Your threads are phenomenal. I'll be linking to these from the front page.

Cool!!! That's great! Thanks POAC.

You kiddin' me? THANK YOU!

” Of all the war crimes which he claimed he had to commit on the orders of Hitler "the worst of all," General Keitel said on the stand at Nuremberg, stemmed from the Nacht und Nebel Erlass-"Night and Fog Decree." This grotesque order, reserved for the unfortunate inhabitants of the conquered territories in the West, was issued by Hitler himself on December 7, 1941. Its purpose, as the weird title indicates, was to seize persons "endangering German security" who were not to be immediately executed and make them vanish without a trace into the night and fog of the unknown in Germany. No information was to be given their families as to their fate even when, as invariably occurred, it was merely a question of the place of burial in the Reich.

On December 12, 1941, Keitel issued a directive explaining the Fuehrer's orders. "In principle," he said, "the punishment for offenses committed against the German state is the death penalty." But

if these offenses are punished with imprisonment, even with hard labor for life, this will be looked upon as a sign of weakness. Efficient intimidation can only be achieved either by capital punishment or by measures by which the relatives of the criminal and the population do not know his fate.42

The following February Keitel enlarged on the Night and Fog Decree. In cases where the death penalty was not meted out within eight days of a person's arrest,

the prisoners are to be transported to Germany secretly... these measures will have a deterrent effect because (a) the prisoners will vanish without leaving a trace, (b ) no information may be given as to their whereabouts or their fate.43

The S.D. was given charge of this macabre task and its captured files are full of various orders pertaining to "NN" (for Nacht und Nebel), especially in regard to keeping the burial places of the victims strictly secret. How many Western Europeans disappeared into "Night and Fog" was never established at Nuremberg but it appeared that few emerged from it alive.

Some enlightening figures, however, were obtainable from the S.D. records concerning the number of victims of another terror operation in conquered territory which was applied to Russia. This particular exercise was carried out by what was known in Germany as the EinsatzgruppenSpecial Action Groups, or what might better be termed, in view of their performance, Extermination Squads. The first round figure of their achievement came out, as if by accident, at Nuremberg.

One day some time before the trial began a young American naval officer, Lieutenant Commander Whitney R. Harris, of the American prosecution staff, was interrogating Otto Ohlendorf on his wartime activities. It was known that this attractive-looking German intellectual of youthful appearance-he was 38-had been head of Amt III of Himmler's Central Security Office (R.S.H.A.) but during the last years of the war had spent most of his time as a foreign trade expert in the Ministry of Economics. He told his interrogator that apart from one year he had spent the war period on official duty in Berlin. Asked what he had done during the year away, he replied, "I was chief of Einsatzgruppe D." Harris, a lawyer by training and by this time something of an intelligence authority on German affairs, knew quite a bit about the Einsatz groups. So he asked promptly: "During the year you were chief of Einsatzgruppe D, how many men, women and children did your group kill?" Ohlendorf, Harris later remembered, shrugged his shoulders and with only the slightest hesitation answered: "Ninety thousand!" (Rise and Fall of The Third Reich, Simon and Schuster 1960, William L. Shirer, pp. 957-958)”

Arkansas Democratic party chairman shot and killed in Little Rock
Elana Schor in Washington
guardian.co.uk,
Wednesday August 13 2008

The state chairman of the Arkansas Democratic party was shot and killed today at his Little Rock office by an assailant who later died after being shot by police.

Democratic chairman Bill Gwatney was attacked by a man who insisted on speaking with him before firing three shots and fleeing, according to local media reports. Gwatney was taken to the hospital after his secretary made an emergency call from a nearby flower shop, but he later died of his wounds.

Police chased the assailant, reported to be a white male in his 40s, 25 miles into a neighbouring town before shooting him and arresting him. The suspect later died of gunshot wounds. The motive for the shooting is so far unknown.

"His leadership and commitment to Arkansas and this country have always inspired us and those who had the opportunity to know him," Bill and Hillary Clinton, who knew Gwatney from their years as Arkansas governor and first lady, said in a statement. "Our prayers are with his family during this time."

The Arkansas Times newspaper reported that police may have tracked the attacker based on a tipoff from the state Baptist organisation. A manager there reported being confronted earlier today by an armed man who complained of losing his job before fleeing the building.

Gwatney, who owns an auto dealership in the state, was set to attend the Democratic presidential convention later this month and cast his delegate vote for Barack Obama, who released a statement saying he was "shocked and saddened to hear about the tragedy".

The Copperhead Libel
-- by Sara

Bill O'Reilly has taken his war on the blogs to the next level, engaging an "Internet Cop" who regularly appears on his show to provide examples of just how over-the-top outrageous those potty-mouth liberal bloggers are. The argument is that while conservative blogs may be rough-and-tumble, they're nothing like those liberal blogs, where commenters routinely make death threats against conservatives. (I know. I know. Conservative projection in action, once again. When Ann Coulter calls for us to be executed as traitors on national TV, that's just incisive commentary in Bill's World. When some hothead with issues corks off on our pages -- even when the rest of us cut him off or shut him down -- it's a cardinal sign that liberal blogs have become a danger to the nation.)

The really funny part of this is that his "cop" is Amanda Carpenter of Townhall.com, a site that recently called Michelle Obama a "race pimp" and said that congressmen who "damage the morale and undermine the military" should be executed as saboteurs. And no, those weren't comments -- those calls came on the front page. You'd think that would pretty much disqualify her as the Amy Vanderbilt in charge of enforcing good manners on blogs -- but, y'no, it's Fox, and reality is what they say it is.

The not-so-funny (and not-so-surprising) part is that Carpenter's own comments threads contain their fair share of precisely the same kind of ugly speech she purports to be digging up on the threads at liberal blogs -- and, in fact, much worse. Brad Friedman went out and found a choice series of eliminationist screeds that should give all of us pause (and perhaps send us out to the local gun shop this weekend):


FYI: "Copperheads" were Northern Democrats who opposed the Civil War on the grounds that it was expensive, unnecessary, bad for trade, and unlikely to save the Union. Many of them were small businessmen in the border areas of the Union states who lost significant trade with the South; others were out-and-out racists who didn't think freeing black slaves was worth the price in white blood. They got considerable political traction in the north in the latter years of the war, and helped split the Democratic party for the next two decades, allowing the new GOP to become entrenched.

Some Copperheads were overt Confederate sympathizers, and gave aid and comfort to the enemy during and after the war. That's why most Northerners considered them traitors, and advocated executing them as such. (My great-great-grandfather, a Union general who lived on the Indiana bank of the Ohio River, made a small career out of busting up Copperhead nests and arresting their members in the years following the war.)

Calling liberals "Copperheads" because we oppose the misadventure in Iraq is the kind of libel that seems likely to stick -- and will, in some minds, justify an eliminationist response. And the suggestion that American troops may come home from Iraq and turn their guns on their fellow citizens (like my grandfather did) is one we should take seriously. People who have committed heinous acts in the service of a cause are often deeply unwilling to step back and question the rightness of that cause -- because that justification is the single, slender post that keeps the moral weight of their actions from crushing their souls. They'd rather die -- or kill some more -- than allow anyone to point out that the only belief holding up their sanity is a lie.

BOR is, as usual, missing the big story here. It's no secret anywhere anymore: every national law enforcement and intelligence agency we've talked to is bracing for an onslaught of right-wing violence in the months ahead, which will intensify with an Obama win. (We may look back in a few years and realize Knoxville was the opening shot of a much larger wave of domestic terrorism.) The language and logic of that uprising are being worked out in the pages of Amanda Carpenter's own blog -- and yet he's got her on his show, explaining to America why liberals will be the ones to blame when the shooting starts.

So the fascists are calling us fascists, and the copperheads are calling us copperheads. Figures.

St. Paul Police Conduct Mass Preemptive Raids Ahead of Republican Convention
September 01, 2008

Armed groups of police in the Twin Cities have raided more than half-a-dozen locations since Friday night in a series of “preemptive raids” before the Republican National Convention. The raids and detentions have targeted activists planning to protest the convention, as well as journalists and videographers documenting police actions at protests.

Guests:

Coleen Rowley, worked as an FBI special agent for almost twenty-four years. In 2002, she was named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year after she blew the whistle on pre-9/11 intelligence failures. She lives just outside Minneapolis.

Bruce Nestor, President of the Minnesota Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild

AMY GOODMAN: As we interviewed Jon Stewart at the Minneapolis airport next to baggage claim, we got a text message that Democracy Now! videographer, filmmaker Elizabeth Press, who had arrived before us, had been arrested, or she had been detained, or she was in a house with I-Witness Video, and somehow the group was surrounded by police. That was the last details we had. We had the address of the place; they were texted to us. And we raced off.

Armed groups of police in the Twin Cities have raided more than a half-a-dozen locations since Friday night in a series of preemptive raids before the Republican convention. The coordinated searches were led by Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher but conducted in coordination with federal agencies.

Five Minnesotan activists are still detained on probable cause holds, which means they can be held for thirty-six hours without charge, excluding weekends and public holidays. According to this timeline, they won’t be released before Wednesday. The sheriff called them "criminal anarchists who are intent on committing criminal acts before and during the Republican National Convention.”

The raids and detentions have targeted activists planning to protest the Republican National Convention, as well as journalists and videographers documenting police actions at protests. Groups directly affected by the raids include Food Not Bombs, the RNC Welcoming Committee, I-Witness Video and Communities United Against Police Brutality.

Democracy Now! spoke to Michelle Gross from Communities United Against Police Brutality on Sunday. She was at the activist convergence space Friday night when it was raided.

MICHELLE GROSS: I was sitting there waiting for a meeting to happen with other legal people. We were working with a kind of a collective of legal people, and we were waiting to have a meeting. And I was literally just sitting there drinking some water and relaxing, when, you know, these Ramsey County Sheriff’s Department people came blazing in, screaming “Get on the floor! Get on the floor!” and waving guns at everybody in their faces.

And they basically—at the time, I quickly thought and opened up my video camera and hit my record button and started recording the scene. Then, because they were, you know, waving guns in my face, of course, I had to hit the floor, but I kept my camera recording the whole time.

AMY GOODMAN: Gross was held for forty-five minutes, then released. But when she returned home, she found her home and car had been broken into and all her documents thoroughly searched.

Democracy Now!’s Elizabeth Press and I-Witness Video founder Eileen Clancy were among those detained in one of the raids in St. Paul Saturday afternoon. We arrived on the scene soon afterward. Eileen Clancy spoke to us and other reporters from the backyard of the house where she was being held. She was handcuffed with her colleagues.

EILEEN CLANCY: They’ve been detaining people for days around here. And they photographed us. They look through our materials. They copy our materials and don’t return them to you. And then you’re merely detained, so you don’t have the same situation where you have police officers swearing out affidavits, which we could prove was false. This seems to be a new technique.

AMY GOODMAN: Eileen Clancy was sitting with her hands behind her back, handcuffed, surrounded by St. Paul police, along with her colleagues who had been inside the house. She was shouting to us across the yard. The police had said we had to stay in the front, across the street. But her next—but the next-door neighbor of the house where the activists, the I-Witness videographers, were inside, told us to go through her house, the next-door neighbor, and we could stand in the backyard to speak and witness what was taking place, as the I-Witness videographers were brought into that backyard and were handcuffed.

The National Lawyers Guild and Communities United Against Police Brutality filed an emergency motion Sunday asking Judge Mark Wernick to grant "injunctive relief to prevent police from seizing video equipment and cellular phones used to document their conduct.” The groups sought a temporary restraining order on police to stop them from illegally detaining journalists and confiscating equipment.

I’m joined here in St. Paul at St. Paul Neighborhood Network by Bruce Nestor from the Minnesota chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. We’re also joined by Coleen Rowley. She has worked as an FBI special agent for almost twenty-four years. In 2002, she was named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year after she blew the whistle on pre-9/11 intelligence failures.

We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Let’s begin with you, Bruce Nestor. What is going on here? One raid after another throughout St. Paul? What are these preemptive raids? What does that mean?

BRUCE NESTOR: It was really an effort led by the Ramsey County Sheriff to put people in preventative detention. The raids were carried out by Sheriff Bob Fletcher, who had been arguing for months that there needed to be a stronger law enforcement response, and he was being told that wasn’t necessary. And so, he sent his officers in, after doing intelligence gathering and infiltrating these groups.

And then, really what he did is he took common household items that you would find in any home in Minnesota—a hatchet, rope, glass bottles and rags—attached the label “anarchist” to the people who are living in the homes, and then raise this public fear that the anarchists were threatening violence, public disorder. But really, it’s taking a common household item, something you’d find anywhere, calling it an edged weapon and then attacking people for their political beliefs, that then is used to generate this public fear and keep activists detained, as you said, through Wednesday at noon.

AMY GOODMAN: This situation that we witnessed in St. Paul, where I-Witness Video was surrounded by police, they moved in on the videographers with a weapon drawn. Democracy Now!‘s Elizabeth Press was inside. She was filming. The police came in with their weapon drawn on these videographers.

BRUCE NESTOR: They did the same thing in the house raids in south Minneapolis. They broke down doors, even though these were knock warrants, meaning they were supposed to knock and announce themselves. I was personally present and saw officers with riot gear and assault rifles, pump action shotguns. The neighbor of one of the houses had a gun pointed in her face when she walked out on her back porch to see what was going on. There were children in all of these houses, and children were held at gunpoint. Everyone was forced to the floor and handcuffed and then detained for about an hour, while they were processed out, and then individuals were released.

It was really an overwhelming show of force, again, designed to heighten public fear to do two things: to make people fearful of the protests, but also to discourage people from protesting. I think it’s somehow designed to say, you know, don’t take to the streets, because this could happen to you, or you could get caught up in this, and therefore, don’t get involved. And that’s why they have that level of force involved.

AMY GOODMAN: Coleen Rowley, you’re a former FBI agent. As I talked to Elizabeth, our producer, here in St. Paul, one of the people who was arrested or detained at I-Witness, it seems that they were careful not to arrest at least this group but detain them for hours. They’re handcuffed. One of the protesters, his arms were red for hours afterwards. But she said that before the police came in, the FBI was there. What is the role of the FBI in this? Who is doing this?

COLEEN ROWLEY: Well, I can tell you what it’s supposed to be. And then I retired in 2004, and so these fusion centers have grown, of course, since that time, and who knows what it actually now amounts to? What it actually is supposed to be is in a major event, such as the RNC, the FBI is really to take the lead on the counterintelligence aspect, which, of course, if there was a true threat—let’s say there was a domestic terrorism group, which is—this is what we’re talking about. We’re talking about at the very most nonviolent civil disobedience. So the confusion with true intelligence for a terrorist threat is quite enormous. There’s a big range there. But in a real case, obviously, if you really did have, let’s say, the Aryan Brotherhood or something like that, a group bent on terrorism, the FBI is supposed to take the lead on that and coordinate the intelligence gathering.

AMY GOODMAN: What is your experience with preemptive raids?

COLEEN ROWLEY: Well, the word “preemptive,” of course, is— should send a red flag up, because that word came into play right before the Iraq war. And, of course, we all know that it’s very, very difficult to determine ahead of time what is a true threat. And so, when you start this word “preemptive,” and now, unfortunately, it seems to have migrated to domestic law enforcement. You cannot determine—we always talk about intent and capability, and if you really know that a group is going to pull off a bank robbery, you really have to make sure that an overt act is committed in furtherance of that. It’s not enough to know, for instance, that somebody’s talking about a bank robbery. So that’s a problem here, and certainly when you get into satire and, you know, taunts and this type of thing, it seems to be a terribly misguided and an overreaction on the part of police.

And it has terrible consequences, actually, for policing, too, which I can talk about later. People put this—they try to say, well, security, we must sacrifice civil liberties. They think of it as a tradeoff. And it is absolutely not true. Our security does depend on good police work. And so, when police do this, and they go against their own community policing model, they actually so distrust, so that if they do want to ask a question of someone next time, let’s say, there is a true threat, somebody may say, “I don’t want to talk to you. I know what happened last week when you handcuffed people incorrectly.” This is just sending a very bad signal to police work. And I’m sure there are many police officers who are just as disappointed with this, because it’s going to make their job in the future much more difficult.

AMY GOODMAN: As the police were surrounding I-Witness Video and Elizabeth Press, I asked the police officer if it was true that one of them came in earlier with an AR-15, with an automatic weapon, and he said yes.

COLEEN ROWLEY: Yeah, it’s—you know, again, with the escalation of force, and you get to the point where imminent—the word always is “imminent” threat, where you actually are allowed to use deadly force. FBI agents, for instance, train on this standard. All law enforcement trains on this standard. And to see this now erased a little bit is very wrong, and it needs to be corrected.

AMY GOODMAN: Coleen Rowley, you mentioned fusion centers. Explain what they are?

COLEEN ROWLEY: Well, you know, fusion centers are where law enforcement can combine forces. It has a good aspect, obviously, because you don’t want these jurisdictional restraints sometimes to prevent sharing of information. So there’s a good side to that.

There’s a bad side, potentially a bad side, which is that the separate jurisdictions exist for a reason. So, for instance, Ramsey County, seems like much of this is emanating from Sheriff Fletcher in Ramsey County. He seems to be the one that is into this preemptive show. I would think that St. Paul, the community policing model, is maybe not. But now, when you combine forces, you know, you see that problem of that—they all have the same equal law enforcement, maybe, authority in some of these cases. And Minnesota actually is quite a state that has always looked at separate jurisdictions. So the fusion center could have that problem.

AMY GOODMAN: Are there infiltrators? Is there surveillance that you know about going on in peaceful protests?

COLEEN ROWLEY: Well, here’s what—you know, our group, we have been at peace vigils now for five, going on six, years, and, you know, we’ve never had this problem that in this last week—our peace vigils in suburbs have been approached by police.

AMY GOODMAN: What do you mean “approached”?

COLEEN ROWLEY: We’ve had police officers come up to both of our really—we stand at a corner holding a sign, for one place, for over three years. And now we have police checking on intelligence and talking to us about violence. And, of course, we think of this as very intimidating. I have numerous peace folks who have marched for five years, who are now actually worried about not only Monday, but the whole week. Many of our artistic—my group is having a picnic, for instance, on Harriet Island. Now, you can’t imagine something more peaceful than a peace island picnic, and yet people are worried that that could be disrupted by this—a show of force and also by—you know, people are worried and may stay away. So this is very wrong.

It not only hurts civil liberties and the exercise of First Amendment rights, but it actually also hurts security. That’s something to keep in mind. This does not help security. It takes the police away from true threats, and then it also causes later problems for them trying to talk to people and get cooperation from the public.

AMY GOODMAN: Bruce Nestor, what is this injunction that has been sought?

BRUCE NESTOR: This started out with a raid on Glass Bead Collective, a group here out of New York City that last week was arrested at 1:30 in the morning for walking near some railroad tracks in northeast Minneapolis.

AMY GOODMAN: Now, explain. Two of them had gone to get their friend who came in on the bus?

BRUCE NESTOR: That’s right. They had gone down to the Greyhound station in downtown Minneapolis, were taking the 17B city bus back to their house, where they were staying, got off the bus, walked two blocks. And it borders a railroad track, as do lots of streets in Minneapolis. The police were quoted as saying, “We’ll arrest anybody”—or “We’ll detain and question anyone walking near railroad tracks at 1:30 in the morning.”

They then explained who they were. They provided identification. They had all of their equipment seized—diaries, computers, video cameras, still cameras, money, personal belongings and clothes—and were held for twenty-four hours, that equipment. We actually got it back through public pressure, going to the media, holding a press conference.

But this is a pattern, and it was a pattern that didn’t get publicity in Minneapolis, particularly people with Communities United Against Police Brutality. And so, part of the affidavits filed with the temporary injunction order that we are seeking included copwatchers, who have had their equipment taken and smashed, memory cards erased, because they’re just documenting police abuse during the course of ordinary arrests.

So we saw an escalation of that once the RNC is in town. The harassment of I-Witness Video is part of that, as well as the questioning of people just taking photographs. A former producer for a local TV station photographed a police SWAT team. He was stopped, questioned. His memory card was erased. Ordinary activity is being treated with this overwhelming level of force, and people are being detained. And so, we tried to get the injunction to say, particularly in terms of people documenting police misconduct, you can’t seize their video cameras, and you can’t erase images. You have to preserve that.

AMY GOODMAN: Coleen Rowley?

COLEEN ROWLEY: You know, back in 1986, the FBI overreacted and seized our main newspaper Star Tribune’s and our main television station’s cameras, and it was a very unique situation. But back in ’86, William Kunstler came on the scene, filed a lawsuit, and unfortunately, you know, the FBI lost the case, and it actually set a precedent that you cannot seize a news camera. You know, it’s called, I think—I can’t remember the name of the case, but there is a strong precedent that this violates, of course, First Amendment rights, as well as Fourth Amendment rights. So this should be—the lawyers really need to stay on this. People need to read those affidavits. And ultimately, let’s hope we don’t need a Church Committee when this is all over to sort out these kinds of abuses.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you both very much for being with us. Coleen Rowley is a former FBI agent, well-known as Time’s Person of the Year after September 11th. That’s Time Magazine. And Bruce Nestor with the Minnesota Chapter of National Lawyers Guild.

Minnesota Monster Mash: Police-State Zombies in a Dead Republic
Written by Chris Floyd
31 August 2008

I know the police cause you trouble;
They cause trouble everywhere.
But when you die and go to heaven,
You won't find no policeman there.

-- Goebel Reeves, "Hobo's Lullabye"

Glenn Greenwald tells a harrowing tale of police-state tactics in Minneapolis, with armed security forces conducting Baghdad-like raids on the houses of activists, terrorizing many and arresting some for thought crimes -- such as "planning to cause a riot" -- and other bogus charges. The sweeps -- guided and aided by the federal government -- are designed to "ensure domestic tranquility" during the imminent Republican convention in the city. As Greenwald points out, not one of those who were shackled, arrested and hauled out at gunpoint had committed any crime whatsoever.

Heinous indeed, and entirely worthy of the anger that Greenwald marshals in his reports from the scene. But we must disagree with him on one crucial point: his repeated declaration that these incidents are "extraordinary." On the contrary, there is nothing at all remarkable about them. They are all of a piece with the similar tactics employed to cleanse the city of Denver of any unseemly expressions of old-fashioned, long-gone American liberties during the Democratic convention, where any protests that escaped the grotesque official "cage" set aside for them were strangled by militarized police and mass arrests.

Such tactics are not confined to major political events with "national security" implications -- i.e., the presence of afflatus-bloated muckity-mucks who must be spared the slightest confrontation with their crimes and complicities. They are now simply part and parcel of modern American society. Greenwald might be mistaken in regarding the Minnesota Monster Mash as "extraordinary," but he is certainly correct when he notes its deeper implications:

As the recent "overhaul" of the 30-year-old FISA law illustrated -- preceded by the endless expansion of surveillance state powers, justified first by the War on Drugs and then the War on Terror -- we've essentially decided that we want our Government to spy on us without limits. There is literally no police power that the state can exercise that will cause much protest from the political and media class and, therefore, from the citizenry.

Beyond that, there is a widespread sense that the targets of these raids deserve what they get, even if nothing they've done is remotely illegal. We love to proclaim how much we cherish our "freedoms" in the abstract, but we despise those who actually exercise them. The Constitution, right in the very First Amendment, protects free speech and free assembly precisely because those liberties are central to a healthy republic -- but we've decided that anyone who would actually express truly dissident views or do anything other than sit meekly and quietly in their homes are dirty trouble-makers up to no good, and it's therefore probably for the best if our Government keeps them in check, spies on them, even gets a little rough with them.

After all, if you don't want the FBI spying on you, or the Police surrounding and then invading your home with rifles and seizing your computers, there's a very simple solution: don't protest the Government. Just sit quietly in your house and mind your own business. That way, the Government will have no reason to monitor what you say and feel the need to intimidate you by invading your home. Anyone who decides to protest -- especially with something as unruly and disrespectful as an unauthorized street march -- gets what they deserve.

Isn't it that mentality which very clearly is the cause of virtually everyone turning away as these police raids escalate against citizens -- including lawyers, journalists and activists -- who have broken no laws and whose only crime is that they intend vocally to protest what the Government is doing? Add to that the fact that many good establishment liberals are embarrassed by leftist protesters of this sort and wish that they would remain invisible, and there arises a widespread consensus that these Government attacks are perfectly tolerable if not desirable.

True enough. But Arthur Silber, among a few others, was there long ago, in numerous essays over the past few years. Of special note in this regard is a remarkable series sparked by the tasering of Andrew Meyer in 2007 -- a damning and revealing incident that quickly became a national joke ("Don't tase me, bro!") and, for the "left," a national embarrassment to be flushed away as soon as possible. But from this incident -- and the reactions to it -- Silber opened a seam of insights into a thoroughly corroded national consciousness. He also provides copious factual detail on the growing use of tasers as a means of social control (and official murder) by state authority -- a cancerous repression that has only spread and worsened in the ensuing months. From Silber (see original for links):

See the connection, and the similarity: the United States launches criminal wars of aggression against nations which constitute no serious threat to it, and which are known to constitute no serious threat -- for the sole purpose of gaining compliance, that is, of installing governments in other countries that will act in accordance with our demands. This has long been the purpose of our interventionist foreign policy: to ensure that other countries act in accordance with our orders, even when genuine issues of national defense are altogether absent. America is God. God's Will be done. Even after the catastrophe of Iraq, leaders of both political parties threaten war against Iran, another nation that does not threaten us, because Iran dares to thwart our will.

Is it any wonder then that, within our own borders, law enforcement will use potentially lethal weapons in the absence of any serious threat -- simply to gain compliance? When the state decides that your behavior matters, you will obey. Yes, you may engage in debate -- within the parameters established by the state. Yes, you may ask questions -- if the state approves them. If you dare to step outside the boundaries set by the state, you will be brought into line, by force as required -- and by possibly lethal force. The United States government murders a million innocent people who never threatened it; of what significance is the life of a single student, especially since he's a "troublemaker" anyway?

We all know that if, say, Vladimir Putin or Hugo Chavez had put on the kind of display we've seen in Minneapolis and Denver, the entire American media-political establishment would be in full condemnatory cry about such "anti-democratic repression." But of course, there is nothing extraordinary about this blatant and brutal hypocrisy, either; Americans have long exempted themselves from the legal and moral standards they apply to others. (Others who fail to kowtow properly to the Washington line, that is; only they are subject to condemnation for failing to meet these lofty standards. Meanwhile, those those who play ball with the Beltway barons -- such as Egypt, Israel and Saudi Arabia, to name a few -- are allowed to get away with murder. Literally.)

What happened in Minneapolis is neither extraordinary nor surprising. It is simply what happens in a police state, one in which the Leader claims the power to ignore every law, to order torture, murder and wars of aggression as he sees fit, to declare anyone on earth an "enemy combatant" (on criteria that he alone decides) and detain them, without charges, for as long as he wants -- and is never resisted in any of these egregious acts of tyranny by the political "opposition." Instead his crimes and authoritarian encroachments are continually excused, countenanced, justified, immunized, ignored or fully supported by the "opposition," whose leaders refuse to take any legal action against the multitude of state crimes, but instead say openly that their main goal is simply to seize power for their own co-opted and corrupted elite faction.

There are probably any number of names one could call such a system -- but a constitutional Republic is not one of them. Or as I put it last year:

The game is over. The crisis has passed -- and the patient is dead. Whatever dream you had about what America is, it isn't that anymore. It's gone. And not just in some abstract sense, some metaphorical or mythological sense, but down in the nitty-gritty, in the concrete realities of institutional structures and legal frameworks, of policy and process, even down to the physical nature of the landscape and the way that people live.

The Republic you wanted -- and at one time might have had the power to take back -- is finished. You no longer have the power to keep it; it's not there. It was kidnapped in December 2000, raped by the primed and ready exploiters of 9/11, whored by the war pimps of the 2003 aggression, gut-knifed by the corrupters of the 2004 vote, and raped again by its "rescuers" after the 2006 election. Beaten, abused, diseased and abandoned, it finally died. We are living in its grave.

Taxpayers off the hook for GOP convention lawsuits
By RYAN J. FOLEY , Associated Press

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Taxpayers should be off the hook for any damages stemming from claims of police misconduct related to the Republican National Convention under a first-of-its-kind agreement.

The deal required the Republican Party's host committee to buy insurance covering up to $10 million in damages and unlimited legal costs for law enforcement officials accused of brutality, violating civil rights and other misconduct.

Other cities who hosted conventions in recent years — including Denver, Boston, New York and Philadelphia — either covered those costs from their general budgets or used tax money to buy insurance policies.

But St. Paul officials, led by Mayor Chris Coleman, insisted the committee use its private donations to purchase the insurance policy. They had some leverage because the party had named St. Paul as the location for the convention before striking the city services agreement in January 2007.

"The negotiating team, with the mayor's encouragement, took the firm ground that we had to have the police professional liability insurance paid for by someone other than city taxpayers," said City Attorney John Choi. "Ultimately, and reluctantly on the host committee's part, we were able to secure that."

The deal could save taxpayers millions. Police have arrested nearly 300 people, and many protesters are threatening lawsuits. New York City still faces more than 400 lawsuits from some of the 1,800 people arrested at the 2004 GOP convention, said Laura Postiglione, a spokeswoman in the city's law department.

In St. Paul, some critics say the agreement has only encouraged police to use aggressive tactics knowing they won't have to pay damages.

"It's an extraordinary agreement. Now the police have nothing to hold them back from egregious behavior," said Michelle Gross, who leads Communities United Against Police Brutality. She is considering filing suit after being handcuffed and searched last week during a raid of the St. Paul hub of an anarchist group.

Choi said such claims were unfair, noting most officers are probably unaware of the deal. He called it a landmark agreement that would likely become the standard for future political conventions.

The policy, with Boston-based Lexington Insurance Co., cost the committee $1.1 million or about half as much as originally anticipated. It will cover claims against more than 100 city, county and state law enforcement agencies who are helping police the area for the convention.

The city will not have to pay a deductible or any of the costs of hiring outside law firms to investigate and defend claims, which will not be counted toward the $10 million damage limit.

Teresa McFarland, a spokeswoman for the host committee, agreed the arrangement was the first of its kind for a convention city. The committee purchased the policy in April, earlier than required, to help the city recruit law enforcement partners for the convention, she said.

"It's a very unfortunate part of a convention but you need to make sure that everyone is protected in case something happens," she said. "As a host committee, we try to relieve the burden that would otherwise fall on the cities to host the convention. We certainly have done that and this is one component."

Ron Guilfoile, the city's top risk manager, said he expected claims for police misconduct, damage to property and civil rights violations to begin flowing in from the convention. Already, he said one lawsuit seeking over $50,000 claims the police raids of buildings housing convention protesters were illegal.

Though it's possible claims could outstrip the $10 million policy, Guilfoile said he was confident they would not.

"We made the determination early on the exposure was too great to put the taxpayers in the city of St. Paul at financial risk," he said. "And they won't be — not one dime."

National Socialism could have happened elsewhere in the modern world, but it hasn't yet. Up to now it is unique to Germany. And the deception and self-deception it required were required of a people whose civilization, by common measurement, was very highly advanced. German music and art, German belles-lettres and philosophy, German science and technology, German theology and education (especially at the highest levels) were part and parcel of Western achievement. German honesty, industry, family virtue, and civil government were the pride of other Western countries where Germans settled. "I think," says professor Carl Hermann, who never left his homeland, "that even now the outside world does not realize how surprised we non-Nazis were in 1933. When mass dictatorship occurred in Russia, and then in Italy, we said to one another, 'That is what happens in backward countries. We are fortunate, for all our troubles, that it cannot happen here.' But it did, worse even than elsewhere, and I think that all the explanations leave some mystery. When I think of it all, I still say, with unbelief, 'Germany-no, not Germany.'"
They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer, published by the University of Chicago Press. ©1955, 1966, pages 242-243.