Thursday, January 10, 2019

01/12 Peña celebrate the Anniversaries of the Haitian and Cuban Revolutions and the Zapatista Uprising of Chiapas Mexico

Charlie Welch<cwelch@tecschange.org>
*/Happy New Year/Feliz Año Nuevo 2019/*

January marks several historical events. Please join encuentro5 family,
friends and comrades to commemorate and celebrate the Anniversaries of
the *Haitian and Cuban Revolutions and the Zapatista Uprising of Chiapas
Mexico*. We will also celebrate current victories on *Saturday January
12, 2019 at *

*9A Hamilton Pl. Boston across from Park St. T station (Green/Red lines)
and next to Orphuem Theater*

/Enero marca varios acontecimientos históricos. Únase a la familia,
amistades y camaradas del encuentro5 para conmemorar y celebrar los
aniversarios de las *revoluciones haitiana y cubana* y el *levantamiento
zapatista de Chiapas México*. También celebraremos las victorias
corrientes el *sábado 12 de enero de 2019 en 9A Hamilton Pl. Boston
frente a la estación de Park St. T (líneas verde / roja) y al lado del
Teatro Orphuem*/

2018 went out with a government SHUTDOWN orchestrated by the president!
The instance that the People of usna pay for a “wall to keep out illegal
immigrants” while immigrants who exercise their right to seek asylum are
being denied (illegally) that right while starving, ill and denied basic
human hygiene is appalling! In addition, children are dying while “in
custody” of the usna federal border patrols enforcement officials.
However, 2018 with its horrific nightmares, has also served as a
catalyst to the building and strengthening of liberation movements as
well as revitalizing movements such as women’s rights to confront such
issues as sexual abuse, inequities in employments and wages. Other
glaring issues continue to be outstanding and in need of address such as
racial oppression and in particular the marginalization of  Women of
Color we must also address the weakening of workers protections and we
must *resist* the rampant destruction of our environment. *We will
commemorate and celebrate the 215th Anniversary (January 1, 1804) of the
Haitian Revolution and the 60th Anniversary (January 1, 1959) of the
Cuban Revolution.*

/¡2018 salió con un /*/APAGO de/**/gobierno/*/orquestado por el
presidente! //¡El caso de que el pueblo de usna pague por un “muro para
mantener alejados a los inmigrantes ilegales", mientras que a los
inmigrantes que ejercen su derecho a buscar asilo se les niega
(ilegalmente) ese derecho mientras se muere de hambre, está enfermo y se
le niega la higiene humana básica, es espantoso! Además, los niños se
están muriendo mientras están "bajo custodia" de los oficiales federales
de las patrullas fronterizas de la usna. Sin embargo, 2018 con sus
horribles pesadillas, también ha servido como catalizador para construir
y fortalecer los movimientos de liberación, así como como el derecho de
las mujeres a enfrentar temas del abuso sexual, las inequidades en los
empleos y los salarios. Otros problemas flagrantes siguen siendo
sobresalientes y necesitan ser abordados, como la opresión racial y, en
particular, la marginación de las Mujeres de Color. También debemos
abordar el debilitamiento de las protecciones de los trabajadores y
debemos resistir la destrucción *desenfrenada* de nuestro ambiente.
*Conmemoraremos y celebraremos el 215 aniversario (1 de enero del 1804)
de la Revolución haitiana y el 60 aniversario (1 de enero del 1959) de
la Revolución cubana.*/

/*
*/

*For more information/para mas información (617) 922-5744 *

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The Reel Time Travelers - Like A Song Bird That Has Fallen - Cold Mounta...

Using the internet to prevent war RootsAction Team

RootsAction Team<info@rootsaction.org>
To  
We’re often told that RootsAction.org is the most effective pro-peace, anti-war online organization in the United States. Whether or not that’s an exaggeration, we’re eager to make it true.

The year ahead presents more big opportunities and dangers than ever.

To help us continue and expand our work, please donate here.

Below is a little background on where we've been and where we're going.

RootsAction helped prevent the bombing of Syria in 2013. We were part of the successful pressure for talks and negotiations between the presidents of Iran and the United States, and we demanded the upholding of their agreement for years. We helped persuade Congress to forbid any new war on Iraq. We were part of reducing military weapons transfers to localpolice forces. In a matter of hours, we became the first large group to support NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. We led the way in demanding justice for CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling and strongly joined in support for Chelsea Manning as well as for publisher Julian Assange.

RootsAction members helped lobby the Governor of Connecticut to create a commission to advance conversion from a war economy to a peace economy. We helped to successfully pressure the city of Burlington, Vermont to reverse its position and oppose basing F-35 fighter jets there. We've helped persuade numerous cities and the U.S. Conference of Mayors to tell Congress to move money from war to human and environmental needs.

We've helped educate the public through the course of these campaigns. We can only continue doing so with your help. Contribute here.

We've urged employees of companies to reject military contracts and led an effort that succeeded in canceling a pro-war television program. RootsAction has pushed hard for steps toward peace in Korea, including the cessation of war rehearsals, that have been achieved. Much more will be needed in the months ahead.

RootsAction is working to reduce hostility between the United States and Russia, and to reduce the likelihood of nuclear war. We're pressing Congress to uphold the INF treaty. We're urging both NATO and Russia to halt war rehearsals.

Congress is closer than it has ever been to ending a war, the war on Yemen, on which RootsAction has flooded Congressional offices with constituent demands. This will be a big focus in the coming days.

Meanwhile, Trump is proposing to pull the U.S. military out of Syriaand to reduce its presence in Afghanistan. And Iraqi legislators are demanding that the U.S. military finally get out of Iraq. These are all demands that we have advanced and will continue to advance without fear or favor to party or politician.

We've pressed politicians to take on military spending and seen them respond, as with a recent public letter to Senator Bernie Sanders, following which he's produced a statement and a video on the topic.

We're advancing efforts under the War Powers Resolution to end wars, and articles of impeachment to hold warmakers accountable. We're going after the hatred and bigotry that accompany militarism. We're educating and mobilizing, locally, nationally, and globally for a systemic and cultural conversion to a peaceful and sustainable world.

We cannot do it without you. Donate now.



-- The RootsAction.org Team

P.S. RootsAction is an independent online force endorsed by Jim Hightower, Barbara Ehrenreich, Cornel West, Daniel Ellsberg, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Klein, Bill Fletcher Jr., Laura Flanders, former U.S. Senator James Abourezk, Frances Fox Piven, Lila Garrett, Phil Donahue, Sonali Kolhatkar, and many others.


  
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Is a right to privacy inalienable or disposable? RootsAction Education Fund Thomas Drake

To   


Thomas Drake
Do you have a right to privacy?

Thomas Drake continues to insist that you do. And he continues to pay a very high price for being a historic NSA whistleblower.

As 2019 began, we asked Tom for his thoughts on privacy in the USA now. We found his reply to be fascinating, and we’re sharing it with you below.

This new year presents an old question: Can we tangibly support brave whistleblowers whose lives have been nearly crushed by the vengeful “national security” apparatus of the U.S. government?

The answer is that we can and we must.

Whether or not the rare whistleblowers at places like the National Security Agency go to prison -- and Tom was prosecuted with the threat that he’d be in prison for the rest of his life -- a key official goal is to drive them close to the poverty line for the rest of their lives, deprived of pensions and rendered unemployable for all but low-paid jobs.

If you click here to support Thomas Drake as an NSA whistleblower who continues to speak truth to -- and about -- power, you can make a tax-deductible contribution. Whatever you can afford would be deeply appreciated. Half of every dollar you donate will go directly to Tom, while the other half will support the Whistleblowers Public Education Campaign that he chairs.

Although Tom ultimately prevailed in court after a Kafkaesque ordeal that lasted years, the government completely wrecked his personal finances. (If you’re not familiar with his courageous stand on behalf of the Fourth Amendment, please see the links under “Background” at the bottom of this email.)

And now, here are some new comments from Tom Drake:

**  What has happened to privacy in our post 9/11 national security world? Why is the 4th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution so weakened by the acid of secret government surveillance powers and the commoditization of our personal data by corporate interests selling us out for profit and gain, and more often than not without our express consent?

**  We live in the Digital Age with vast amounts of data collection on virtually every aspect of our personal lives. The tradeoff is the gradual erosion of our precious privacy rights, as so much of our lives are now increasingly captured by the yawning net of government and corporate surveillance with many troubling implications for our liberty, our freedom, and even democracy.

**  There are no real surprises, but I do have ample grist for the “privacide” mill that I would like to share with you. Why? Our very individuality, our persons and eventhe essence of our everyday human “beingness” is at stake when the inalienable right to privacy is viewed by some as something to take away because it has such unique value.

**  So, out of this “Grist for the Privacide Mill” -- featuring the National Security State, Surveillance, Privacy and You -- I have something for you all to chew on as a real live historical unfolding play on the stage of surveillance in all its many tentacled forms.

Scene 1:  Enter abuse of state and corporate power from stage left and exit privacy and individual sovereignty stage right as eyewitnesses along that other dark underside arc of history.

And how can we resuscitate our inalienable rights to freedom and liberty?

Scene 2:  Beyond just technology knowing where you are, there’s still largelyunderreported tracking with backdoor government access based on secret mass surveillance agreements as well as deeper metadata and content sharing on a vast scale.

Scene 3:  Privacide conducted on such a mass scale, through real-time location information collected by apps on smart (or really tracking and surveillance) devices using unique data habits, where even “anonymized identifiers can often be reverse engineered and used to track individual people.”

Scene 4:  Granting back door “exceptional access” to our electronic communications by secret state-sponsored actors or agents is just another euphemism and excuse for an anytime, all-the-time digital surveillance panopticon. Yet what good is encryption when they are swimming in our communication streams?

Scene 5:  To answer at least the heart of the core question centered on the loss of privacy, and against this dystopian backdrop, I would like to share a panel discussion on whistleblowing only very recently made available on YouTube that took place at a Ron Paul Institute conference right across from Dulles Airport in northern Virginia back in September 2017, where I was one of the featured speakers.

I was one of the whistleblowers on the panel and gave a summary account of what happened to me, why it happened to me, the price I paid, and what we must do about the multiple threats to our individual sovereignty and liberty in the Digital Age of data and personal privacide.

You can watch and listen to me directly between minutes 39 and 1:09 and then hear some responses I also provided during the Q&A that followed, with some humor and lighter moments to provide some perspective and humanity.

With appreciation,
Tom Drake


PS from the RootsAction Education Fund team:

Truth-telling can be inspirational. Another NSA whistleblower, Edward Snowden, has said: “If there hadn’t been a Thomas Drake, there couldn’t have been an Edward Snowden.”

Meanwhile, Tom Drake remains deeply in financial debt. Ironically, we are in hisdebt -- morally, politically and ethically. We owe him so much because he stood up for civil liberties and human decency.

Let’s continue to help repay that debt to Tom Drake, who exposed extreme mass surveillance by the NSA.

Living in what is supposed to be a democracy, we get vital information because of the courage of whistleblowers.


Tom Drake has no intention of going silent. He wants to keep writing, traveling and speaking out. But he needs our help.

Please make a tax-deductible contribution in support of his work.


Thanks!

GRAPHIC: Sign here button

Please share on Facebook and Twitter.

Background:
>  Daily Beast: “U.S. Intelligence Shuts Down Damning Report on Whistleblower Retaliation”
>  Freedom of the Press Foundation: “Beware of Trump Administration’s Coming Crackdown on Leaks -- and Journalism”
>  Minneapolis Star Tribune: “Former NSA Executive Urges Public Vigilance Against Government Overreach”
>  “The Constitution and Conscience: NSA’s Thomas Drake”: Video of speech on May 2, 2017
>  The Washington Times: “Donald Trump on Edward Snowden: Kill the ‘Traitor’”
>  
Jesselyn Radack, The New York Times"Whistleblowers Deserve Protection Not Prison"
>  
Jane Mayer, The New YorkerThomas Drake -- "The Secret Sharer"


 
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FYI Only- Run, Bernie, Run! Our Revolution Heather Gautney

Our Revolution Heather Gautney<info@ourrevolution.com>
To   

Run, Bernie, Run!

Friends,
I'll be blunt: We need a presidential candidate who cares about working class and poor people. There's just too much on the line.
Bernie Sanders has galvanized millions around Medicare for All, tuition-free public college, 100% renewable energy, a $15 minimum wage, and other policies that would vastly improve our lives. He stands apart in his dedication to building a grassroots movement and a truly progressive agenda for all.
Our Revolution is the continuation of the bottom-up energy that fueled Bernie's 2016 campaign. Our 250,000 members, over 600 local groups, and millions of supporters are building grassroots power across the country. We've elected progressives up and down the ballot, democratized the Democratic Party, and continued the fight for universal health care, free public college, and a host of other progressive issues. Now we need a US President who shares our movement's desire for social and economic justice.
Our message to Senator Sanders should be loud and clear: Run, Bernie, Run!
2016 was just the beginning. It's time we take out the ballpoint pens, find the clipboards, and start talking to people about the next President of the United States.
In solidarity,
Heather Gautney
Executive Director
Our Revolution

https://www.facebook.com/events/209910659931948/ Women’s March Saturday January 19, 10:00 am, Boston Common


Women’s March
Saturday January 19, 10:00 am, Boston Common


-- 

[From Virginia Pratt]

I just received an e-mail from a friend indicating that there will be a Women's March this year in Boston on the Common beginning at 10 AM on Jan 19, 2019.  I used the link to register…

Virginia Pratt


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Mountain Folk Music

Red Rocking Chair - Coon Creek Girls - Appalachian Folk

01/10 Oppose stepped up up US Intervention in Venezuela

Charlie Welch<cwelch@tecschange.org>
Via  Act-MA <act-ma-bounces@act-ma.org>
Please distribute widely.

The Venezuelan Solidarity Committee invites you to join us on January
10^th for an event marking the step up of US intervention in Venezuela
on the day of the inauguration of Nicolas Maduro’s second term in office.

This event will include firsthand accounts from the recent delegation
that visited Venezuela in November as well as audio/videos presentation.

We will be monitoring the situation in Venezuela during this critical date.

Come join us for an open discussion of current events in Venezuela and
the political situation surrounding Venezuela.

Location: Encuentro5, 9A Hamilton Place, Boston, MA.

Time: 7-8:30pm

Date:January 10th

Venezuela has been under a US attack for many years economically and by
a media propaganda campaign with the sole purpose of isolating the
country to the point submission. Now the attacks are coming from many
directions. The Grupo Lima has call for not recognizing the new Maduro’s
government and to suspend diplomatic relations with Venezuela. The group
members that voted in favor of this declaration were Argentina, Brazil,
Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Panama,
Paraguay, Peru, and Saint Lucia while Mexico abstained.

Colombia has 7 US military bases along the border with Venezuela, and
now the new Brazilian president is open to establishing US military
bases along its border with Venezuela as well.

Rumors swirl about US cutting diplomatic relations or taking other
actions.  Meanwhile, Russian military aircraft landed in Caracas as part
of expanded military cooperation with Venezuela.


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