The Friends of California Libre...

18 May 2003

Freedom's Just Another Word

Greetings, friends,
Here's a nice long one for you...set aside some quiet time and enjoy.

While the recent bombings in Saudi Arabia were not, unfortunately, a big surprise, the attacks in Morocco were. If you need more information, begin your Internet gathering here:
Morocco, of all the countries in North Africa, is probably the closest to representative democracy. Although I'd hardly recommend the place for a gold star (active secret police, limited franchise for women, occupation of a neighboring country) a relatively enlightened monarch and proximity to Europe was very promising for their future as a gateway to Africa and the Islamic world. The reaction to these attacks in Morocco and Europe will be very telling...especially as the victims numbered three Spaniards, three Frenchmen, an Italian and 21 Moroccans. Extremely pointless...bitter...and the finger will alight on three men, Mr. Bush, Mr. Aznar, and Mr. Berlusconi. The finger's been on Mr. bin Laden for a long time, but I hardly think he could have much involvement in this from the lawless frontier of Pakistan (or, as I surmised in the past, a nice resort on the Arabian coast, with Mr. Hussein.)

We are also starting to see the bitter fruit of imperialism being brought home to our allies in Europe and the Middle East. Will they react by moving away from us, or towards our new brand of "closely-watched" democracy? Ask Mr. Ashcroft.

An interesting article about the crackdown on public drunkenness -- inside bars -- was sent to me by Ms. Soriano-Lightwood, but rather than reprint the entire thing, I refer you to the offending 'zine, which is pretty interesting in it's own right:

I was asked by certain parties to send the information regarding restrictions on travel to Cuba which have been recently reinstated:

>Eric Fenster wrote: From: "Eric Fenster"
>Date: Thu, 08 May 2003 19:11:04 +0200
>Subject: US blocks information about Cuba
>IFLA is right to insist that countries assure free access to information.
>The United States has just stopped granting the "educational licenses" that were the small crack in a draconian, decades old policy to prevent US citizens from getting information about Cuba by traveling there. (excerpts from NY Times article, below)
>The United States has been holding prisoners incommunicado for a year and a half ON THE ISLAND OF CUBA. Nobody can get information about them, and they and we have been told they are held in a location not subject to any national or international laws or treaties except the law of force.
>The United States, under the insulting name of the "Patriot Act," is surveying what people read in its libraries and buy in its bookstores. So far, librarians have complained on the one hand and practiced compliance on the other. There is no such thing as free access to information in a context of government intimidation.
>Let's hope IFLA will issue a parallel statement on May 10 that holds the United States to the standards it claims to represent.
>U.S. policy shift limits travel to Cuba
>David D. Kirkpatrick NYT
>Monday, May 5, 2003
>Duncan Beardsley . . ., director of the travel study program for Stanford University alumni, learned that the Bush administration was no longer granting special licenses that allowed alumni organizations, museums and other cultural groups to take American citizens on educational trips to Cuba.
>. . .
>Beardsley and his group brought up their complaints in a meeting at the United States Interests Section in Havana, the equivalent of an embassy. "We were told the educational license was being eliminated because it was being used primarily for salsa and the beach," he said. . . .
>. . .
>"The new regulations spell the virtual end of travel to Cuba for ordinary Americans," said Nancy Chang, a lawyer for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a civil rights group. The rules still leave exemptions for students on academic programs as well as for professional scholars, journalists, government officials and Cuban-Americans visiting family, but far fewer people fall into those categories.
>The Bush administration is ending the educational licenses because it believes too many people have been using them mainly to have fun. . . .
>"The license was being abused," said Taylor Griffin, a spokesman for the Treasury Department. "It undermined the intention of the U.S. sanctions against Cuba, which are to deprive the Castro regime of the financial wherewithal to continue to oppress its people."
>On March 24, the Office of Foreign Assets Control, the branch of the Treasury Department that administers the long-running embargo, stopped granting new licenses and issued the rule eliminating the exemption.

And back to more (and more and more) benign forms of idiocy around the globe.

In France,
Race Driver's License Confiscated for Speeding
Cafe Toilets Get Makeover

In Italy,
Mafia Blamed for Rubbish Revolt

In Nevada,
Deodorant Co. to Sponsor Armpit Festival

And finally, my favorite picture so far from Iraq:
Saddam Gets a Makeover

Okay, for those interested, I have a few articles which show what my colleagues have been up to on the home front, fighting the Patriot Act and the international destruction of libraries. Being a librarian is becoming much more interesting:

Pulling FBI's Nose Out of Your Books
By Bernie Sanders
U.S. Rep. Bernie Sanders represents Vermont as an independent.

May 8, 2003
After 9/11, the Bush administration, particularly Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft, pushed hard for passage of the Patriot Act, which contained sweeping changes to our nation's surveillance laws and new intelligence powers for the FBI and other agencies. At that time of national outrage, Congress passed with little debate a bill the attorney general had crafted.
Few who voted for the Patriot Act - I did not - knew that among its provisions was one that gave FBI agents the authority to engage in fishing expeditions to see what Americans read. Although it does not mention bookstores or libraries specifically, the sweeping legislation gives the FBI the power to seize all of the circulation, purchasing and other records of library users and bookstore customers on no stronger a claim than an FBI official's statement that they are part of a terrorism investigation. Surely the powers the government needs to fight terrorism can be subject to more meaningful checks and balances than that, especially when the right to read without government intrusion is at stake.
Until the Patriot Act, the FBI had the authority to obtain bank records, credit records and certain other commercial records only upon some showing that the records requested related to a suspected member of a terrorist group. The Patriot Act expanded the FBI's authority in two ways. First, it gave the FBI the authority to seize any records of any entity. Most members of Congress probably didn't realize it, but this included libraries and bookstores. Second, Congress dropped the prior requirement that the FBI actually have some evidence that the person whose records it sought was a member of a terrorist group or otherwise involved in terrorism.
Now, one Patriot Act provision allows the FBI to obtain whole databases, including records of citizens not suspected of any wrongdoing. The FBI has a history of abusing its power: monitoring, keeping records on and infiltrating civil rights organizations, Vietnam War protest groups and others that had broken no laws but were considered controversial. Little has changed to prevent the FBI from abusing its powers again if it is left unchecked. The new powers appear to have been used already - a University of Illinois survey shows libraries were targeted at least 175 times in the year after 9/11 - yet the FBI refuses to explain how or why.
Such is the state of affairs that librarians in California and across the country are putting up signs warning patrons that the FBI may be snooping among their records. These librarians, along with booksellers, are particularly concerned because the proceeding for these warrants takes place in a closed court and the new law has a built-in gag order: Those who are asked to turn over records are not allowed to say that the search has occurred or that records were given to the government. In addition, under this provision the courts are no longer an arbiter of individual rights because judges are not allowed to determine whether there is probable cause to justify such sweeping searches.
We need law enforcement to track terrorists down before they do their evil deeds. But if we give up some of our most cherished freedoms - the right to read what we want without surveillance; the need for "probable cause" before searches are made - the terrorists win, for their attacks will have struck at the very heart of our constitutional rights.
To remedy the excesses of the Patriot Act that threaten our right to read, I have introduced the Freedom to Read Protection Act. The bill, which has the support of Democrats and Republicans, progressives and conservatives, will establish once again that libraries and bookstores are no place for fishing expeditions. Because this new legislation will allow the FBI to use the constitutional routes at its disposal, including criminal subpoenas, to get library and bookstore records, it will not tie the hands of investigators. At the same time it will require - as had always been the case - that investigations be focused and that the reasons behind them be subject to judicial scrutiny.
Before Congress begins any discussion of new powers for the FBI, as some in Washington are advocating, we must first focus on correcting the unchecked authority the Patriot Act already grants the government.

To view the entire article, go to
Burn a Country's Past and You Torch Its Future
By Robert Darnton

It happened here, too. The British burned our national library in 1814. It wasn't much of a library, to be sure -- just a collection of about 3,000 volumes assembled for the use of senators and representatives in the new capitol being built in the wilderness of Washington, D.C. But in destroying it, the British invaders struck at the heart of what would develop into a national identity.










To the glory that was Greece
And the grandeur that was Rome.







The original article can be found on here:
Sunday, April 13, 2003 (SF Chronicle)
Arcata the defiant/Town ordinance penalizes officials who cooperate with Patriot Act, but law may not stand up in court
Kevin Fagan, Chronicle Staff Writer

Brian Willson, the national peace protester who lost his legs trying to block a Concord munitions train in 1987, lives in Arcata and helped draft the law. "I think a lot of people are freaking out," he said. "You can see the developing police state, and we have to start opposing it."




Finally, an old article, but note the statistics at the end about support for anti-US/Britain boycotts in Europe. The ways of American hawks are many...

France will pay for war stance, Powell says
Administration's dove suggests trouble ahead as new UN confrontation looms over Iraq sanctions
Julian Borger in Washington, Paul Webster in Paris and Andrew Osborn
Wednesday April 23 2003
The Guardian

Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, who is generally considered the most dovish member of the administration, warned France yesterday that it would pay a price for its opposition to the Iraq war.

His blunt remarks suggest that France's conciliatory proposal that most UN sanctions on Iraq should to suspend has done little to heal the US-French rift.






Mr Powell, who had persuaded President Bush to take his case to the UN, became convinced that Paris was determined to veto military action in any circumstances.

His subsequently hawkish line on Iraq helped to slightly narrow the gap between the state department and the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. The two men had lunch together yesterday.

A US administration official confirmed yesterday that some steps would be taken to downgrade formal relations between Washington and Paris - possibly ending the regular four-way consultations between foreign ministry political directors from the US, France, Britain and Germany.

France may also encounter difficulties in exploiting its oil concessions in Iraq.

But the official said there was no question of broader economic sanctions.

"We have a broad and deep relationship, and this is not going to disturb that in the long run," he said.

The Pentagon is pushing for harder-edged measures, primarily in Nato, where moves are being made to squeeze Paris out of the inner councils for blocking plans to send Nato defence systems to Turkey before the war.

The long process of returning France to the integrated military structure of Nato, from which it withdrew in 1966, has yet to be completed.

Mr Powell's remarks make it clear that last week's telephone call from Jacques Chirac to George Bush, the first between the presidents for two months, did nothing to heal the worst split between the two nations since Charles de Gaulle's cooling towards Nato and closure of US bases in France in 1966.

The official French response to Mr Powell came from Mr De Villepin on a visit to Turkey.

He said: "Throughout the crisis France, along with a very large majority of the international community, acted in conformity with its convictions and its principles to defend international law"- a reference to a determination to reinforce UN authority.

"It will continue to do so in all circumstances."

Relations looked likely to worsen further yesterday as France made it clear that it opposed ending UN control over Iraq's oil exports in the near future. President Bush has called for all sanctions to be lifted, not merely suspended.

The move to block an immediate lifting of oil sanctions is part of France's attempt to ensure a "central role" for the UN in postwar Iraq, as opposed to the "vital role" proposed by the US presidency.

France also wants the return of the UN weapons inspectors, implying that it does not trust the US plan to send its own inspection team.

Meanwhile, an opinion poll released in Brussels showed a high level of French resistance to buying American goods. About 17% of those questioned by a PR agency, Weber Shandwick, said they were ready to boycott US imports.

The survey suggested that 11% of people in Britain and 13% of those in Germany held similar views. In France 11% of shoppers said that they also rejected British goods.

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