At a recent DNC fundraiser 56- year old LGBTQ advocate Ellen Sturt heckled Michelle Obama  to ask for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) to be signed via executive order. This was a simple demand, as she notes in her Washington Post op-ed where she says she could no “longer remain silent.” Although this was brave, what about famed gay whistleblower PFC Bradley Manning? Would he get the same treatment? Glenn Greenwald wrote that Chair of the San Francisco Pride Parade overode the board's decision declaring that Manning would not be one of the Grand Marshals of the parade while huge corporations like AT&T, Verizon, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, sponsored the Parade. What he wrote next was a bombshell: “[the] remarkable shift in public opinion on gay equality…is less significant than it seems because...gay equality poses no real threat to elite factions...If anything, it bolsters those power structures.” One must ask: does the cause of gay equality “pose no threat” to the ruling elite?First one, one must understand, that the LGBTQ rights movement has changed over time. BusinessWeek calls the gay rights movement, “one of the most successful political enterprises in history” because of its contributions in the last 40 years. However, this “enterprise” has led people to worry: lesbian host Ellen DeGeneres is perceived as the mainstream gay perspective, that there is a

We information renegades have been fighting for free information and an open net free of censorship. But, those wanting to control information have struck back. The digital imperialists are those companies that exploit our online information and gather it to blast advertising at us while violating the basic right to privacy at the same time which is part of the globalization of the surveillance state. As the late Aaron Swartz said in a speech at the Freedom to Connect Conference in 2012, “The enemies of the freedom to connect have not disappeared. The fire in those politicians’ eyes hasn’t been put out. There are a lot of people, a lot of powerful people, who want to clamp down on the Internet. And to be honest, there aren’t a whole lot who have a vested interest in protecting it from all of that.”I was reminded of this reality when AnopsLegion tweeted that “Liberty Reserve's domain has been officially seized,” in this case by the dirty five: the Secret Service, the DHS, the Treasury Department, DOJ and the Global Illicit Financial Traffic Team. To give some background, I used the Internet Wayback Machine and found an archived page from April, in which the site defines itself as “an account-based payment system where you can store value in U.S. Dollars, Euro or Gold Grams and transfer payments to others and receive payments from others. It is safe, reliable and confidential. Payments are irrevocable...In just minutes, you can send and receive payments from anyone, anywhere on the globe!” A BBC article on the subject noted that “Authorities in the Central American country said Arthur Budovsky [the founder of the Liberty Reserve] had been taken into custody in Spain on suspicion of money laundering...[but that] the closure of Liberty Reserve has the potential to "cause a major upheaval in the cybercrime economy" [and that while] there had been "anxious discussions" about ...

 I was searching around the internet for the full video of the recent hearing on the Authorization of Military Force where Pentagon officials said the “war on terror” would last another 10-20 years and claimed powers beyond the constitutional requirements set under the War Powers Clause and elsewhere. Eventually, I watched the video on Democracy Now! and another one on The Pentagon Channel which just happens to be run by the Pentagon. The videos were very different as one was propagandistic and another was not at all. That is what inspired me to write this article. Usually when propaganda is talked about it is either emanating from the corporate mass media, covert operations or otherwise. But with the recent changes to the Smith–Mundt Act, which specifies which global audiences will receive US propaganda officially called "public diplomacy," the dissemination ban on distributing this information domestically was eliminated. Those outlets affected by this act and other similar ones must be discussed. The reason for this, is that information from such government outlets is either white or gray propaganda. Wikipedia on their page titled CIA influence on public opinion they write that: "white [propaganda] is acknowledged as an official statement or act of the U.S. Government, or emanates from a source associated closely enough with the U.S. Government to reflect an official viewpoint. The information is true and factual. It also includes all output identified as coming from U.S. official sources." However, there is likelihood that some of the outlets are spreading gray propaganda or when “the true source (U.S. Government) is not revealed to the target audience. The activity engaged in plausibly appears to emanate from a non-official American source, or an indigenous, non-hostile ...

 Very early in the morning, the historic sit-in was ended. Police swarmed in and arrested all whom were involved. I had been following it all night, even writing an article about it. This political disturbance is in the place one would least expect it: Saudi Arabia. A sworn ally of the United States, the monarchy rules over the people with an iron fist. Amnesty International in a post calling for the release of female prisoners who had participated in demonstrations wrote that “criticism of the state is generally not tolerated in Saudi Arabia. Those who do criticize the government, their policies or practices are often held incommunicado without charge, sometimes in solitary confinement, and denied access to lawyers or the courts to challenge the lawfulness of their detention. Torture or other ill-treatment is frequently used to extract “confessions” from detainees.”This is not the beginning of disturbances in this country. Already back in January 2011, following the shockwave coming from the “Arab Spring,” one man lit himself on fire, beginning mass demonstrations. As I wrote in a post on the Culture of Resistance tumblr blog, “demands throughout have included changes in political and economic conditions, suffrage for women, giving women the right to drive, the release of all political prisoners, taking the Saudi forces out of Bahrain which are participating in crushing the uprising, equality for Shias in the country along with a Constitution and independent legislature in the country’s Eastern Province.” There have been very few concessions to meet these demands, as most of them are just meant to stop further protest, not eliminate the root ...

 Opening my inbox, an unread email reads “It’s official: CISPA is back.” I remember that I signed up for that mailing list of Fight for the Future. I continue to scroll through the message which says the following: “We just got the official word that CISPA is back. CISPA would let corporations share all of your private, personal information with the government... with no restrictions…Congress needs to hear a strong, clear message from Internet users…This email, your love letters, your secrets and private conversations, your search and email history, what you say and do anywhere on the web...All these things could become a part of a government file on you that everyone from the IRS to local police would have access to.” Next the email tells me to sign a petition on cispaisback.com. I do so but with reluctance, realizing that much more needs to be done than just signing a petition by entering my email into a bar or donating to their cause. There is a good graphic describing what CISPA is and how it will affect people in the United States.  Still, it just seems too passive to just sign a petition. In an instant, the words of Anti-Flag’s song calling for  all political prisoners to be released, Mumia's Song, comes to mind where the singers yell that we must “keep hope alive!” So, I decided to write this article because I thought that it could do what the Anti-Flag song recommended that listeners do: inspiring people to fight back, in this case to fight for the internet. For those fighting for free information the future looks bleak. Tuesday President Obama implemented new cybersecurity measures with an executive order. A technology magazine, The Verge, wrote that it opened “the door for ...

 As I continue to highlight the war in Mali, I realized the need for an update. Putting posters around my campus is raising awareness but it’s not doing much of anything to stop the war. Not much else other action has occurred on my campus. I contacted the ten organizations listed in my last article and only two responded. I can’t find the email I got back from Global Exchange, but I do have the one from Veterans for Peace. According to the email, Vice President, Matt Southworth added onto their statement about AFRICOM that “our best message is that US counterterrorism policies have many negative consequence--some immediate--in Africa. The intervention in Libya, which the US participated in (spending over $1 billion is just a few months) has contributed to fall out in Mali, where the US trained military leaders that then undertook a coup [sic] of the Mali government. US logistical support for the French (and British) in both Libya and Mali represent participation in a war that Congress has not authorized. US support for militant leaders and dictatorial governments in Africa will inevitably backfire, leading to untold blowback. After over a decade of US led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we should take pause to re-evaluate failed US policies, rather than double down on them in countries all over Africa to further undefined ends. Training foreign military leaders, conducting drone strikes and providing logistical support for various interventions by US allies will inevitably prove counterproductive and undermine true US security interests.” Off-campus, an online hacker “breached into the official website of French Ministry of Defense,

 I have written many times already about this subject, but I feel that few are following in my lead. The New York General Assembly, what is the center of the Occupy Movement, is doing great work but has no actions planned to protest the war. I have seen few mentions on their twitter feed about this at all. While some spread my articles on twitter and reddit (I applaud you), the subject still doesn’t seem to be getting out there. In a sense, saying there is no resistance is unfair because of actions that have occurred previously. In April of last year activists protested against those behind the coup,  Islamists have protested the war in Egypt, local residents have instigated an uprising against the Islamist forces in northern Mali, in October of last year, over 100 women protested the implementation of Sharia law in Timbuktu, in May of last year Malians held a sit-in against these same Islamists, this month protesters in Kuwait protested by carrying banners saying that France should end its war in Mali, and before ECOWAS joined in, hundreds marched in Mali’s capital to protest their deployment to the country. Even Tunisia’s government said they were against the war. However, even with these actions there hasn’t been the organized effort of the peace movement to oppose this war. That is what I wish to counter.Some peace organizations have offered hope that this criminal and imperialist war which is about getting natural resources or protecting French-backed economic unions (in the case of most African countries involved) can be opposed on a larger scale. A press release by Veterans for Peace is good in a sense. They mention that “the expansion of AFRICOM in Africa in ...

 On Tumblr I found a map which peaked my interest. A user had uploaded a map from AFP showing how different countries are involved in the war in Mali (other than France) including the EU, US, Germany, Belgium, Canada, UK, Italy and the UAE, among others. Of these countries, currently Nigeria (as shown by a Reuters picture) and Togo (according to Euro News) have troops on the ground. The French seem to be the main players in the war which I noted was imperialistic and violated international law. I also already knew that four governments (Israeli, Spanish, French and Ukrainian), the chairman of the German aerospace defense industry association, a French multimillionaire, the CEO of Daimler AG, the  CEO of Dassault Aviation, anti-gay multibillionaire named Serge Dassault, the CEO of the Boeing Company, the French company Panhard, and Virginia-based Geo-Eye Inc. are directly profiting from France’s share of the war. It seemed obvious why UK, Italy and Belgium would participate since they wanted to regain control of Africa, the same with the US which is engaging in the next imperial ‘scramble for Africa’.  As for Canada, EU, UAE, and Denmark, it seemed that these countries liked the spoil of war and wanted to follow along, supporting their allies ...

 After I saw that there was another war in Mali I shook my head in dismay. I had predicted this war back in November, saying it would be fought under the guise of fighting terrorism, but would actually be about securing gold deposits, undiscovered oil and the drug trade. There is one aspect I didn’t necessarily predict which was that America would not lead this war. The “socialist” in France, Francois Hollande who was elected with messages mirroring what propelled Obama into power in 2008, is leading the war effort but the U.S. is the secret force behind this intervention. As Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! put it “the U.S. has backed France’s offensive in Mali…ferry[ing] hundreds of additional French troops to Mali…[and] U.S. officials say they’re also making plans to send drones or other surveillance aircraft.” In addition to this, France also wants 3,300 troops from West African states to “deploy in support of the Malian army.” The questions that must be asked are: why would France engage in such a imperialistic war in its former colony, does this war violate international law and what should we do about it  First, the background of this war is important to understand. Glenn Greenwald lays this out in his piece in The Guardian. He writes that the war in Mali will be the eighth war in which “western powers…have bombed and killed Muslims,” saying it will fuel anti-western extremism. Greenwald further notes that the war for oil in Libya, which I described in May as an imperialistic intervention, caused instability in the country, ...

In the morning after Christmas, I listened to a video from Democracy Now! detailing the day’s headlines. What I heard announced by Amy Goodman angered me greatly: “U.S. Army teams will be deploying to as many as 35 African countries early next year for training programs and other operations as part of an increased Pentagon role in Africa. The move would see small teams of U.S. troops dispatched to countries with groups allegedly linked to al-Qaeda…The teams are from a U.S. brigade that has the capability to use drones for military operations in Africa if granted permission. The deployment could also potentially lay the groundwork for future U.S. military intervention in Africa.” President Obama echoed this sentiment when he nominated John Kerry; he congratulated his previous Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on restoring “our global leadership” and declared triumphantly: “the United States will continue to lead in this world for our lifetimes.” These statements and the headline from Democracy Now! didn’t surprise me one bit. Already, I had heard that an imperialist intervention will begin in the West African state of Mali next year, fighting over uranium deposits, gold deposits and untapped oil deposits, which is exactly what I predicted back on November 3rd. I had already written a year earlier, criticizing the war for oil in Libya for the same reasons, saying that “the extent of imperialism in this war is very troubling…[and] is not debatable…The war is imperialist, ...