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Thought of the Day: Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission

The People vs. Corporations: US Supreme Court overturns campaign spending limit
Just hours ago, the Supreme Court gave Corporate America a green light to use its immense wealth to buy elected officials.
The court’s shocking decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission struck down 60 years of legal precedent prohibiting corporations from making campaign expenditures to attack or support political candidates.
The court ruled that the First Amendment – designed to protect the speech of real, live humans – guarantees for-profit corporations the right to influence elections.
This is nothing short of a massive assault on the very foundation of American democracy

“shed a tear for American democracy”
- Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen

Please watch this special video on what Public Citizen is doing in response to the Supreme Court’s decision:

We spoke with Jeff Milchen of ReclaimDemocracy.org about the coalition of groups coming together at Move to Amend.org

At 4:30 PM MST Diane Dimond is a modern day journalist who defies a category. She’s been called “A renaissance broadcaster” for her versatility on-air and “A reporter’s reporter” for her consistently high-quality investigative storytelling. Dimond’s greatest talent may be her ability to communicate complicated stories in an understandable, common-sense way.
Most recently, Diane has branched out on multi-media platforms to tell the stories she finds so fascinating. She writes a soon-to-be nationally syndicated weekly crime and justice newspaper column and she maintains an official website.
In the field of radio, Diane was picked by the Greenstone Media group to co-host their syndicated morning radio talk show in 2007 and she can often be heard filling in on other major radio talk shows. Demos of this work can also be found on their website.
We will discuss her recent article America’s Wrong Reaction To Terror

…Life at the airport has been an evolving scene of humiliation and loss of personal freedoms ever since. And after all our sacrificial efforts terrorists have now proven they can go through coat-belt-shoe X-rays and still get on board jetliners carrying explosives.
Don’t get me wrong I’m all for strict security measures against terrorism but agreeing that we should all be eyed as equally potentially guilty at the airport just never sat right with me. From the get-go it felt like a huge injustice. It feels like junior high when the teacher kept all of us on detention for a week because one moron let loose with a spitball. I thought back then and I think now we’re better off in the long run figuring out a way to grab up the bad guy to beat them at their own game.
If we’re really serious about making our airports safer we need to stop thinking so narrowly, stop thinking that full body scan machines and more tension filled TSA X-ray lines are going to do the trick. They won’t.

At 5 PM MST Shantel Shurb-Beach returns ! from the Council on Hemisperic Affairs to discuss this article on Tar Sands Canada has options for oilsands production, think-tank says

”If the Obama administration brings in tough environmental measures, Canada may sell its oil elsewhere. A respected American think-tank is urging the Obama government to think twice before introducing environmental measures that would disadvantage Alberta’s oilsands.
“Washington may find that if it pushes too hard or too fast with carbon-cutting legislation targeting the oilsands, its friendly neighbour might finally grow tired of being taken for granted when it comes to oil,” warns the Council on Hemispheric Affairs” … What makes this report interesting is that Canadians tend to believe that they have few levers to influence American policy making. And that it would be too risky to ever use oil as a bargaining chip.
Further, that Canada is not even on the radar screen for American lawmakers.
The report, written by researcher Shantel Beach who attended the University of Calgary, seems to contradict all such assumptions.
… “Canada can and likely will push back, especially since China is more than happy to step in and purchase oil . . . if the U.S. chooses not to.”
That prospect is taking on enhanced credibility as planning proceeds for the Northern Gateway pipeline project to carry oilsands petroleum to Kitimat in northern B.C. for potential shipment to Asia. …

: former guest TJFS, Andrew Nikiforuk: The Bombings, the Olympics and the Police

• The Tyee — Sour Gas: The Smell of Money
• Convicted bomber Ludwig arrested in B.C. pipeline blasts
• Anti-oilpatch activist free to go; RCMP have new evidence in pipeline bombings, Bob Weber, 9.Jan.10, Canadian Press
• Wiebo Ludwig to be charged with extortion after pipeline bombings: Lawyer, Bob Weber, 8.Jan.10, Canadian Press

At 5:30 PM MST We will air our earlier conversation with Francis A. Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law in Champaign, USA. For their criminal policy & practice of “extraordinary rendition” & torture perpetrated upon about 100 human beings, Professor Boyle has filed a complaint with the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague against:

• George W. Bush,
• Richard Cheney,
• Donald Rumsfeld,
• George Tenet,
• Condoleezza Rice, &
• Alberto Gonzales

In 2001 he was selected to be the Dr. Irma M. Parhad Lecturer by the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Calgary in Canada. In 2007 he became the Bertrand Russell Peace Lecturer at McMaster University in Canada. Professor Boyle is listed in the current edition of Marquis’ Who’s Who in America.
Professor Boyle is Attorney of Record for the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, conducting its legal affairs on a worldwide basis. Over his career, he has represented national and international bodies including the Blackfoot Nation (Canada), the Nation of Hawaii, and the Lakota Nation, as well as numerous individual death penalty and human rights cases. He has advised numerous international bodies in the areas of human rights, war crimes and genocide, nuclear policy, and bio-warfare.
He has written and lectured extensively in the United States and abroad on the relationship between international law and politics. His eleventh book, Breaking All the Rules: Palestine, Iraq, Iran and the Case for Impeachment was recently published by Clarity Press. His Protesting Power: War, Resistance and Law (Rowman & Littlefield Inc. 2007) has been used successfully in anti-war protest trials. In the September 2000 issue of the prestigious The International History Review, Professor Boyle’s Foundations of World Order: The Legalist Approach to International Relations (1898-1922) was proclaimed as “a major contribution to this reinterrogation of the past” and “required reading for historians, political scientists, international relations specialists, and policy-makers.” That book was translated into Korean and published in Korea in 2003 by Pakyoungsa Press.

…Also, most regretfully, the new Obama administration has publicly stated that it will continue the Accused’s policy and practice of “extraordinary rendition,” which is really their euphemism for enforced disappearances of human beings and consequent torture by other States. Hence the Highest Level Officials of the Obama administration fully intend to commit their own Crimes against Humanity under the I.C.C. Rome Statute – unless you stop them! Your opening an investigation of my Complaint will undoubtedly deter the Obama administration from engaging in any more “extraordinary renditions” — enforced disappearances of human beings and having them tortured by other States. Indeed your opening of an investigation into my Complaint might encourage the Obama administration to terminate its criminal “extraordinary rendition” program immediately and thoroughly by means of issuing a public statement to that effect. In other words, your opening an investigation of my Complaint could very well save the lives of a large number of additional human beings who otherwise will be subjected by the Obama administration to the Rome Statute Crimes against Humanity of enforced disappearances of persons and their consequent torture by other States, inter alia.
The lives and well-being of countless human beings are now at risk, hanging in the balance, waiting for you to act promptly, effectively, and immediately to save them from becoming Victims of Rome Statute Crimes against Humanity perpetrated by the Highest Level Officials of the Obama administration as successors-in-law to the Accused by opening an investigation of my Complaint. Otherwise, I shall be forced to file with you and the I.C.C. a follow-up Complaint against the Highest Level Officials of the Obama administration. I certainly hope it will not come to that. Please make it so.
Finally, for reasons more fully explained in the Conclusion to my Complaint, I respectfully request that you obtain I.C.C. arrest warrants for the Accused in accordance with Rome Statute articles 58(1)(a), article 58(1)(b)(i), article 58(1)(b)(ii), and article 58(1)(b)(iii). The sooner, the better for all humankind….

You can add your support to this complaint by contacting the ICC Prosecutor
The Honorable Luis Moreno-Ocampo
Office of the Prosecutor
International Criminal Court
Post Office Box 19519
2500 CM, The Hague
The Netherlands
Fax No.: 31-70-515-8555
Email: OTP.InformationDesk@icc-cpi.int

At 6 PM MST Jim Groom an Instructional Technology Specialist and adjunct professor at the in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Has been working for over a decade in education with a consistent focus on the development of teaching and learning in higher education. In addition to his extensive experience teaching at the college level, for the past four years he has worked primarily in the field of instructional technology.
His experience as an instructor coupled with his extensive collaborations with faculty and students with a specific focus on curricula, pedagogical and technologically enhanced projects has informed many of the innovative work he have been a part of in the field of instructional technology over the last several years.
He writes regularly about the work as an instructional technologist–in addition to several other interests such as film, the EduPunk Movement, literature, and media of all kinds–on his personal blog, Bava Tuesdays.

…It’s a movement away from what has become of the mainstream edtech community – a collection of commercial products produced by large companies. Edupunk is the opposite of that.
It’s DIY. It’s hardcore. It’s not monetized. It’s not trademarked. It’s not press-released. It’s not on an upgrade cycle. It’s not enterprise. It’s not shrinkwrapped.
It’s about individuals being able to craft their own tools, to plan their own agendas, and to determine their own destinies. It’s about individuals being able to participate, to collaborate, to contribute, without boundaries or barriers.
… But, the key to edupunk is that it is not about technology.
It’s about a culture, a way of thinking, a philosophy. It’s about DIY. Lego is edupunk. Chalk is edupunk. A bunch of kids exploring a junkyard is edupunk. A kid dismantling a CD player to see what makes it tick is edupunk. … – D’Arcy Norman on Jim & EduPunk

At 6:30 PM MST Laurence Overmire is an emerging voice for conscience and consciousness in the poetry world. Popularly known as “The Genealogist-Poet,” he has had a multi-faceted career as writer, actor, director and educator.
His award-winning poetry, eclectic in form, style, and subject matter, and often provocative in its direct confrontation of social issues, has been widely published in the U.S. and abroad in hundreds of magazines, journals, and anthologies.
His plays include Slingshot, A Woman in Washington’s Army, and A Scrooge Mart Christmas Carol.
Join us for part of our series of weekly visits with our ‘Poet in Residence’ Laurence Overmire.
His latest book REPORT FROM X-STAR 10

A world in crisis: Economic. Political. Social. Spiritual. The climate changing, the stock market plunging. Species becoming extinct. Disease, famine, overpopulation. War. Nuclear annihilation?
Revolution or evolution?
Where is mankind heading? What is the fate of human civilization on our little Planet Earth?