It has happened here

 

List of Journalists Arrested at the RNC

Posted on September 10.2008 by Josh Stearns

During and before the Republican National Convention police in St. Paul arrested numerous journalists, including Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and her staff, members of a number of independent video groups, an AP photographer and staff from local broadcast stations and newspapers around St. Paul.

Arresting and detaining journalists for doing their jobs is a gross violation of free speech and freedom of the press. Journalists must be free to do their jobs without intimidation. On September 5th, local citizens delivered more than 60,000 letters to St. Paul City Hall calling on Mayor Chris Coleman and local law enforcement officials to drop all charges against journalists arrested while covering protests outside the Republican National Convention.

Below we have begun collecting names of journalists who were charged and links to news reports about their arrests. This is a growing list. If you have information about a journalist who is not listed here please email Josh Stearns at jstearns@freepress.net.

Name	Outlet	Arrested	Charge
Sharif Abdel Kouddous	Democracy Now!	Sept 1 and Sept 4	Suspicion of felony riot and unlawful assembly
Nicole Salazar	Democracy Now!	Sept 1	Suspicion of felony riot
Amy Goodman	Democracy Now!	Sept 1	Obstruction of a legal process and interference with a peace officer.
Matt Rourke	Associated Press	Sept 1	Gross misdemeanor riot charge
Edward Matthews	Univ. of Kentucky (journalism student)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Britney McIntosh	Univ. of Kentuky (journalism student)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Jim Winn	Univ. of Kentuky (journalism advisor)	Sept 1	Riot charge
Lambert Rochfort	PepperSpray Productions	Sept 3	Held without charge
Joe LaSac	PepperSpray Productions	Sept 3	Held without charge
Stephen Maturen	Minnesota Daily	Sept 4	Peppersprayed and ziptied – only held momentarily.
Jonathan Malat	KARE 11	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Tom Aviles	WCCO	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Amy Forliti	Associated Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jon Krawczynski	Associated Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Dean Treftz	U-Wire (national college wire service)	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jeff Schorfheide	Badger-Herald	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Matt Snyders	University of Iowa / former reporter for Daily Iowan	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Christopher Patton	Daily Iowan	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Rick Rowley	Big Noise Films	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jon Wise	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Alice Kathloff	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Art Hughes	Public News Service	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jerry Snook	Westwood One	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ben Garvin	St. Paul Pioneer Press	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Jason Nicholas	New York Post	Sept 1	Unlawful assembly and obstructing the legal process
Wendy Binion	Portland IndyMedia	Sept 2	Felony conspiracy to riot
Geraldine Cahill	The Real News	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ania Smolenskaia	The Real News	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Suzanne Hughes	The Uptake	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Ted Johnson	Variety	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Alice Kalthoff	MyFoxdfw.com	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
John P Wise	MyFox	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Eileen Clancy	I-Witness Video	August 26	Unknown
Anita Braithwaite	Glass Bead Video Collective	August 26	Unknown
Olivia Katz	Glass Bead Video Collective	August 26	Unknown
Nick Brooks	Downtown Express	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly and interfering with legal process
Sam Stoker	Association of Alternative Newsweeklies	Sept 4	Unlawful assembly
Paul Demko	Minnesota Independent	?	Unknown
Emily Forman	I-Witness video group	?	Unknown
Malisa Jahn	I-Witness video group	?	Unknown
Elizabeth Press	Democracy Now!	?	Unknown
Sheila Regan	Twin Cities Daily Planet	?	Unknown
Seth Rowe	Sun Newspapers	?	Unknown
Mark Skinner	University of Nevada Las Vegas Rebel Yell reporter	?	Unknown
Vlad Teichberg	Glass Bead Video Collective	?	Unknown
Nathan Weber	Chicago Freelance Photographer	?	Unknown
Tony Webster	Twin Cities Independent Media	?	Unknown
Alex Lilly	Portland Indymedia	?	Unknown
Charlie B	MTV Think blogger	?	Unknown
Andy Birkey	Minnesota Independent	?	Unknown
Matt Nelson	University of Iowa Photojournalism student	?	Unknown
Mark Ovaska	Rochester freelance photographer	?	Unknown
Chad Davis	Freelance Photographer	?	Unknown
Dawn Zuppelli	Rochester IndyMedia	?	Unknown

Free Press

Surfing: the future

Really, I would have been perfectly happy with Firefox 3, but just look at what the kids at Mozilla have in store for us:

Hang ‘Em High

“Internal memo: If we have to devastate the planet and kill billions to line our pockets, that’s a small price to pay.” [Ooh - ooh, let's have some soccer mom say it.]

- Deleted scene, from America’s Energy Future, brought to you by the Oil and Gas Industry.

If Oil Industry Profits Are Up, Why Aren’t Gas Prices Down?

Could critics be right in accusing oil industry of gas price gouging? – KTKA.com

Please, God — damn them all to hell.

Shooting Back – Ruin and Humiliation

In January 2007, B’Tselem launched “Shooting Back”, a video advocacy project focusing on the Occupied Territories. We provide Palestinians living in high-conflict areas with video cameras, with the goal of bringing the reality of their lives under occupation to the attention of the Israeli and international public, exposing and seeking redress for violations of human rights.

B’Tselem Video – Shooting Back – Ruin and Humiliation – Qalqilya

God bless you, Jon Stewart

Gives new meaning to ‘blowhard.’

Gaffe-In | The Daily Show | Comedy Central

Across the Universe

 

 

OK, the last thing I want to do is oversell this thing. That said, it’s the most fun I’ve had with a movie in years.

The kids are all wonderfully appealing and their sense of the music is terrific.

So far as I’m concerned, Julie Taymor walks on water.

The Hills Are on Fire

 

I’ve said it before. I’ll say it again. We have too much water in some regions of the world, too little in others.

We need to build an aquatic equivalent of the information, transportation and electrification grids to manage the flow of water.

Otherwise, climate change will continue to accelerate, along with all its attendant death, destruction and evangelical dementia:

• California burning.
• Climate change and Darfur
• This guy thinks it’s false, ergo it must be true…

The Open Society: Irony Rises, Feels Much Better

I admire George Soros. He passes as a philosopher among businessmen and his Open Society Institute has done great good in the world.

In college, I avidly read Karl Popper’s masterful work on The Open Society and Its Enemies. In brief, an open society sustains a free market for ideas and their unfettered expression. A closed society tries to stifle same for reasons religious, political and/or ideological.

We are an open society on good days. China is not. The USSR was not. And neither, apparently, is the Huffington Post, where the following item appeared the other day:

Dept. of Misdirection: With Iraq a Disaster, GOP Goes Crazy Over a Newspaper Ad

I attempted to reply in their house blog that Soros had seen fascism up close in his youth — and that perhaps this early scarring had something to do with the ad targeting Petraeus, which was remarkably tone deaf and tellingly juvenile.

I argued, quietly and calmly, that to call the Iraq war a disaster does not make it so. That, to fill a bubble with the refrain does not make it so, though it may deafen us to what we might otherwise hear.

I stated that the left had acted to balance the right, that our soldiers were coming home, that we can all take a measure of comfort in the implications.

That the war is over, that it ended the moment Al Qaeda began to attack the Iraqis. (Would that all our enemies were so stupid.)

I reminded that the Iraqis, their neighbors and the rest of the world are now free of Saddam & Sons. That Iraq has held elections, forged a constitution, and created a fledgling democracy.

It was too much. They didn’t want to hear it. They refused to air it. They declined to give a reason why. (I asked.)

None of which is important. Except insofar as it highlights a larger picture, wherein the left & right continue to shout past one another, neither hearing what the other has to say — and so unwittingly limiting their audiences, preaching to the choir, filling their echo chambers with sound and fury that comes to stand in for original thought and authentic emotion.

We all suffered a major trauma six years ago. The word, ‘trauma,’ is related to the German traum, meaning ‘dream.’ Those who have been traumatized behave as though they continue to relive a nightmare wherefrom they cannot awaken, often thrashing about in an effort to call attention to their plight.

I want to wake both houses and alert them to the dangers within and without. While we squabble among ourselves, the world moves on.

Israel has just now bombed Syria, on suspicion of nuclear activity abetted by N Korea.

France is talking about war with Iran.

The political structure of Pakistan is wobbling.

The polar ice caps are crumbling.

Our economy gives evidence of another meltdown.

Our people are putting on lard like they expect an extended privation.

Our homeless children are showing up on porn sites everywhere.

Millions more have no health insurance and meanwhile a billion dollars no longer qualifies you at Forbes.

Wake up.

Bush must face trial over Iraq

TEHRAN (AFP) — Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Friday that US President George W. Bush had been defeated in his Middle East plans and would one day stand trial for “atrocities” committed in Iraq.

He also said he thought Hillary Clinton’s new look was “rather fetching,” and wondered aloud as to just “how married” she was.

Khamenei’s withering personal attack on the US president in a Tehran prayer sermon to mark the onset of the Muslim holy month Ramadan came one day after Bush once again accused Iran of undermining the Iraqi government.

“I have a firm belief that one day this current US president and the American officials will be tried in a fair international court for the atrocities committed in Iraq,” he said.

“I also believe, contrary to popular opinion, that one day pigs will fly and that unicorns will be found living on the dark side of the moon.”

Observers noted that an early recording of Pink Floyd could be heard from behind the speaker, who giggled at odd intervals in the course of his remarks.

US Media Ignore Al Qaeda Torture Manual

I propose that sensible moderates everywhere do whatever they can to shatter the echo chambers on both left and right:

lgf: US Media Ignore Al Qaeda Torture Manual

This kind of groupthink is inexcusable. I watched a normally sensible guy interviewing Charles Krauthammer the other day. Krauthammer was arguing, rightly, that the recent turnabout in Anbar was huge. The interviewer said, without so much as a thought, OK, maybe it is a slight improvement — or words to that effect.

I wanted to reach through the TV screen and repeatedly slam the guy’s head into his desk. Meanwhile, subgenius politicians continue to drone on about our failure in Iraq.

Try to keep up, kids. Iraq and the Middle East have never known democracy as we do. It took centuries for us to evolve our practices. Trying to shake-n-bake a modern state in the region is just going to take more time than MTV might have you believe.