Attorney Allison Folmar (third from left), Maryanne Godboldo, Mubarak Hakim and Penny Godboldo and some of their many supporters celebrate Judge Ronald Giles’ ruling outside 36th District Court Aug. 29, 2011

 Judge Giles: “We are talking about a person’s constitutional rights, including liberty”

Channel 7 exposes illegality of Wayne County Juvenile Court practice of rubber-stamping judge’s signature to take children

By Diane Bukowski

Aug. 29, 2011

36th District Court Judge Ronald Giles

DETROIT—Thirty-Sixth District Court Judge Ronald Giles today emphatically dismissed all criminal charges against Maryanne Godboldo, who refused  to turn her 13-year-old daughter Ariana over to police officers during a 12-hour stand-off at her home March 24. His ruling came at the conclusion of Godboldo’s two-part preliminary exam on numerous felony charges. 

“There are two main issues here,” Giles said. “First, the [court] order in and of itself. The order has to do more than look official. We are talking about a person’s constitutional rights including the right to liberty, subjecting them to an order that is grossly inadequate and incorrect. The mistakes on it are numerous as identified by CPS [Child Protective Services] worker Mia Wenk herself. It is ridiculous to go in to remove in this court’s opinion somebody’s children based on THIS order. It does not even express any situation where we have exigent circumstances where it says the child is at risk. There was no imminent threat of death or severe physical harm. Therefore I am going to quash this order and everything thereafter is null and void. It is the fruit of the poisonous tree.” 

Giles held an  evidentiary hearing on the order prior to the first part of Godboldo’s preliminary exam July 25, but held his ruling in abeyance. 

Rukiyah Shabazz declares: MY CHILD DOES NOT BELONG TO THE STATE1

Even if the court did find the order valid, Giles said, “I have no evidence on this record that this defendant discharged that firearm. It could have been either one of the individuals in the house. Therefore this court dismisses all charges.” 

Police brought a Special Response Team with assault weapons, armored cars and helicopters to Godboldo’s home on Linwood near Blaine to take Ariana after officers first on the scene claimed they heard a gunshot in the home. Wenk had called 911 to summon police to the scene because she wanted Ariana on a dangerous psychotropic drug, Risperdal.   

In a court where at least 95 percent of defendants are bound over to circuit court, many hailed Giles’ ruling as extremely courageous. 

Attorney Allison Folmar, also a mother of a young daughter, speaks to media with her client Maryanne Godboldo at her side; Attorney Roger Farinha is behind them

An emotional cry rang out from Godboldo’s supporters and dozens followed her outside weeping and hugging her with joy, as she and Ariana’s father Mubarak Hakim linked hands. 

“The judge did the right thing, and I had wonderful attorneys beside me, along with my supporters,” Godboldo said. “I thank you all and especially Judge Giles, and I thank the people of Detroit.”

Later, she said, “Ariana was the one who suffered the most in this situation. She was taken from me and abused sexually, physically, emotionally and spiritually. It was five weeks that I lost with my daughter, I couldn’t eat and I couldn’t sleep, but now I have her back am I am able to once again take even better care of her.”

Godboldo told VOD earlier that Ariana has been “her entire life,” ever since her birth.

Attorneys Byron Pitts and Allison Folmar after first part of Godboldo's preliminary exam July 25

Godboldo had faced “one count of Discharge of a Weapon in a Dwelling, three counts of Felonious Assault, three counts of Resisting and Obstructing an Officer, and a Felony Firearm count,” charges carrying up to at least eight years in prison. Attorneys Allison Folmar and Byron Pitts represented her on the charges. 

“We thank Judge Giles for standing solely on the Constitution and looking solely at the law,” Folmar said outside. 

 “Maryanne Godboldo has been an upstanding citizen of her community all her life. She has lived at the same address and had the same phone number for 40 years. She had to endure not only the unlawful taking of her child but these criminal charges as well. This sends a message to Detroit Police that when you come to someone’s house you have to be legal. Unfortunately the police department did not know their own policy.”  

Like his supervisor Lt. Michael Neid, P.O. Kevin Simpson also has a military background

On July 25, Pitts showed a policy from the DPD manual regarding the service of civil orders to Police Officer Kevin Simpson, who with his partner Thomas Trewhella responded to Wenk’s 911 call. The policy states clearly that is it not the job of the DPS to serve civil orders. Wenk had testified that she wanted a police car there because Ariana needed to be “caged.” 

Simpson then admitted police were not performing their proper duties during the stand-off. 

Pitts and Folmar both have pointed out that even the Michigan appeals court order currently criminalizing resistance to police officers in the case of unlawful arrests says that the officers must be “in the performance of their duties.”  

On Aug. 29, Assistant Prosecutor Lora Weingarden called civilian Deputy Chief Michael Falvo, an attorney, to the stand to counter Simpson’s admission. Falvo said it has been common police practice since the 1970’s to accompany CPS. However, Judge Giles would not agree to Weingarden’s request to admit him as an expert witness, saying that only he as judge can rule on legal matters in his court. 

Weingarden then brought up another section of the DPD manual allowing deviance from policies in “rare” instances. 

On Pitts’ cross-exam, Falvo admitted that officers must report deviations to their superiors, which had not been done in this case. Pitts pointed out that the manual expressly forbids forcible entry into a house in rare instances where DPD might assist other agencies. 

Asst. Wayne County Prosecuting Attorney Maria Miller, spokesperson for Prosecutor Kym Worthy, at first released a statement saying the office was “considering” an appeal.

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy

Shortly afterwards, she said, “He [Judge Giles} ruled that the Juvenile Court order to remove Godboldo’s daughter was not valid.  However, Judge Lynne Pierce, Wayne County Third Circuit Court Judge in Family Court, held a lengthy hearing and determined the court order was valid. Judge Giles also ruled that there was insufficient evidence produced to show that the defendant fired a gun at law enforcement authorities. The Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office objected to the Court’s rulings and will appeal the dismissal.”

During the custody hearing before Pierce, a court supervisor testified that it is routine procedure for probation officers to rubber stamp Family Court Chief Judge Leslie Kim Smith’s signature on court orders to remove children, although they have no legal authority to do so. Smith never even sees the documents involved. (For full details on this matter, click on VOD story at http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/08/03/another-shock-no-judge-authorized-ariana-godboldos-removal/  )

 Even Maura Corrigan, appointed as Director of Human Services under Gov. Rick Snyder, recently said “only judges” can authorize CPS’ removal of children. (Click on Maura Corrigan statement to read Corrigan’s statement.) 

Gail Bagalle, at left, of the Save Our Children Coalition, which advocates for foster care, with Judge Lynne Pierce at right

Roger Farinha, attorney for Ariana’s father Mubarak Hakim, said the criminal court finding will affect the ongoing civil custody case, which is scheduled for another hearing in front of Pierce Sept. 29.

 On Aug, 9, a jury found that Ariana should remain under state custody based in part on Pierce’s repeated rulings that the order was a valid court order, despite testimony by court supervisor Vikki Kapanowski testified that three probation officers rubber stamp Family Court Chief Judge Leslie Kim Smith’s signature to child removal documents which never go before the judge.

“We repeatedly asked Judge Pierce to wait until the criminal case was over before allowing introduction of evidence [relating to the stand-off],” Farinha said. Farinha and Attorney Wanda Evans, who represented Hakim and Godboldo in the custody case, argued that testimony from police officers at that hearing would prejudice the jury, since Godboldo would have to take the Fifth Amendment regarding the events of March 24.

“The statute says a judge cannot have probation officers perform her duties,” Farinha said. “The file stamp on the order was not valid, the seal was not valid. We are pursuing appeals of the jury finding and Pierce’s orders.” (See story on appeal shortly to come.)

Detroit police officer William Blake of Tactical Mobile Unit

Weingarten argued that her office had proven that Godboldo fired a gun during the stand-off. However, it came out during the exam July 25 that no evidence technicians were ever called to the scene. Police Officer William Blake, of the Tactical Mobile Unit which backed up the assault team, said he saw a “bullet hole” in the ceiling of the inside stairwell leading to the kitchen, but on cross-exam by Pitts, he admitted he had never reported seeing that bullet hole in his initial CRISNET report, or in a May report to the prosecutor’s office.

Officers testified they found a gun and bullets in the house, but never linked them directly to Godboldo through physical evidence. Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Deborah Thomas, who acted as a mediator during the stand-off and was called as a prosecution witness, testified that  Godboldo told her only that “a weapon was discharged” during the stand-off.

No evidence technicians were called to the scene in a timely fashion. On Aug. 9, a unit of “Crime Scene” Detroit police officers with a search warrant came to the home belatedly and jiggled a pen around in a hole in the kitchen door they apparently claimed was a bullet hole. Professor Eric Lambert, chair of Wayne State University’s Department of Criminal Justice, told VOD however that the search was extremely belated and could be subject to challenge in court.

Weingarten never raised the search during the Aug. 29 hearing.

As this article went to press, Godboldo’s supporters held their weekly Monday meeting at 6 p.m. at Hartford Memorial Church, where she and her sister are active members. They vowed to continue the battle against Worthy’s appeal and to return Ariana to her mother’s custody.

MARYANNE GODBOLDO, MUBARAK HAKIM, AND ARIANA GODBOLDO-HAKIM HAVE RECEIVED WORLD-WIDE SUPPORT IN THEIR CASES. VOD READER PORTIA COMMENTED EARLY ON:

Fuhrer Hitler

“The main problem is ‘the best interests of the child’ was the slogan used by Hitler and his SS in Germany. Said the Fuhrer, “When an opponent declares: ‘I will not come over to your side, I calmly say ‘your child belongs to me already.’ Who are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing but this new community.’”

This sums it all up. Bless those who now support this family, as it could be your family tomorrow.”

The Justice 4 Maryanne Committee’s website is at http://www.justice4maryanne .  

Below is Channel 7 reporter Heather Catallo’s excellent report on the unlawfulness of seizing children based on orders signed by probation officers, and never reviewed by a judge. VOICE OF DETROIT broke this story Aug. 8.

To Donate online:

Donate securely through our online donation page.

*Thank you to everyone who supported our rally on April 2nd! We raised just over $3,000. However, our work is NOT over!* 

“Free Ariana NOW!” Petition on Change.org

Please View and Sign our Petition

http://www.change.org/petitions/free-ariana-now 

Black Libyan executed by U.S./NATO led counterrevolutionary forces

VOD ED: Reuters claims Black Libyans shown executed by counterrevolutionaries led by US/NATO came from other parts of Africa; in fact, 50 percent of Libyans are Black and have been targeted and lynched for months by racist “rebels”  

 (AP)  TRIPOLI, Libya — The bodies are scattered around a grassy square next to Moammar Gadhafi’s compound of Bab al-Aziziya. Prone on grassy lots as if napping, sprawled in tents. Some have had their wrists bound by plastic ties.

The identities of the dead are unclear but they are in all likelihood activists that set up an impromptu tent city in solidarity with Gadhafi outside his compound in defiance of the NATO bombing campaign.

It is impossible to know who killed them, but the discoveries raise the disturbing specter of mass killings of noncombatants, detainees and the wounded.

President Barack Obama: Bush #2 Mission Accomplished

Between Bab al-Aziziya, seized by rebels on Tuesday, and the Gadhafi stronghold neighborhood of Abu Salim, where fighting raged Thursday, AP reporters saw about two dozen bodies Thursday. Five or six were in a tents erected on a traffic circle that housed the activists and were decorated with the flags of many African nations.

One had an IV in his arm, and another body was completely charred, its legs missing.

At least a dozen other bodies were found in a grassy area and a canal nearby. Several of the dead had been shot in the head, with their hands tied behind their backs. A body in a doctor’s green hospital gown was found in the canal. The bodies were bloated.

One of the dead had a strip of cloth in bright green, the national color of Gadhafi’s Libya, tied around his wrist. The man was darker skinned than most Libyans.”

REBEL TERROR: CIVILIANS, INDEPENDENT REPORTERS AND ACTIVIST RISK LEVELS RISE

27 Saturday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra in LIBYA, URGENT APPEAL

Rebel Assassins Terrorizing Libyans

By Stephen Lendman

In his new article headlined, “9/11 After A Decade: Have We Learned Anything?” Paul Craig Roberts said:

“Today Americans are unsafe, not because of terrorists and domestic extremists, but because they have lost their civil liberties and no protection from unaccountable government power.”

So have millions under occupation and/or attack by US/NATO forces, terrorizing them in the name of “democracy” to “set them free.”

America is a global terror state. For decades, it’s menaced humanity’s survival by imperial wars for wealth and power, not liberation or democratic values. All US administrations reviled them, notably Obama’s, including at home.

Under him, “unaccountable government power” terrorizes globally.

It’s a truism that where large energy reserves exist, America has imperial plans to control them. Libya is now ground zero. US-led NATO assassins invaded to menace, intimidate, kill, plunder, and cause out-of-control chaos, notably in Tripoli, the struggle’s current epicenter.

On August 16, Michel Chossudovsky’s article headlined, “The Pentagon’s ‘Salvador Option:’ The Deployment of Death Squads in Iraq and Syria,” saying:

Reports suggest the use of “thousands of Islamist ‘freedom fighters,’ reminiscent of the enlistment of Mujahideen to wage the CIA’s jihad (holy war)” against Soviet Russia in Afghanistan.

Chossudovsky wrote about possible plans “to enlist thousands of Muslim volunteers in Middle East countries and the Muslim world to fight alongside the Syrian rebels. The Turkish army would house,” train, and send them to Syria.

Thousands of similar elements are in Libya.

Counterrevolutionaries armed and led by US, Britain, NATO

On August 20, independent journalist Thierry Meyssan said NATO debarked large numbers of jihadi forces with heavy weapons on Tripoli’s coast. Special forces led them. Violence and mass killing followed. It still rages, slaughtering hundreds, perhaps thousands, and wounding many more.

On August 26, London Independent writers Kim Sengupta and Portia Walker headlined, “Bodies pile up as search for Gaddafi intensifies,” saying:

“Fierce fighting and wild rumors (spread) as hunt gathers pace.” So far, there’s “no sign of an end to the conflict as” battles rage.

On August 26, London Guardian writer Simon Jenkins headlined, “Libya is not an advertisement for intervention,” saying:

Hospital worker in Tripoli shows bodies of civilians and Gadhafi supporters

“Several claims….made about NATO’s involvement (have) little basis in reality,” including:

(1) Preventing a Benghazi massacre. It “was NATO propaganda.”

In fact, mass killing only began when NATO arrived and hasn’t stopped.

(2) Replacing Gaddafi to protect civilians and install a more democratic regime.

NATO plans occupation and puppet leaders taking orders from Washington, as well as plundering Libya for profit.

(3) “(N)o foreign troops on the ground” will be used.

“This NATO pledge was mendacious….British (and other Western) ground troops were extensively deployed in Libya,” arriving before conflict began last winter.

(4) “Britain was not taking sides in a foreign civil war.”

Arada neighborhood in Tripoli after recent NATO air strikes

In fact, Washington, Britain, and other NATO countries partnered to oust Gaddafi. Insurgents, supported by air power, were recruited to do it. Western interests “most emphatically decided the fate of the Libyan people. (They) brought anarchy in the place of order….(They can’t) disown the consequences.”

From the start, Western leaders knew if they “toppled Gaddafi (they) would own the place. It was no good saying they “learn(ed) from Iraq. The lesson of Iraq was, don’t do it in the first place.”

Libya, in fact, is replicating it. NATO’s Operation Mermaid Dawn hoped to end it in Tripoli. “Mermaid” is Tripoli’s nickname. On August 20, it was launched from Sarim Street’s Ben Nabi mosque after Iftar, the breaking Ramadan’s fast.

Insurgents used mosque loud speakers to broadcast chants to Tripoli residents. NATO carpet bombing and strafing preceded and accompanied it to clear their way to advance unimpeded after initial loyalist counterattacks.

Activated sleeper cells around the city joined the fighting. Weapons were shipped in weeks in advance. Text messages urged residents to join insurgents. Battles raged. They still do. Likely protracted conflict will cause thousands of deaths and injuries, as well as destruction across Tripoli and other parts of Libya, besides the horrendous past six months’ toll.

Green Square July 7 filled by one million Libyans supporting their government

The Big Lie accompanies the campaign, including a Potemkin village replica of Tripoli’s Green Square and Gaddafi compound in Doha, Qatar.

It was used to create fabricated scenes of euphoria, aired by Al Jazeera, an imperial co-conspirator. In fact, it was an elaborate hoax to convince residents Tripoli was in rebel hands. Perhaps seizure of Gaddafi’s compound was also exaggerated, reminiscent of Orson Welles’ famous 1938 War of the Worlds radio drama.

The hoax heard around the world sounded real enough to make millions think aliens had landed. Angry about public gullibility, Welles reportedly said, “If they’ll believe everything, I’m going to give them something (really) unbelievable to believe.”

Victim of counterrevolutionary attack

Misinformation and the art of surprise work well enough to convince people of most anything. It’s especially effective tactically in wars. The jury is out on if it’ll work this time, given strong loyalist opposition to NATO occupation.

All along, the pretext used to intervene was to “protect civilians and civilian populated areas from threat of attack,” as stipulated under the General Assembly’s 2005 World Summit Outcome Document, adopting the responsibility to protect (RtoP).

A previous article explained paragraph 138, stating each nation must “protect (its) population from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.”

Paragraph 139 delegates responsibility to the UN “to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapters VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from” these crimes.

Military force isn’t authorized, and the UN Charter prohibits it for humanitarian interventions. As a result, justifying it under RtoP is illegal. Doing so amounts to committing war crimes to prevent them.

The UN Charter’s Chapter VI calls for peaceful conflict resolutions. If they fail, Chapter VII authorizes the Security Council to impose boycotts, embargoes, blockades and severance of diplomatic ties – not war.

As a result, Washington’s led NATO intervention is naked aggression, supplemented by paramilitary assassins, terrorizing Tripoli residents and other Libyans they attacked, murdering Gaddafi loyalists.

After entering Tripoli, AP and Reuters reported massacres of his supporters near his compound, AP saying:

“The bodies are scattered around a grassy square next to (Gaddafi’s) Bab al-Aziziya (compound). Prone on grassy lots as if napping, (they’re) sprawled in tents. Some have had their wrists bound by plastic ties. The identity of the dead are unclear but they are in all likelihood activists that set up an impromptu tent city in solidarity with (Gaddafi) outside his compound in defiance of the NATO bombings.”

AP noted “the disturbing specter of mass killings of noncombatants, detainees and the wounded.” Some were “shot in the head, with their hands tied behind their backs. A body in a doctor’s green hospital gown was found in the canal. The bodies were bloated.”

Reuters reported 30 bodies “riddled with bullets….Five of the dead were at a field hospital nearby, with one in an ambulance strapped to a gurney with an intravenous drip still in his arm.” Two other bodies “were charred beyond recognition.”

The London Telegraph interviewed a surgeon saying hundreds were “coming in within the first few hours (of fighting). It was like a vision from hell. Missile injuries were the worst. The damage they do to the human body is shocking to see, even for someone like me who is used to dealing with injuries.”

He said most casualties were civilians. Tripoli’s three main hospitals are full of them. Unable to handle the volume, many suffer in agony or die untreated. Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres) warned of a medical catastrophe. Already there’s a human one wrought by NATO and their rebel assassins on the pretext of humanitarian intervention.

What’s involved, of course, is planned colonization, occupation and plunder of Libya’s wealth and natural resources, including its Great Man-Made River (GMMR). Gaddafi rightfully called it the “Eighth Wonder of the World,” consisting of the largest global underground network of pipes and aqueducts, distributing water from an ocean-sized aquifer.

Along with free education, healthcare, housing assistance and other social benefits, Gaddafi supplied it to Libyans. NATO wants it privatized to make it costly or unaffordable henceforth, along with charging for everything formerly gotten free.

The opening comments of a previous article bear repeating, saying:

The US/UK/French-led war on Libya will be remembered as one of history’s greatest crimes. It violates the letter and spirit of international law and America’s Constitution.

The Nuremberg Tribunal’s Chief Justice Robert Jackson called naked aggression “the supreme international crime against peace….so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate (its) being ignored, because it cannot survive….being repeated.”

Post-WW II, it got worse, highlighted by what Washington, its NATO partners, and rebel assassins are doing across Libya. At the same time, they scandalously avoid calling it war, when, in fact, it’s that and more in the worst sense.

Make no mistake. For months, Libyans have been slaughtered and terrorized by vicious war criminals headquartered in Washington, London and Paris.

Unaccountable, they plan more conflicts across the region for total dominance at the expense of thousands more lost lives, as well as unspeakable human misery. It doesn’t get any worse than that.

A Final Comment: Journalists targeted by US/NATO led assassins

A morning email alert said the following:

Canadian independent journalist Mahdi Nazamroaya

“Although journalists reporting from the Rixos Al Nasr Hotel in Tripoli were relocated to the Corinthia Hotel, also in Tripoli, on Wednesday August 24, in an effort to increase their safety, independent journalist and Canadian citizen Mahdi Nazamroaya continues to express grave concerns for his life. Mr. Nazemroaya told friends on Thursday that his safety was now even more at risk with armed groups entering the Corinthia hotel. Mr. Nazemroaya is unable to leave the hotel.

The planned departure of a boat which would have brought journalists and migrants outside of Libya was delayed and the transfer of journalists to the boat in all safety remains uncertain.

The Canadian Government has yet to act to ensure that Mr. Nazemroaya is repatriated to his home country despite having ties with the Hongarian embassy in Tripoli. Friends and family continue to demand that the government take concrete action to ensure that Mr. Nazemroaya is escorted back to safety.

Mr. Nazemroaya is a recent graduate of the University of Ottawa where he also held a research assistant position.”

For further information:
Mireille Gervais
Director, Student Appeal Centre, Student Federation of the University of Ottawa

The lives of other trapped independent journalists are also at risk, including Lizzie Phelan, Franklin Lamb, Thierry Meyssan, Mathieu Ozanon and JulienTeil, because they’re unprotected at the rebel-held Corinthia Hotel.

Thierry Meyssan

As a result, assuring their safe passage out of Libya is urgent. So far, a chartered ship can’t dock because of fighting. The longer it’s delayed, the greater the risk. Further updates will follow.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net .

BY PAUL LEE 

Two contractors for Corby Energy Services of Bellville, Mich., remove the DTE street light from in front of my home at 150 Massachusetts, Highland Park, on Aug. 19, 2011. It took all of seven minutes to complete.

The citywide removal of street lights was done under the euphemistic name “Highland Park Lighting Improvement Project,” which was careful to downplay the fact that the lights on the STREETS, as opposed to SOME of those at the intersections, would NOT be replaced.

When the bulbs were removed last week, the contractors were followed by a private investigator, wearing a police badge, apparently because DTE was concerned about the reaction of residents — most of whom know little or nothing about this program.

DTE and the mayor have justified the removal on the basis of a debt-forgiveness and cost-saving arrangement. When I asked city native and former city Emergency Financial Manager Arthur Blackwell, whose mother lives a few doors from me, about the arrangement, he replied, “It’s a great deal,” particularly in light of the city’s population loss.

However, most residents are only learning about this program as the lights are being removed, and many are concerned about the possible ramifications on safety, particularly of our children and older residents. Below is a report on this by WWJ-TV (CBS), Detroit:

Street Light Upgrades Leaving Residents In The Dark

August 16, 2011 6:17 AM

HIGHLAND PARK (WWJ) — Highland Park residents say the lack of street lights in their city leaves them fearing for their safety.

Reporting live from Rhode Island Street, WWJ’s City Beat Reporter Vickie Thomas found it pretty dark there in the early-morning hours. The street lights and many others throughout the block had already been turned off and they would not be coming back on.

“The residential streets have no lights, but the intersections have lights now,” resident Diane Parren told Vickie. “They just recently did that so it’s still a major concern because the fear is still there.”

Crews are in the process of installing new, more efficient lights at intersections, so one light will replace about six of the old street lights. Intersections and main roads, such as Woodward Avenue, will stay lit.

“My concern is for my mom,” said Parren. “She’s older and with the street lights being out, it’s sort of confining her to the house. She doesn’t come out after dark, and she’s concerned — as I am — about the neighborhood and things that could happen in the night…”

Mark Hackshaw, president of the Highland Park Business Association, isn’t happy about it either and is also concerned.

“The membership is very concerned and the residents of the community are very concerned, for all of the obvious reasons,” said Hackshaw.

Elene Robinson, a write-in candidate for mayor said the city should use solar lighting.

“I don’t understand how a city so small hasn’t applied for government money to be focusing on bringing solar to the municipal building and to our street lights,” said Robinson.

Mayor Hubert Yopp says the city owed DTE Energy $4 million and the new plan puts the city back in the black with the utility. The city’s monthly bill will go from about $62,000 down to about $10,000. (VOD: DEFINITELY PUTS THE CITY IN THE DARK! INCREDIBLE!)

http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2011/08/16/street-light-upgrades-leaving-resident…

NEW: See also the report by Curt Guyette in “The Metro Times”:

http://metrotimes.com/news/highland-dark-1.1192555

Legislation Would Limit Cash Assistance to 48 Months: MyFoxDETROIT.com

•  As many as 14,000 families face life-time cut-off of cash benefits, food stamps and health insurance Oct. 1 as Senate votes on immediate effect of HB 4409-4410
• MARCH IN DETROIT THURS. AUG. 25 CADILLAC PLACE

Gov. Rick-tator Snyder faces mass protest in Benton Harbor at Blossom-Time Parade/Photo by Brett Jellinek

By Diane Bukowski 

Aug. 24, 2011 

DETROIT—As this article goes to press, the Michigan Senate is voting to give immediate effect to two bills that will cut the last life-line to housing, food, and medical care that as many as 14,000 families in Michigan have effective Oct. 1. The bills will then go to Gov. Rick(tator) Snyder for the final blow of the guillotine, his signature. 

Clinton initiated national "welfare reform" that led to Michigan cut-off

“The four-year time limitation is part of TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families), the welfare “reform” bill that was passed in 1996 under the administration of Bill Clinton,” Marian Kramer of the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization (MWRO) wrote in an earlier article posted on VOD at http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/07/14/michigan-to-throw-12600-families-off-welfare-who-will-be-next/ . “However, it was left up to the states as to when they would implement this part of the bill. Some states rushed to implement it and others tended to leave the time limitation alone.” 

Kramer explained further, “Come October 1, 12,600 families will be cut off the rolls. The family unit will also lose their insurance and their food stamps. Then every month, more people will be eliminated. If you have been on welfare for say three years, you only have one year left.”

The MWRO is asking everyone affected, and all of those who support them, to come out to the Resurrection March described above. They are also working to organize a National March on Washington as part of the Assembly to End Poverty, to be held June 30, 2012. (See flier at end of article.) 

Families on TANF received the following letter from Michigan’s Dept. of Human Services Director Maura Corrigan Aug. 9.

“Where will those 12,000 people go the next day? Where are they going to go to get food? State Sen. Morris Hood (D-Detroit) asked on July 13, when the Senate passed the original legislation described in the VOD link above. 

Detroit homeless shelter; currently famlies in these shelters still receive food stamps and health care from the state, but many will be cut-off Oct. 1, and more not currently in shelters will flood them as they lose their housing

“They have fallen upon hard times because of the economy and loss of jobs. It still begs the question of what’s going to happen to them the next day. Just imagine yourself sitting there with your children, your wife, your family, and a parent you are taking care of with no food on the table. You have babies crying because they are hungry and don’t have any food. What is a man or a woman sitting at that table going to say to their children when they say they are hungry? What are you going to say? Well, you are just going to have to go without because I don’t have the resources. . . . .”

Michigan State Sen. Morris Hood III

To those who are not on assistance, Hood said, “You are only one paycheck from being in that same situation. You are only one mishap in your life from being in that situation. In the twinkling of an eye your life can change. Think about it, you may be in that situation. What are you going to do and what are you going to say to your children?”

Many have forgotten, however, that it was Governor Jennifer Granholm who signed the original legislation leading to the current bills in December, 2006, after she had pledged on the campaign trail not to do so. (Click on http://blogpublic.lib.msu.edu/index.php/granholm-signs-off-on-various-bills-making-them-law-and-vetoes-others?blog=5 for source of citation below.)

Then Gov. Jennifer Granholm with Andy Dillon, now Snyder's chief hatchet man as state treasurer, and his youngest daughter Teagan in 2004 in Dearborn Heights; his family won't suffer.

She signed “The measure to limit Michigan welfare recipients to four years of cash assistance, with several exceptions, starting in October 2007. The measure also sets up penalties for recipients who dont comply with work or educational requirements. Recipients could apply for a fifth year of cash assistance if they havent been sanctioned and the job market is down.”

Republican legislators only added draconian provisions this year that further penalize poor and working people, as described in the VOD story link in the second paragraph of this article.

Granholm’s role, and that of Clinton in 1996, make it clear that the battle for the very lives of poor and working people in Michigan is not a battle between Republicans and Democrats. They have conspired since the Clinton era to bring about the further chaos, devastation and suffering that is about to happen in Michigan this October.

Dr. Cornel West on Poverty Tour in Detroit Aug. 8/Photo by Diane Bukowski

“In the name of deregulating markets, that leaves poor people socially neglected, economically abandoned, poor people have been demonized, poverty has been demonized,” Dr. Cornel West told Detroiters Aug. 8 during The National Poverty Tour he co-sponsored along with Tavis Smiley. “The line in the sand is between the greedy oligarchs and the working and poor people.”

Smiley directly criticized the debt ceiling legislation signed by President Barack Obama earlier this month.

“We have a piece of legislation that did not extend unemployment, did not close corporate loopholes, did not raise revenue on the rich or lucky,” Smiley said.

Tavis Smiley speaks in Detroit Aug. 8; Councilwoman JoAnn Watson sponsored the Poverty Tour's appearance.

“Corporate America got away scott free again, Wall Street got away scott free again. When these cuts [additonal cuts included in the debt ceiling legislation on TOP OF Michigan’s TANF cut-off]  start to kick in, this is going to get ugly. As bad as it is right now, it’s going to get worse if we don’t find the courage annd the conviction and the commitment to speak truth about this suffering.”

Poverty Tour audience speakers including (center) Maureen Taylor, of MWRO, and Deborah Williams, of the Justice 4 Maryanne Godboldo Coalition

The large majority of people who came to hear Dr. West and Smiley in the Erma Henderson auditorium Aug. 8 were supportive and anxious to describe the travails they are facing as the budget ax, and the economic crisis created by the banks and big business, comes down on their heads.

But a small portion of those present, the most vocal of which was Ernest Johnson, formerly a high-paid executive with no assigned duties under Democratic Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano, disrupted the meeting continually. They purported to support President Obama because he is Black and a Democrat, and to focus energy on the elections in November, 2012, instead of building the mass movement of the people that Dr. West and Smiley called for.

Below is the flier for the National March on Washington which Kramer told the crowd Aug. 8 will help build that movement.                                                                         

 The call to action says The Assemby to End Poverty “is a coalition of 450 individuals and organizations throughout the United States. Its website is at http://www.oneclassonecause.org or it can be reached locally at 313-964-0618.

Monument to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Washington, D.C.

People also marched on Washington last week-end for the unveiling of a monument commemorating Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Dr. King was not only a leader of the civil rights movement, he was planning a national Poor People’s March on Washington when he was assassinated in 1968. He had also joined forces with the movement against the war in Vietnam, just as people today must assemble en masse to oppose all U.S. wars abroad, which are draining the country’s resources. At the forefront now is the horrendous U.S./CIA/NATO assault on the people of Libya, described in the stories below.

Audience at Poverty Tour event in Detroit Aug. 8 gives standing ovation to Dr. Cornel West and Tavis Smiley

LIBYA’S GADDAFI SAYS RETREAT FROM BAB AL-AZIZYA TACTICAL MOVE 

English.news.cn   2011-08-24 07:54:29 

TRIPOLI, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) — Embattled Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi said early Wednesday that the withdrawal from the Bab al- Azizya compound in the capital of Tripoli was a tactical move, local al-Orouba TV reported. 

Gaddafi, whose whereabouts remain unknown, said the compound was leveled to the ground by as many as 64 NATO airstrikes, the TV said, adding the defiant leader vowed death or victory in fight against the “aggression.” 

Libyan rebels Tuesday captured Muammar Gaddafi’s Bab al-Azizya compound after heavy fighting and looted an armory inside the vast barracks, while the whereabouts of the embattled Libyan leader and his sons remain unknown to the moment. 

Meanwhile, rebel National Transitional Council (NTC) head Mustafa Abdul Jalil told a French TV on Wednesday that some 400 people were killed and 2,000 others injured in three days in clashes between the government forces and the rebel troops in Tripoli.

 Jalil added some 600 government troops were captured.

VOD:  Click on http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/08/24/gadhafi-forces-overcome-natocia-backed-counter-revolutionaries/ and http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/08/24/u-s-liable-for-civilian-deaths-in-libya/ for earlier reports that thousands of Libyan civilians have been killed in NATO air strikes on Tripoli.

LIBYA: NATO PSYOPS COLLAPSES. GADDAFI PREVAILS AGAIN.

23 Tuesday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra

By Tony Cartalucci

Update: You can’t make this up – the International Criminal Court (ICC) now claims it never confirmed that Qaddafi’s son Saif Al-Islam was captured. Here is the Telegraph article quoting ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo as having indeed confirmed his capture. Here is a farcical Reuters report now claiming such a confirmation was never claimed. ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo should resign, so should editors at both the Telegraph and Reuters and a myriad of other media agencies complicit in spreading this willful and malicious propaganda. Continue reading →

WHITE HOUSE AND PENTAGON EVACUATED; PENTAGON NOW DEEMED SAFE FOR "RE-OCCUPATION" (of Libya, Yemen, Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, Iran, which country?)

VOD: IS IT THE WRATH OF ALLAH IN RETRIBUTION FOR U.S. WAR CRIMES?

 (CBS/AP) 

WASHINGTON – A 5.9 magnitude earthquake centered northwest of Richmond, Va., shook much of Washington, D.C., and was felt as far north as Rhode Island and New York City.

The quake sent hundreds of people spilling into the street a block from the White House, with other buildings evacuated in North Carolina and tremors felt as far away as New York City.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was 3.7 miles deep. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were evacuated. The quake was in Mineral, Va., in Louisa County. The Pentagon was later deemed safe for reoccupation. (VOD: of which country or countries?) 

Not too big

Huffington Post

Today 2:41 PM 5.9 Magnitude Earthquake In D.C.

From the D.C. Alert system:

“United States Geological Survey reports an earthquake in the Metropolitan Area registering at 5.9 on the Richter Scale. Small aftershocks reported. As safety measure if experiencing please take cover under a desk, table, bed or door frames. Stay clear of windows and other glass. Please stay put. If you are outdoors find areas clear of buildings. Stay tuned to radio and tv news updates.”

Today 2:45 PM ‘Muffled Thud’ Heard Outside Eisenhower Executive Office Building

HuffPost’s Howard Fineman reports:

The quake produced an odd muffled thud outside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next door to the White House. The old granite 19th century pile of the “Old EOB” is under renovation, and the tremors evidently shook metal scaffolding that girds the north face of the building to the point where passersby could hear what sounded like construction material falling from one part of the facade to another.

Today 2:56 PM U.S. Geological Survey Spokeswoman: Stay Indoors

HuffPost’s Dan Froomkin reports: If you’re outside right now, you might want to come back in. Leslie Gordon, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Geological Survey, said that people are safer inside a modern building than they are standing outside where things could fall on them.

“The biggest danger in an earthquake is something falling on top of you,” she said. “Our advice to start with is the duck, cover and hold, and not run out of a building into a street.” If you are outside, “you need to look around and think: What’s going to fall on top of my head? If you’re standing right on the side of a building and glass could fall on you, that’s not a good idea.” (VOD: DUH!)

Today 3:04 PM HHS Chief Kathleen Sebelius Forced To Conduct Conference Call Outside

HuffPosts Joy Resmovits reports: A Washington, D.C., Health and Human Services Building was evacuated, forcing HHS chief Kathleen Sebelius to conduct a conference call with reporters and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan from a noisy street corner. “We’re here on the sidewalk, waiting for our building to be secured,” Sebelius said, over sirens, after she finished describing the new criteria for the early childhood version of Race to the Top, a federal education grant competition. (VOD: DEFINITELY THE WRATH OF ALLAH FOR DESTROYING U.S. PUBLIC EDUCATION)

The U.S. Education Department’s building was deemed safe. “This is my first earthquake, so it’s quite an experience,” Duncan said. “But everyone’s fine.”

Today 2:59 PM National Operations Center Remained Operational

HuffPost’s Andrea Stone reports: An official at the Department of Homeland Security, speaking on background, said that “out of an abundance of caution, individuals did leave the building, however the National Operations Center remained operational through the event.” (VOD: DARNNIT! WHICH ANTI-WAR ACTIVIST ARE THEY GOING TO OPERATE ON NEXT?)

Today 2:59 PM Pieces Have Reportedly Fallen from D.C. National Cathedral

Pieces have reportedly fallen from the National Cathedral in DC, structural assessment underway – via @walkeje http://bit.ly/ndy3Bk  (VOD: told you, the wrath of Allah)

Today 2:51 PM FAA Grounds Flights

Today 2:44 PM Today’s Virginia Earthquake Matches Record

Today 2:43 PM Washington Metrorail Stays Open

HuffPost’s Dan Froomkin reports: Washington’s mostly underground Metrorail system is staying open after the earthquake. “Trains are running,” a Metro spokesman said. There are significant delays, however, he said, as trains are traveling at a maximum speed of 15 miles per hour until a systemwide track inspection is complete. (VOD: GOTTA KEEP THOSE TRAINS RUNNING, AS MUSSOLINI SAID!)

Espinoza family with supporters outside Family Court July 27: (l to r) Luis III, 13, father Luis with Leonardo, 3, Cornell Squires, Gavino, 9, mother Cecilia, Pedro, 12, and Mabel Love

Espinoza family caught in tangled CPS, court web

By Diane Bukowski

August 23, 2011

DETROIT – In a shocking development Aug. 3, Family Court referee Mona Youssef ordered Cecilia Espinoza out of her home and away from her five children, while ordering the return of her six-year-old daughter Genoveva to the home. All five children are to be cared for by their father Luis Espinoza pending trial, set for September 27.

Friends of the family who have talked to the children since have said they are upset and crying for their mother, as the father struggles to see that they are fed and ready for school at Bennett Elementary in September, while working as an auto mechanic.

Cornell Squires supports Justice for Aiyana Jones at press conference May 16, 2011, first anniversary of child's murder by cop

“Leonardo [three years old] doesn’t understand,” said Cornell Squires of We the People, which was formed to assist families victimized by Child Protective Services and other human and civil rights violations. “He thinks his mother doesn’t love him anymore and cries for her. He won’t eat and has lost weight. Genoveva wakes up at night crying for her mother. Gavino and Pedro don’t understand why their mother can’t come home.”

Some of the court documents in the case obtained by Squires bear the rubber-stamped signature of Judge Leslie Kim Smith, Chief Judge of the Third Circuit’s Family Court division.

Third Judicial Chief Judges Leslie Kim Smith and Virgil Smith with DHS director Maura Corrigan, who oversees CPS

During a hearing in the case of Ariana Godboldo-Hakim, Court supervisor Vikki Kapanowski testified that those signatures are stamped by probation officers under her supervision, who are not authorized to order the removal of children and are not attorneys. Judge Smith never sees the documents. (Click on http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/08/03/another-shock-no-judge-authorized-ariana-godboldos-removal/ for full story.)

The Espinozas’ oldest sons, Luis III, 13, and Pedro, 12, were in court with their parents for the Aug. 3 hearing. They were asked to leave the court during the hearing, supposedly for the sake of sequestration of witnesses. However, the parents’ court-appointed attorneys Edward Hill (for father) and Rick Unger (for mother), did not call them to the stand.

Luis’ testimony in particular was crucial to the case. Genoveva was taken from the home by her grandmother Consuelo Meade on June 19, Father’s Day, after she sustained a black eye while the mother and grandmother were visiting Meade’s husband’s grave. Meade afterwards refused to let her return. She filed a CPS complaint July 8, claiming it was her mother who gave her the black eye.

“My mother wasn’t even home,” Luis III told VOD after the hearing. As his father prepared dinner that day, Genoveva had crawled under her bed, a common activity for her. When she was unable to get out because the bed is so low to the floor, Luis III lifted it off her. It was then he saw her black eye, apparently sustained in her struggle to get in and out.

Her mother told VOD that when she came home, Genoveva said she had given her the black eye, but Meade told her that wasn’t possible because they were gone.

Hill told VOD that the boys “will testify later on.” Court-appointed attorneys are paid by the state on a per-hearing basis. It was Unger who brought up the proposal for the mother to leave the home out of the blue after she testified that she had never hit or otherwise mistreated Genoveva.

“My own mother beat me all the time when I was growing up,” Cecilia Espinoza told this reporter previously, referring to Meade, who adopted her as a child in Mexico. “I swore I would never lay a hand on any of my own children. I discipline them by assigning them chores or withholding things they like for a period of time.”

During the hearing, Referee Youssef allowed Assistant State Attorney General Richard Karoub to admit into evidence five undated photos of Genoveva, allegedly taken by Meade and her niece Rebecca Gutierrez, which purported to show a black eye along with some bruises on the child’s arms and chest. Along with the photos, Karoub introduced written affidavits from Meade and Gutierrez. Neither was present during the hearing to face cross-examination.

Unger and Hill both objected to introduction of the exhibits as unauthenticated, saying there was no evidence Meade and Gutierrez could not be present to attest to the photos.

By the time Meade made her CPS complaint, there was no evidence of any injury to Genoveva. She was taken to Children’s Hospital July 13, where doctors verified that she was in good health with no marks or bruises.

CPS worker Shanitra Bowman testified that she got the photos from Meade July 12 and that Genoveva told her directly that her mother had hit her. By that time, Genoveva had been living with Meade in her luxurious condominium in Warren for three weeks.

On cross-exam, Bowman admitted that no one else from Genoveva’s family, including the other children, told her they saw her mother give her the black eye, although she interviewed them all.

“Didn’t it strike you as strange that the grandmother didn’t report this to CPS right away?” Unger asked Bowman.

“There was some concern,” Bowman responded.

“You are aware that there is stress in the relationship between the mother and grandmother,” Unger said. “When you interviewed the other children, did they offer you an explanation that was consistent with the mother’s?”

Bowman responded that their explanations were consistent with the mother’s “second” explanation. She said the boys told her that their mother was not home when the injury occurred.

Hill called Luis Espinoza to the stand to testify that he and his wife had made repeated phone calls to Meade to have their child returned. Karoub objected to his testimony, saying the state “is not arguing abandonment at this stage,” but that “it may come out at trial.”

Cecilia Espinoza testified at length as reported in VOD’s earlier interview with her (click on http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/08/03/espinoza-family-fights-for-their-five-young-children/ for full story.)

“Genoveva tries to blame things on other people,” Ms. Espinoza said. “She’s just playing, we don’t take it seriously.”

She said she and her husband allowed Meade to take Genoveva for a couple of days, but then could not get her returned. On June 26, she said, Meade brought one son, Gavino, home from swimming and Genoveva was with them. However, she said, when Genoveva tried to whisper something in her mother’s ear, Meade grabbed her arm and took her back. When they showed up for a family picnic on Belle Isle, Ms. Espinoza said the same thing happened.

On cross exam by Karoub, she said Genoveva had no bruising anywhere when she saw her briefly on June 26. She said Genoveva told her after first claiming that she (Cecilia) had hit her, “I hit my eye when I got under the bed.” She said Genoveva “rocks back and forth” to get under the bed.

She testified the children’s paternal grandmother in Mexico cared for the four oldest including Genoveva in Mexico for three and one-half years, due to the extreme poverty she and her husband were experiencing.

She said they came back on Feb. 2, 2009, and that Genoveva was still in diapers at the time due to differing child-rearing practices. She said that Genoveva sometimes wets her pants deliberately now when she does not get her way. Ms. Espinoza said she had an appointment to take her to a doctor about the problem but prior to that, Meade had removed her.

She told Karoub, “I never struck my child. I was whipped [by Meade]. Knowing my mother, she brainwashes kids.”

Youssef asked Hill, “Is your client [the father] willing and able to care for all the children if I order the mother out of the home?”

Unger objected, “Is it the right thing to do? This would be very traumatic. There is no medical evidence to suggest abuse. The people who took the pictures are conveniently not here. You can do things to a photo to make it look different. The grandmother clearly has an agenda, she wants to keep the child. There is no history of abuse. I ask you to dismiss the case. However, my client places the well-being of her child above all else and will voluntarily leave the home if necessary.”

Youssef so ordered, but said that Ms. Espinoza can see her children with CPS supervision. However, since that time, Squires said, Ms. Espinoza’s case worker has not answered repeated calls to set up visitation, and she has not seen her children since Aug. 3.

To contact We the People, call Cornell Squires at 313-460-3175

Interview with Don DeBar, anti-war activist & Journalist in New York  

Tue Aug 23, 2011 8:14AM GMT

Press TV: How do you see the events that have been taking place in Libya? It seems that they have changed very rapidly and when we talk to a lot of our people on the ground in Tripoli, they were also quite taken aback at the speed of which everything changed in Tripoli especially.

Don DeBar

Don DeBar: Well, I was fortunate enough to be in touch. I have been up all night as a matter of fact in touch with people on the ground in Tripoli who somehow were able to stay on the internet and stay in touch. Almost all of the reporting that is coming from there is coming from inside a hotel that the reporters cannot leave. One reporter was shot at trying to post a press sign out.

Several have been threatened by the western journalists in the building with death. There was an article published calling for the killing of a French journalist from a website in France and Lizzie Phelan who you have featured here before.

Protest against U.S./NATO war on Libya at White House, July 12/Photo Askia Muhammad: Final Call

So the information itself, a lot of it, is coming from the people pointing a camera out the window of the hotel and the information that has come to me from some of the people on the ground there including Lizzie Phelan has come from calling around the contacts that they have nurtured in Tripoli over the last month that she has been there and reports from different neighborhoods and those reports were quite different.

Keep in mind that since Friday the western media has been saying that Gaddafi left the country. They were reporting him in Tunisia on Friday afternoon on NBC and this was paraded in the western media all weekend. Now today again somehow he is back in Tripoli and they are trying to find him and they have arrested his sons and so the information itself suspects.

But this entire war, people have to think about this fact: the United States has been funding this and conducting the bulk of the military operations here and anyone on the ground, anywhere where the United States has their guns pointed, including Tehran that takes comfort on the fact that the United States is about to achieve a military victory in Libya should really reconsider that position and think about what is the next step going to be for this type of policy which, believe me, has a map. They expressed Tehran as a destination now for the last 20 to 25 years.

So I would be mostly concerned about what does this mean for the people that these guns are being pointed at next and I would question every report you are hearing out of Tripoli right now that says that they are in charge because they have been saying it for days before there was anyone there.

The last point is that the reports that we got were that the people that had come into Tripoli from the outside with arms were actually Qataris and they have been in there with their own commanders running this operation and I am told that there are many dead Qataris on the ground in Tripoli.

Press TV: Don DeBar, you mentioned as far as the role of the media. Let’s expand on this in general. How do you see the role in general, especially in this situation that is taking place in Tripoli from the beginning till today as far as the role of the mainstream media and how they have reported the events that have taken place?

Don DeBar: OK, the enabling rhetorical point is that this is a popular uprising against Gaddafi and from there it was that the government is brutalizing protesters including with aerial bombardment and that was the enabling narrative for resolutions 1970 and 1973 out of the United Nations Security Council.

Now the Russians, who have conducted satellite surveillance of planet Earth because they have been prepared for 50 years for a nuclear strike from the United States, said on specific dates that the charges will delineate it that Gaddafi had attacked his people from the air. Here are the photographs. There are no planes in the air, there were no area of activities conducted whatsoever.

This has not made the media in the west at all including on programs like Democracy Now and on Aljazeera which has carried a progressive radio networks that you cannot believe that in the United States.

In addition to that, it was reported in the Pakistan Observer, the English language daily in Pakistan, on February 25 that there were US, UK and French troops that landed in Benghazi from Indian naval vessels on the 23 and 24 of February.

Now this is in advance of the UN Security Council Resolutions and that also has never been reported and I personally reported both that and the Russian intelligence information and the program Democracy Now for example and other progressive media outlets here and even I hear from them that they set it up as a straw man to shoot down, let alone actually report these things that were reported elsewhere including from government officials, the foreign minister and defense minister of Russia.

So the media has been not just deficient but in my mind active and complicit with this effort by NATO to take the oil of Libya and to establish for anyone that does not do what the United States tells them, you are next.

Press TV: If the Gaddafi regime has totally fallen or will fall, how likely is it that the Libyan people will actually go further towards independence and be freer people as a lot of them who have been in the streets and they have been showing some of them today? What is the likely scenario in your perspective?

Don DeBar: The likely scenario is colonialism and the reason for the invasion of Libya is that Libya was one of the places organizing against colonialism of the continent of Africa.

This is the second stop for AFRICOM [Africa Command]. The first direct stop for AFRICOM under Obama’s regime, AFRICOM came online about two months before he was elected but after code of law where they carried the elected president out of the country at gunpoint, the French did, the former colonial power, this episode began and if you want to believe Nelson Mandela, Libya played a major role in ending apartheid in South Africa and Muammar Gaddafi in particular played a major role in doing that. He has been active in building a communication infrastructure and a financial infrastructure owned by Africa in Africa.

The people of Libya, by the way, went from being the poorest people on the planet in 1969 by every objective measure to having the highest standard of living in Africa and one of the highest standards of living in the Muslim world [is that] housing is owned by the people free of any mortgages, everyone, it is a human right there under the law and the entire education system and free healthcare.

Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam surrounded by loyalists/ AP Photo

VOD: EVEN THE U.S. MEDIA HAS BEEN FORCED TO ADMIT THAT REPORTS OF COL. MUAMMAR GADHAFI’S DEFEAT ARE UNTRUE.  CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE, HEADLINED ‘DOUBTS GROW OVER REBEL CONTROL IN LIBYA,’ THEN PROCEED TO INDEPENDENT JOURNALISTS’ REPORTS BELOW.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/appearance-by-gaddafis-son-tempers-rebel-hopes-of-victory/2011/08/23/gIQAZMWZYJ_story.html?hpid=z1

LIZZIE PHELAN REPORTS FROM TRIPOLI AUGUST 22, 2011

22 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra in GLOBAL CIVILIANS FOR PEACE, LIBYA

Editor’s Note:
This is just in from Lizzie Phelan and it is good news. The Libyan government has implemented a truly brilliant strategy and it has yielded the results they had hoped for. The tribes, true to their word, have come to Tripoli’s aid. A full report will follow later.

I have now from RELIABLE sources that the Libyan army is still in control of Tripoli. Al J footage of Green Sq was FAKE. Gaddafi went to Green Sq with one of his sons. Things much calmer now. More info soon. – L.P.

I have heard reports that people have come out into Green Square and other parts of the city waving the green flag and that the Libyan army is in control. Now, what we’ve heard is that the strategy of the Libyan government and army was to permit the rebels into the city because previously they have been operating in sleeper cells and therefore it was very difficult to know who they were and where they were hiding, so this strategy was part of bringing them out of the woodwork so that they could be dealt with quite swiftly. We have also heard that the large tribes (she names them) have come to Tripoli to join the battle. We have also heard that Gaddafi was in Green Square with the people. – L.P.

RUMOURS OF THE DEMISE OF THE LIBYAN REGIME HAVE BEEN GREATLY EXAGGERATED

22 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra in LIBYA, THE FACTS

EDITORIAL
Alexandra Valiente
Libya 360°

As I await clear answers and verified reports from inside Libya, I offer this brief synopsis of today’s events.

Each reporter that I have featured in today’s news speaks honestly from their own perspective, but not one has the entire picture. Much of their reporting was conjecture blended with fact. Keep in mind that they are not able to roam freely to see what is actually happening and their communications are erratic and limited.

My sense is that regardless of Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s profoundly misleading statements, NATO has no victory to celebtate. NATO is delusional and the full extent of the globalist’s insanity was revealed today in CFR president Richard Haas’s call for the occupation of Libya.

In reality, NATO’s mercenaries and al qaeda troops have been lured into a trap. The Libyan army is closing in, encircling the insurgents. NATO’s forces will be defeated.

This information was confirmed first by Lizzie Phelan and later by Susan Lindauer.

There will be tribal disputes to settle afterwards but the grievances are between those supportive of the Jamahiriya and those who comprise the insurrectionist elements and the TNC. The tribes will avenge the lives of every man, woman and child lost through their treachery.

Reports of members of the Libyan government fleeing the country are false.

I have heard from more reliable sources that Muammer al Gaddafi is fighting with the Libyan army, as are his sons.

Which is fact?

Gaddafi has always stated he would die fighting for Libya rather than abandon her to imperialists bent on destroying her and exploiting her resources. I find him far more credible than mainstream propagandists. His life accomplishments are a testament to the fact that he is a man of his word.

Reports that Saif al-Islam and Saadi were arrested and are being held in custody are fabricated. Saif al-Islam made a public appearance today where he affirmed his confidence in the Libyan army’s inevitable victory.

Reports that Khamis Gaddafi was killed are unverified (it would be the fifth time he has been murdered by the media since the war began). As with all present mainstream media news, this is a cruel psyops against the Libyan people.

I am genuinely concerned about the welfare of certain journalists in Tripoli whose lives have been threatened because of their integrity. Among them are Thierry Meyssan, Mahdi Nazemroaya and Lizzie Phelan. We have heard from Thierry and Mahdi today but no one knows what has happened to Lizzie. In her messages last night she stated she had good news. Later we received reports that she was blocked from posting on her blog, her Facebook page and unable to email her friends. She appeared briefly in an RT video filmed just before her communications went down.

I cannot understand how Frankiln Lamb, Thierry Meyssan and Mahdi Nazemroaya are giving interviews on RT and 108morris108 on youtube as well as emailing contacts while Lizzie is unable to communicate by any means. They were in the same hotel in Tripoli. Mahdi mentioned she was among the group of journalists who had been threatened by CIA and MI6 agents working under cover for CNN, because their reports contradicted NATO’s psychological operation. In particular they were ordered not to speak of al qaeda’s involvement in the NATO assault on Tripoli (denial of which is a psyops against the people of NATO member nations and an attempt to conceal NATO’s deep criminality). Franklin was shot in the leg while attempting to gather information on the status of the streets. Mahdi was shot at by a sniper when he went up to the roof of his hotel to see what was happening outside.

The global community must demand that the US, UK, Canadian and French governments guarantee the safe return of all journalists presently trapped in Tripoli.

Webster Tarpley discussed the present danger facing Dr. Moussa Ibrahim and his family. He also went into detail describing what occupation under NATO would look like under the monarchist, Islamic extremists. It is unthinkable. There is no option for Libyans. They would have shattered, impoverished lives if NATO were permitted to overthrow them. This is not about NATO toppling the Libyan government or Gaddafi. It is about the permanent subjugation of the population, the destruction of their direct democracy system of governance and colonial enslavement. The people cannot accept such terms. Dignity is not negotiable.

IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Lizzie Phelan is safe and has given a brief report on RT here just moments ago.

© Copyright 2011 by Libya 360°

This page may be republished for non-commercial purposes as long as reprints include a verbatim copy of the article in its entirety, respecting its integrity and cite the author and Libya 360° as the source including a live link to the article.

NATO TERRORISTS AND THEIR “LEFTIST APOLOGISTS” WILL ANSWER TO HISTORY FOR CRIMES IN LIBYA

22 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra 

Greg Butterfield on Monday, August 22, 2011

The battle of Tripoli is not over. Currently, forces loyal to Col. Gadhafi and the 1969 nationalist revolution are battling counter-revolutionary “rebel” forces near Gadhafi’s compound. It seems likely that if captured, Gadhafi will be lynched or assassinated like Osama Bin Laden.

The masses of Tripoli and other areas of the country are armed – armed by the very “tyrannical leadership” denounced by the Western imperialists and their lapdog media. The coming days will show if they are able to regroup and mount a struggle to take back Tripoli.

However, some things are already perfectly clear.

The invasion of Tripoli was accomplished by U.S./NATO terror bombing. Al Jazeera news service, which has played a rotten collaborationist role throughout the NATO war on Libya, reported that the “rebels” were calling on NATO for further bombardments against Gadhafi’s compound on their behalf. There are also unconfirmed reports of British and French troops (probably Special Forces terrorists) attempting to enter Tripoli.

Protest against Big Oil in Latin America

Western Big Oil companies are licking their chops at the opportunity to grab Libya’s oil wealth. This morning, Reuters reported Italian and Quatar oil companies were looking forward to getting their share of the spoils for supporting the NATO war. “We don’t have a problem with Western countries like the Italians, French and UK companies. But we may have some political issues with Russia, China and Brazil [countries that to some extent opposed the NATO war],” said Abdeljalil Mayouf, “information manager at Libyan rebel oil firm AGOCO.”

Paul Joseph Watson at Infowars noted: “Global central banks will now get to carve up Africa’s most oil-rich nation while simultaneously divvying up around 144 tons of gold bullion – which might go some way to repaying Hugo Chavez after his announcement that Venezuela is to nationalize its precious metals industry. Unless of course Chavez becomes the next head on the chopping block for another ‘humanitarian intervention.’”

CIA-backed Libyan counter-revolutionaries have murdered hundreds of Black Libyans, who comprise 50 percent of the country's population

White terror is unfolding on the streets of Tripoli. Although there is a dearth of reliable reporting from inside, it appears that hundreds have been killed since the invasion of the capital began. The counter-revolutionaries and their CIA / Western intelligence leaders know that many thousands of Libyan civilians have taken up arms in recent months to defend the nation’s sovereignty. We know it, too, because of the courageous work of independent journalists like Lizzie Phelan, who have introduced us to these brave women, men and youth through their reports.

Those independent journalists in Tripoli are now directly in the line of fire. Mathaba news service, which works with them, reports that three out of the five independent journalists were “targeted as soon as the NATO-led rebel advances on Tripoli took place.” At midnight on Aug. 21, Dr. Franklin Lamb was shot in the leg by a sniper near his hotel. “Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya also narrowly escaped death from a sniper targeting him as he stepped out of the hotel to place a sign saying ‘PRESS’, and was additionally threatened by CNN journalists.”

Now add Lizzie Phelan to the list. As of Monday afternoon, she was censored from posting to her Facebook account. In an email message, she too reported warnings from CNN staffers to stop her “traitorous” reporting.

The tragic developments in Libya are a huge setback to the Arab/African revolutionary wave that began in Tunisia and Egypt and continues today in Yemen, Bahrain and elsewhere. Under cover of “humanitarian support” for a “popular uprising,” U.S. imperialism and its allies have struck a deadly blow at one of its key adversaries in the region and now plan to take over this strategic country lock, stock and oil barrel, establishing a counter-revolutionary military beachhead in the midst of the ferment.

Perhaps the most shameful thing of all is the rotten role played by many Western leftists in aiding and abetting this imperialist-led onslaught of a sovereign African country. Not only the usual liberal and social-democratic hangers-on, but even some who claim to be “socialists,” “communists” or “anti-imperialists” hopped on the bandwagon to attack the nationalist Gadhafi regime and support the “rebels,” even as they waved the flag of monarchy and lynched darker-skinned African workers. Their support has continued long after it became apparent that the “rebels” were organized, armed, financed and led by the forces of U.S., British and French imperialism.

Today they are cheering on White Terror in the streets of Tripoli and death from the skies by Washington, London and Paris. Tomorrow they will be cheering further imperialist aggression against Syria, Iran and Venezuela.

These shameful acts of imperialism and its enablers of the “left” will not be forgotten or forgiven by the people of Libya or genuine anti-imperialists anywhere.

Long live sovereign Libya and its people! Victory to Col. Gadhafi and the true forces of resistance! Death to U.S. imperialism!

We will not think about death or life. We will think about the call of the duty.
– Muammar Gadhafi, 7th June, 2011

TRIPOLI: NATO IS NOT WINNING. MI6-CIA THREATENING TO MURDER JOURNALISTS TRYING TO REPORT THE TRUTH.

22 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by Alexandra in CIA, LIBYA, M16, NATO

≈ 3 Comments

Editor’s Note:
The interviewer’s naivite regarding the CIA-MI6 is shocking. He actually is stupid enough to think these agents are not assassins and that the people should trust them.

Journalists are forbidden to mention al-qaeda under threat of death.  Nice work, North Atlantic Terrorist Organization!

Read about al-qaeda in Libya here

~ Alexandra

‘NATO not winning’: Gunfire heard during Tripoli live report

Journalist Mahdi Nazemroaya, who is in the hotel in Tripoli where the foreign press have been obliged to stay during the conflict is afraid for his safety and says he’s been threatened. Rebels say they now control most of Tripoli, and have taken Libyan state TV off air. But some reports also suggest that opposition fighters have been looting private houses. Three of Gaddafi’s sons are now thought to be in rebel hands. Opposition leaders say a large number of their fighters have been killed. There are reports rebels are closing in on Gaddafi’s compound, but the whereabouts of the Colonel are unknown. Some rumours suggest Gaddafi may be in talks with South Africa about a possible escape route, despite denials from both sides. And NATO insists it will continue combat air patrols until all government forces surrender. Following a night of chaos in the capital, crowds have been seen in Tripoli’s central square waving revolutionary flags.

‘CIA, MI6 ‘journos’ in Tripoli Rixos hotel, outside NATO loses ground’

Journalists trapped in a Tripoli hotel say there are heavy explosions close-by, power is down, and there’s gunfire outside. Journalist Thierry Meyssan, who’s founder and chairman of online newspaper the Voltaire Network is in the Rixos hotel in Tripoli and says NATO forces are doing everything to back up rebels.

Tripoli: Voltaire Network concerned about the death threats hanging over Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya and Thierry Meyssan

Voltaire Network, Monday, August 22, 2011, 13:20 GMT – Voltaire Network is concerned about the threats targeting two of its team members in Tripoli. Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Research Associate, Centre for Research on Globalization, and Thierry Meyssan, president and founder of Voltaire Network and the Axis for Peace Conference, are entrenched in the Hotel Rixos, around which heavy fighting is taking place. Reportedly, the order was given to shoot them down.

Thierry Meyssan has been in Tripoli since June 23, 2011. He started out by heading a fact-finding mission of Voltaire Network associates. For the past two months, he has been carrying out a journalistic investigation of the conflict. His stance differs from that of his peers in that: he describes the rebellion as a minority action, permitting to justify in the eyes of world public opinion a classic military operation.

Whatever the positions taken by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya and Thierry Meyssan, their killing would be unacceptable. Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya and Thierry Meyssan are not combatants, but journalists. Those who support this war, thinking that it is about democracy and freedom, can not possibly condone the assassination of journalists.

Currently, five states have offered them diplomatic protection. But the fighting around the hotel prevents them from leaving the premises and some of the embassies concerned have been encircled to make access impossible.

Aware of the threats hanging over them, Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya Thierry Meyssan have no intention of exposing themselves to any “stray bullet”.

Voltaire Network calls on the citizens of those countries involved in the war to exert pressure on their governments to ensure the safety of these journalists. It is asking each and everyone to play his/her role as citizens and to disseminate this information.

RUMOURS OF THE DEMISE OF THE LIBYAN REGIME HAVE BEEN GREATLY EXAGGERATED
NATO TERRORISTS AND THEIR “LEFTIST APOLOGISTS” WILL ANSWER TO HISTORY FOR CRIMES IN LIBYA
TRIPOLI MORNING UPDATES AUGUST 22, 2011 [UPDATED]
LIZZIE PHELAN REPORTS FROM TRIPOLI AUGUST 22, 2011
LIZZIE PHELAN TRIPOLI UPDATES AUGUST 21, 2011
LIZZIE PHELAN REPORTS LIVE FROM TRIPOLI  AUGUST 20, 2011
OPERATION SIREN: NATO CARNAGE IN TRIPOLI
NATO’S REBEL’S IN THEIR “DEATH DANCE” 
PSYOPS ALERT: THIS REPORT IS A LIE
MASS PSYOP PLANNED FOR TRIPOLI RESIDENTS
TRIPOLI: SNIPER ATTACKS AND A MASSIVE PSYOPS CAMPAIGN
FRANKLIN LAMB IN TRIPOLI: NATO HAS FORBIDDEN A CEASEFIRE

Demonstration in support of California prisoners' hunger strike

From the Black List Pub

Posted by SendMeYourNews on August 22, 2011 at 1:28am

On Wednesday, August 17th, a dozen or so reporters were given unprecedented access to the Secure Housing Unit (SHU) at Pelican Bay. Given that there was a near media blackout by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation while the prisoners were actively on hunger strike, this is a testimony to the pressure that’s being placed on CDCR. The tour, coming in advance of the legislative hearing in Sacramento on August 23rd, was also a chance for CDCR to do some damage control in terms of its image.

Links to some articles, audio and images generated by the tour are listed below. 

http://www.scpr.org/news/2011/08/18/28304/inside-pelican-bay-state-…

http://blogs.kqed.org/newsfix/2011/08/18/officials-prison-isolation…

To read first hand information from prisoners about what it’s like to be housed in the SHU, and other writings from the inside go to:

http://prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com/voices-from-ins…

Inside Pelican Bay/ Photo by Julie Small

Prison Officials Say Conditions Will Improve, Inmates Ready to Strike Again

Letter from prison strike leader included

August 18, 2011, 3:07 pm • Posted by KQED News Staff 

By Michael Montgomery

[original blog post available at CaliforniaWatch.org] 

State corrections officials are moving forward with a major policy initiative that could improve conditions and reduce the length of time some inmates spend in controversial isolation units. The changes are being proposed amid threats of another hunger strike by inmates who spearheaded one last month at Pelican Bay State Prison. 

Cell block in Pelican Bay "Secure Housing Unit"/Photo by Michael Montgomery KQED

The policy changes, which still are being worked out, are in line with proposals highlighted in an internal study completed in 2007 by a panel of experts appointed by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, according to interviews and documents. The panel’s recommendations included: 

• Moving to a conduct-based model that punishes inmates for tangible offenses, rather than for mere affiliation with a gang. This approach is widely used in other states and by the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
• Ending the practice of indefinite detention of alleged prison gang members and associates in the Security Housing Units
• Ending the practice of automatically sending validated prison gang members and associates to the Security Housing Units
• Creating a “step-down” program inside the Security Housing Units to encourage positive behavior by offering incentives, such as special programs
• Ending the distinction between prison gangs and other threat groups to give the department more flexibility in determining inmate placement in the Security Housing Units

Corrections Undersecretary Scott Kernan said the department is doing more than conducting another assessment of current policy. 

A designated exercise area in the Security Housing Unit (SHU). Inmates in the SHU are only permitted to leave their cells to shower and to exercise in designated areas. Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED

“I’m not talking about another study,” he said. “I’m talking about making some changes that make the process much more in tune and in line with national best practices. And that’s what the secretary is going to do.” 

Kernan conceded there are “holes” in the department’s policies for gang management and its use of the Security Housing Units. He also said the state was wrong to deny some personal items to inmates housed in the special facilities.

“I think it’s a sign of strength that the department looked at that (Security Housing Unit policy) and was able to admit their mistakes and that we’re moving forward,” he said. 

The policy overhaul could include substantive changes in gang validation criteria and the practice known as debriefing, which requires inmates to divulge gang secrets in order to return to a regular prison cell. 

“We need to come up with a justifiable due-process validation process and debriefing process that makes sense and that’s consistent with the rest of the nation,” Kernan said. 

Prison experts say California’s current policy is outdated, inefficient, legally vulnerable and often targets gang associates who do not pose a major security risk while leaving more dangerous inmates housed in the general prison population. 

Inmate rights groups say the policies are inhumane, leaving some inmates languishing in isolation for decades. The American Civil Liberties Union and others have called on California to adopt practices used in other states, where inmates are locked in isolation only if they commit serious, tangible offenses and for fixed terms. 

Pelican Bay State Prison's Security Housing Unit has emergency entrance points that allow guards quick entry into the units. The entry points are often mistaken for inmate exercise yards. Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED

Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit has emergency entrance points that allow guards quick entry into the units. The entry points are often mistaken for inmate exercise yards. Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED

Kernan emphasized the changes are not a response to last month’s hunger strike and are aimed at improving security for inmates and staff. He said the department is taking a cautious approach and is not considering a mass release of inmates from the Security Housing Units into the general prison population. 

“Any (policy) modification could very well result in serious spikes in violence in the system,” he said. “So we have to do this right.” 

Kernan also said the changes would depend on the governor’s realignment plan being successfully implemented and would need buy-in from the Legislature, unions and other stakeholders. 

Inmates and advocates said that during the hunger strike, Kernan spoke of major policy changes, but in a July 20 memo, he states only that the department was “reviewing” gang validation and debriefing policies. Department sources said the memo was intended to focus on “minor changes that did not require stakeholder review.” 

Kernan is expected to testify Tuesday before the Assembly’s Public Safety Committee. The hearing was called in response to the inmate hunger strike. 

During a media tour at Pelican Bay yesterday, acting Warden Greg Lewis declined to go into detail about the new policy and said any changes would move slowly.

“Change is like an aircraft carrier. It takes many miles to turn an aircraft carrier,” he said. “It (the plan) is going to be thoroughly vetted, thoroughly reviewed. And I foresee some change. I really do.” 

The hunger strike started with prisoners in the D section of the Security Housing Unit. Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED

Kernan is scheduled to meet strike leaders at Pelican Bay tomorrow, with Donald Specter, head of the Berkeley-based Prison Law Office. Kernan said he will inform inmates about the department’s long-term goals and will emphasize that it could take months to develop a detailed new policy for the Security Housing Units.

 But within weeks, a new system could be in place to allow inmates in the Security Housing Units to earn privileges, such as phone calls to family members, craft items and exercise equipment, he said. 

However, it remains unclear whether inmates will be swayed by the department’s new initiative. Pelican Bay inmate and hunger strike leader George Franco wrote a letter warning of new protests if corrections officials don’t move swiftly on changes. 

“We’re only waiting to see if he (Kernan) will keep his word. If not, we will re-enact our hunger strike indefinitely and there is nothing they can say to any of us, period,” Franco wrote.

Franco’s entire letter, and accompanying documents, are included and transcribed below.

KQED has not verified facts in the letter, and note that CDCR Undersecretary’s name is Scott Kernan. (VOD ed.: “Cate/Kernan” refers to Matthew Cate, Secretary of California Dept. of Corrections.) 

Here is a transcription of Mr. Franco’s letter (VOD: click on Pelican Bay prisoner letter to read letter with all attachments. Also click on Statement from Pelican Bay Prisoners’ Collective for earlier letter dated July 22 that summarizes history of strike.)

Mr. Montgomery,

I am in receipt of your postcard on ___
In a few words: he promised the whole five core demands.

I thank you for taking the time out to write to me and it will be my pleasure to answer all your questions, because what we need out there more than anything is the truth. 

Meeting 1: on 7-14-2011 we had our first negotiation with the CDCR secretary Scott Kerhan, it was me and three other negotiators. I personally represented the Mexican (Northern District – optional). Mr. Scott Kernan was very demanding and disrespectful towards us therefore, the negotiators went “no where” we explained to our mediation team what occurred and what to do as a result of this meeting.  Continue reading →