Terrorism and the Homegrown Terrorism Act

The presentation in class tonight really freaked me out. I don't like this whole homegrown terrorism thing. It is scary to think that any group that speaks their mind or protests anything in this country will be monitered as if they were "terrorists". I don't even know who we are suppossed to think are terrorists anymore. Are they "the enemies" (like Bush likes to repeat so often) of whom I'm not sure, or is it our current government status that is enforcing new regulations that slowly dwindle our civil liberties by slapping a name on it that makes us feel superficially protected?
Also, if here in our country we can torture random people with no proof of their wrongdoing except higher-uppers believing that they are terrorists, and keep these people in jail for life without trial, why are we being told to be scared of terrorists from other countries? The definition of terrorism according to dictionary.com is
1. the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes.
2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3. a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government
Hmmm.. isn't our government using scare tactics to intimidate us and others? Aren't they breaking laws and torturing people themselves? Why is the U.S only concerned with other government's torturing and killing? Isn't all torturing and killing wrong. Isn't that one of the reasons why we were getting Hussein out of the picture because of his lawlessness and violence? And why can laws be broken by politicians and people with money, but not by poor people. Why are americans torturing people in Guantanamo Bay without trial, what is the point of all this? It seems like the more our country tries to "protect" us, the more they take away our freedoms and also turn future generations of people from other countries who weren't our enemies in the first place, into our enemies in the future.

embedded journalists

I feel that there is no correct solution to the possible problem of embedded journalists in the battlfield becoming subjective while living in close quarters with American soldiers. There is no way to regulate the reporter's freedom of speech while reporting from the war front. It is also their responsibility to be as objectvive as they can be. To me this is just another one of these issues that can never be solved. I see the point that Jeff Emanuel is making in his article, "Embedded Journalists won over by soldiers." But if anybody(journalists) is with people(soldiers) in a life and death situation who are partially protecting you and your life and you are watching out for the others(in this case Iraqis), there is almost no way you can be critical. Then again, I think it is different to be critical of war movments decided by government officials and military higher uppers than the soldiers the journalists are with on a day to day basis. Then again, journalists also have to take into consideration which of their articles will be published by a corporate/political agenda based media that may only publish what they want people to see. However, there must be some journalists out there who really do their best to not take sides and publish things as they really see them, but will those things get published?

outfoxed

Today we saw the movie outfoxed in class. I had seen it a couple years ago but it was good to see it again and remind myslef of the atrocities of "fair and balanced journalism" on fox. Media consolidation in my opinion is a huge problem because when the same information is broadcasted on many different t.v. stations, newspapers, and other media outlets that many people read and watch then nobody is really getting real news anymore. Or the news has a "spin" on it as O'Reilly would say, of course he is the biggest info spinner ever. In class I commented and a lot of others had similar comments about how our problem with fox network isn't that it is an obviously right wing scewed network, but the fact that they claim to be fair and balanced and blatantly are not. The main issue that I see with this is not people who are informed and watch fox, but those who may be watching fox for their news outlet and have no idea that the information being divulged is completely one-sided. Especially young people who are just starting to care about what goes on in the world and have not really formed their political opinions yet. Watching fox and similar news outlets may help mold their political positions differently than if they were really getting information from many different sources and opinions.

Tibet-no freedom of speech :(

China has had rule over tibet for 57 years now. The Dalai Lama is in exile. Now China is going even furthur trying to control the Tibetan people (whose religion is buddhism)they are pushing their campaign that requires Tibetan Buddhist monks to denounce the Dalai Lama(their most sacred spiritual leader and head of the religion)and declare their loyalty to Beijing. No free speech in China and the Himalayas apparently. This is so sad to me. I think Buddhism is one of the most interesting religions and what is so ironic is that they are practically the most peaceful people on earth. Have you ever seen a Buddhist Monk walking along and kissing the ground every step? In the last 57 years they have been violentely attacked and had their freedom of religion and lifestyle taken away from them. Now the Chinese government has "pledged to stengthen patriotic education" particularly among young monks to help them become "patriotic, religion loving, and law abiding." according to the Tibet Daily Newspaper.Now the people of Tibet are doing demonstrations and protests in the capital Lhasa and according to Chinese sources 22 people hvae died in these anti-government protests, but according to Tibetans, 140 people have died.

New Orleans

New Orleans is a very interesting place. All the graveyards have the cement coffins above ground because since the place is below sea-level it floods so often like the disaster they saw with Hurricane katrina. I was downtown near bourbon street for a week working with my mom. She publishes a trade magazine called Light Metal Age for people who work in the metal industry which is actually a huge industry. I had to be at these conferences all day long which was sort of a bummer because I only had time to explore the city at night. what an awesome place! I wish I could say I went and helped with rebuilding for katrina, but i didn't, i would have if i had had more time, and I would have liked to explore the city more than the small part I was in but the part I could see was awesome. So many little blues and jazz clubs, so many artistic people on the street. There you can walk around all day anywhere any time with a beer or a drink in your hand. The vibe is definetely more laid back. I only saw one building there that was obviously wrecked by Katrina. They seemed to have done a pretty good job at revamping that region but a bus driver told me that at the hotel I was stayiing water levels were up there to 20 feet! It is a beautiful place, all the architecture is different with most city apartments and shops all having little balconies that span the whole building with tons of plants. I actually got drenched walking under a balcony where some one decided to pour buckets of water on their plants at just that moment. I also saw a movie being filmed in the middle of the street called "12 rounds" it has some famous wrestler as the main character who I didn't know but took a picture of in hopes of getting mad cash from the national enquirer. His name was something Cena. I also was leaving my hotel one evening and happened to pass by the San Antonion Spurs who were just arriving at the hotel. Tony Parker got into the elevator right in front of me. Later that night another of the basketball players got in the elevator with me and I just had to ask if he was on the San Antonio Spurs, he said yes and it seemed much to his shagrin like he wasn't proud of his celebrity. I said, "Sorry to point that out man." He said, "Comes with the territory" and left the elevator in a huff. Every night I went out and drank alot of shitty sweet alcoholic slushies of which they have these bars on practically every block with those slushies. I wonder how different California would be if we all had the freedom to drink on the streets. I want to go back to explore more. I have pictures but they are on my camera that I just had to send to my mom so I will post them when I can.
Peace,
Me

I just got back from New Orleans Louisiana, and boy is life different there. I wanted to make sure I posted something by tonight but I have jetlag so I am going to bed... I will post pictures and write a complete blog tomorrow or Friday!
Hope anyone who reads this is doing well. Love, R

San Francisco Anti-War Protest Jan.18'03

Watching the movie Berkeley in the Sixties in class was very interesting. I was very moved by the power of the human spirit in the students who all banned together for their right to the freedom of speech at berkeley. It lead to a discussion in class about why students don't all get together and protest today. An interesting thing someone brought up is that there are so many things to be upset about that it is hard to all get together and agree about one topic and fight for it. I did go to a protest in San Francisco in 2003 to protest the Iraq war though. I think there were about 200,000 or way more ppl there, but of course the media was estimating less. Everyone was perfectely peaceful and just marching down the street(I think it was Market Street) The end of the march was at city hall. They had to shut down all the streets. I took the BART into the city with hundreds of garishly dressed chanting, singing, music playing people. It was an awesome event I was lucky to be there for that moment in history.