses. In fact, there’s no clear indication that young people seem to notice.

Well, Melissa Hughes noticed. Now, you might think, instead of withholding her taxes, she could have protested the old fashioned way. Made a placard and demonstrated at a Presidential or Vice-Presidential appearance, but we’ve lost the right to that as well. The Secret Service can now declare free speech zones to contain, control and, in effect, criminalize protest.

Stop for a second and try to fathom that.

At a presidential rally, parade or appearance, if you have on a supportive t-shirt, you can be there. If you are wearing or carrying something in protest, you can be removed.

This, in the United States of America. This in the United States of America. Is Melissa Hughes the only one embarrassed?

*Alan sits down abruptly in the witness chair next to the judge*

Judge Robert Sanders: Mr. Shore. That’s a chair for witnesses only.

Really long speeches make me so tired sometimes.

Judge Sanders: Please get out of the chair.

Alan: Actually, I’m sick and tired.

Judge Sanders: Get out of the chair!

Alan: And what I’m most sick and tired of is how every time somebody disagrees with how the government is running things, he or she is labeled unAmerican.

U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro: Evidentally, it’s speech time.

Alan: And speech in this country is free, you hack! Free for me, free for you. Free for Melissa Hughes to stand up to her government and say “Stick it”!

U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro: Objection!

Alan: I object to government abusing its power to squash the constitutional freedoms of its citizenry. And, God forbid, anybody challenge it. They’re smeared as being a heretic.   Melissa Hughes is an American. Melissa Hughes is an American. Melissa Hughes is an American!

Judge Sanders: Mr. Shore. Unless you have anything new and fresh to say, please sit down. You’ve breached the decorum of my courtroom with all this hooting.

Alan: Last night, I went to bed with a book. Not as much fun as a 29 year old, but the book contained a speech by Adlai Stevenson. The year was 1952. He said, “The tragedy of our day is the climate of fear in which we live and fear breeds repression. Too often, sinister threats to the Bill of Rights, to freedom of the mind are concealed under the patriotic cloak of anti-Communism.”

Today, it’s the cloak of anti-terrorism. Stevenson also remarked, “It’s far easier to fight for principles than to live up to them.”

I know we are all afraid, but the Bill of Rights – we have to live up to that. We simply must. That’s all Melissa Hughes was trying to say. She was speaking for you. I would ask you now to go back to that room and speak for her.

Iran successfully launches home-built satellite rocket

Iran said it had launched a rocket carrying a test-satellite into space on Sunday, in a move that could further exacerbate tensions with the West over its nuclear drive.

“The Safir (Ambassador) rocket was successfully launched. All its systems…are Iranian made,” Reza Taghipour, head of Iran’s space agency, told state television, adding that a “test satellite was put into orbit.”

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