Emma Goldman – An exceedingly dangerous woman

Emma Goldman (1869 -1940) stands as a major figure in the history of American radicalism and feminism. An influential and well-known anarchist of her day, Goldman was an early advocate of free speech, birth control, women’s equality and independence, and union organization. Her criticism of mandatory conscription of young men into the military during World War I led to a two-year imprisonment, followed by her deportation in 1919. For the rest of her life until her death in 1940, she continued to participate in the social and political movements of her age, from the Russian Revolution to the Spanish Civil War.

For more information see:

http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Goldman/

We Are Not Slaves, We Are Dynamite

They are old things, from another century. Poverty, which progress seemed to have banished from the West, comes back to make us feel its bite. Bankers aren’t jumping from windows yet, but the poor are filling the streets. Factories and shops close their doors. Millions of people find themselves with no means for facing the future. They were promised that a life passed on their knees, between a job that profited a boss and obedience to the will of the government would at least ensure a quiet survival for them. Now it’s clear to all that this was a lie.

They are old things, from another century. The lines are swelling in front of soup kitchens. The number of thefts in supermarkets is constantly growing. Foreclosure proceedings pile up. And while those on the bottom try not to die of hunger, those on top prepare for the worst, for the feared social explosion. “Zero tolerance” is guaranteed for anyone who breaks the law; new structures of detention are being prepared for natives and immigrants; soldiers and “volunteers” patrol neighborhoods that are under video surveillance. The old and new poor have to know: dying of privation or suicide, these are the only choices permitted to them.

They are old things, from another century. Today, more and more people are reaching out to grab wealth from the places where it exists in abundance. Some even have a dream in their heart, like the two anarchists, Christos and Alfredo, who were arrested in Greece on October 1 for a bank robbery. Christos robbed the bank at gunpoint.

They claim that Alfredo aided him, taking the money on delivery. Now the two anarchists, one Greek and one Italian, are behind bars. Prison is the fate promised to anyone who isn’t resigned to dying in misery, the fate promised to the enemies of all exploitation and authority.

They are old things, from another century. A shattered economy, skyrocketing unemployment, the deterioration of living conditions, a war among the poor fomented by the powerful henchmen, racism speeding up from a mere creep to a gallop, a planet threatened by technological development, States alternating the carrot of democracy with the stick of totalitarianism…

In this sudden return to the past, there is still something missing: the offended dignity that drives desperation away, transforming it into action; the freedom that stops being the right to obey authority and goes back to being the challenge to every form of power; the desire to live that isn’t satisfied with what exists and mounts an assault to snatch what has never been.

They are old things, from another century. Poverty, which progress seemed to have banished fromthe West, comes back to make us feel its bite. Bankers aren’t jumping from windows yet, but the poorare filling the streets. Factories and shops close their doors. Millions of people find themselves with nomeans for facing the future. They were promised that a life passed on their knees, between a job thatprofited a boss and obedience to the will of the government would at least ensure a quiet survival forthem. Now it’s clear to all that this was a lie.

They are old things, from another century. The lines are swelling in front of soup kitchens. The number of thefts in supermarkets is constantly growing. Foreclosure proceedings pile up. And while those onthe bottom try not to die of hunger, those on top prepare for the worst, for the feared social explosion.“Zero tolerance” is guaranteed for anyone who breaks the law; new structures of detention are beingprepared for natives and immigrants; soldiers and “volunteers” patrol neighborhoods that are undervideo surveillance. The old and new poor have to know: dying of privation or suicide, these are the onlychoices permitted to them.

They are old things, from another century. Today, more and more people are reaching out to grabwealth from the places where it exists in abundance. Some even have a dream in their heart, likethe two anarchists, Christos and Alfredo, who were arrested in Greeceon October 1 for a bank robbery. Christos robbed the bank at gunpoint.They claim that Alfredo aided him, taking the money on delivery. Now thetwo anarchists, one Greek and one Italian, are behind bars. Prison is thefate promised to anyone who isn’t resigned to dying in misery, the fatepromised to the enemies of all exploitation and authority.

They are old things, from another century. A shattered economy,skyrocketing unemployment, the deterioration of living conditions, awar among the poor fomented by the powerful henchmen, racismspeeding up from a mere creep to a gallop, a planet threatenedby technological development, States alternating the carrot ofdemocracy with the stick of totalitarianism…

In this sudden return to the past, there is still something missing:the offended dignity that drives desperation away, transforming itinto action; the freedom that stops being the right to obey authorityand goes back to being the challenge to every form of power; thedesire to live that isn’t satisfied with what exists and mounts an assault to snatch what has never been.

IT’S AN OLD THING FROM ANOTHER CENTURY: INSURRECTION

https://www.indymedia.org.uk/media/2009/12//444080.pdf

Kenan Malik ‘In Conversation’ With Aslak Nore.

The meeting, at the Gyldenhal Arena in Oslo was to launch Rushdie Affaeren: Og Veien Fra Fatwa Til Jihad,
the Norwegian version of From Fatwa to Jihad.

http://www.kenanmalik.com/video/oslo.html

Be Happy In The Knowledge That….

Councillor, Councillor, Pull The Other One!

On the Tuesday of December 8th the Vauxhall Centre in Norwich was filled with around fifty concerned individuals eager to listen to two county councillors, David Harwood and Harold Bodmer, try and defend the councils decision to look into closing two day centres in Norwich and two day services in Hempnal.

The centres that are in danger of being closed down, the Essex and Silver Rooms, and the two day  services hosted at Hempnal Mill currently provide community and sense of well being for its elderly and vulnerable users- enabling them to socialise and build relationships with people they may otherwise never have met, as well as also enabling users to partake in a variety of activities.

These services are currently provided for a relatively small amount of money, which includes funding for transport from their homes and decent meals, personal care, entertainment and therapeutic recreation, all given by a dedicated and much respected team of day centre workers.

It is the idea of losing these services that has lead to people organising in an attempt to keep the centres open. This public meeting held by the pressure group Save Norwich Day Centres For Older People led to apublic verbal lynching of the representatives trying to legitimize the closure of the day centres.

The councillors who had drawn the short straw presumably knew that they had to face a room full of rather peeved people- with the elderly in attendance obviously being in a more volatile mood.

A hastily made attempt to explain that

“no final decision had been made, and that if it had, which it had not….”

was spat out stating that any closures would not be made because of financial reasons- despite the ongoing recession.

They also went on to argue that- while no final decision had been made, money was of course not the issue and no savings would be made from the closures-  but that keeping the day centres open would add 15% to council tax thanks to the Labour Government…

It was at this point that any semblance of a coherent argument disappeared as the dastardly duo scraped for any argument that they thought might appease the increasingly anger fuelled audience. At one moment, mid-heckle, it was even argued that the kitchens in one of the day centres needed urgent maintenance and therefore the day centre would be expensive to get up to a suitable standard. There would need to be a full  re-build and more importantly new Health and Safety Regulations deemed the gasworks  in the building were unfit and dangerous.

The fact that dodgy gasworks in the premises hasn’t shut down the centre immediately speaks volumes.

When the chair of the meeting, Ian Gibson, President of the Norwich and District Carers Forum, opened up the debate to questions, the councillors appeared to have given up the ghost, refusing to guarantee that the council would not profit from the sale of the Essex and Silver Rooms. The sense of anger in the meeting was palpable at this stage, with several people stating that they simply would not trust a word out of the politicians mouths.

Of course various people in the crowd attempted to score political points, with a Labour county councillor standing at the back of the room making snide comments yet, unsurprisingly,  contributed very little of actual substance. In fact every third questioner seemed to be a councillor or some sort of political representative who felt the need to declare to  everyone in the room this fact at every possible opportunity!

After the meeting was drawn to a close, the various Trotskyite group members in attendance attempted to hijack the healthy anger from the meeting, standing around the exit moronically attempting to flog their dull, dry rags to those leaving the meeting hall for a biscuit and hot cup of tea.

In conclusion, the meeting was useful in highlighting the councils intentions and that they are clearly not to be trusted. However it was heartening to see that we are not the only ones that truly acknowledge this.

What was evidently and visibly clear from the performance is that people really want to protect the community and services provided by the Silver and Essex Rooms and there appears to be a lot of potential militancy, particularly from the older generation- who it seems are prepared to fight their elected representatives every step of the way.

AS OF TODAY THE  12 WEEK  PUBLIC ‘CONSULTATION’ IS UNDER WAY

To request a paper copy of the consultation, contact the council on 0344 800 8020.

Find out more about the in-house day services consultation by going towww.YourNorfolkYourSay.org where people can access the consultation questionnaire.

Alternatively, an electronic copy of the consultation can be requested by emailing in-housedayservicesconsultation@norfolk.gov.uk

People who need help to complete the consultation feedback form can arrange for an Adult Social Services development worker to assist them by calling 0344 800 8020.

NORFOLK COMMUNITY ACTION GROUP

http://norfolknonaligned.wordpress.com/2009/12/14/councillor-councillor-pull-the-other-one/

Watch Out Picture Takers, There’s A Jobsworth Plod About!

The head of the so called ‘terror police’ is asking for Met officers et al to refrain from harrassing the general public when they’re taking pictures with cameras….no need for using terror legislation….as good old public order legislation no doubt will do!

The move, this afternoon, follows widespread criticism of police policy under anti-terror legislation.

The Met’s Assistant Commissioner John Yates has re-released guidance that already appears on the Met’s website, to ‘all 32 borough commanders’.

Yates said the Met risks ‘losing public support’ if officers use their powers in situations that ‘most reasonable people would consider inappropriate’.

However, for the first time the guidance will be distributed via the Met’s internal ‘intranet’ website which is accessible to 55,000 officers and staff.

The guidance will also be relayed to officers directly via an ‘internal briefing’ prior to them patrolling London’s streets, according to a spokesman for the force.

The spokesman said the Met hopes that by ‘bullet pointing’ the guidance (see below), it will be clearer to officers who are unsure of their powers under the Terrorism Act when it comes to photography.

Yates, assistant commissioner of Specialist Operations, said: ‘People have complained that they are being stopped when taking photographs in public places. Those stops are being recorded under Stop and Account and under Section 44 of the TACT [Terrorism Act].

‘The complaints have included allegations that people have been told that they cannot photograph certain public buildings, that they cannot photograph police officers or PCSOs and that taking photographs is, in itself, suspicious.

Whilst we must remain vigilant at all times in dealing with suspicious behaviour, staff must also be clear that:

• There is no restriction on people taking photographs in public places or of any building other than in very exceptional circumstances
• There is no prohibition on photographing front-line uniform staff
• The act of taking a photograph in itself is not usually sufficient to carry out a stop’

Yates added: ‘Unless there is very good reason, people taking photographs should not stopped.’

Yates tells the Met’s officers and staff today:
‘An enormous amount of concern has been generated about these matters. You will find below what I hope is clear and unequivocal guidance on what you can and cannot do in respect of these sections. This complements and reinforces previous guidance that has been issued.

‘You are reminded that in any instance where you do have reasonable suspicion then you should use your power under the Section 43 TACT 2000 and account for it in the normal way.

‘There are important yet intrusive powers. They form a vital part of our overall tactics in deterring and detecting terrorist attacks. We must use these powers wisely. Public confidence in our ability to do so rightly depends upon your common sense.’

‘We risk losing support when they are used in circumstances that most people would consider inappropriate.’
Developing story…More soon.

http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/news/Met_terror_chief_on_photographer_stops_Officers_must_use_common_sense_update_news_292930.html

How Much Longer Are We Going To Listen To This Rubbish?

The directors of Royal Bank of Scotland are threatening to resign if the government stops them paying bonuses of £1.5bn to staff in its investment arm. If the bank’s top talent leaves, the bank would be less profitable and the taxpayer might get a worse return on its investment, it argues.

I think we speak for the majority of decent and fair minded people in this country when we say..

“On your bikes you fat scumbag leeching bastards!”

Now, anybody happen to have a leak of where these individuals live? Tax payers are wanting to pop round personally to get a BETTER ‘return on their investment’ and make sure they settle up every single penny…..brick by bloody brick!

Slow At The Mo…On Heavy Painkillers For Back Ache….

But where ever you look the Season to be merry is upon us….

Italian police have crashed their most valuable patrol car, a 165,000-euro (£150,000) Lamborghini.

The accident happened near the northern Italian town of Cremona where it was on display at a student jobs fair.

Reports say the car swerved to avoid another vehicle which crossed into its path, ploughing into two stationary cars. It was damaged beyond repair.

One of the two officers in the vehicle at the time of the incident suffered a broken rib, the other received bruises.

The Lamborghini car, painted in the Italian police force’s blue and white colours, was a gift to the force from the carmakers in 2004.

The six-speed luxury vehicle with a 500-horsepower engine is designed to go from zero to 100km/h (60mph) in four seconds.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8388128.stm

 

Now where’s my Codeine….

Statement of Anarchist Konstantina Karakatsani of the Nuclei of Fire group.

Just in case anyone has missed the Greek insurrection that’s been going on a while now….easy to miss in the UK media, what with Jordan’s breasts and other such high calibre subjects getting all the headlines.

Konstantina Karakatsani, an anarchist wanted in relation to the case of the Nuclei of Fire urban guerrilla group publishes a devastating letter against her accusers.

In the last few weeks the counterinsurgency plan of the greek state has concentrated in the issuing of secret warrants of arrest against people that the Ministry of Public Order is targeting as members of the urban guerrilla group Nuclei of Fire Conspiracy. The unprecedented method of secret warrants announced in the media breaches the fundamental clauses of the bourgeois constitution regarding personal freedoms aiming to spread fear and discordia amongst the social antagonistic movement. In this context, the publication of an open-public letter of one of the eponymous 6 wanted for the case, the anarchist Konstantina Karakatsani, is a bold, crystal clear and highly significant act of political determination and defiance towards the new totalitarianism which has been the state’s response to the December Uprising and the revolutionary prospects it has opened. What follows is a translation of the letter, following its original format, explanations in [brackets]:

After the recent event I decided to make public my position regarding the case for which I am being accused, defending first and always my political identity.

Lets take things from the start. The day that the police stormed the supposed safe-house of Chalandri, it arrested four persons. Three of them are at this moment enclosed in various prisons, while the forth was set free. In the news, a climate of terror-hysteria is reigning, while journalists on the verge of a heart attack are screaming off their heads, reproducing delusional horror stories. They set up an orgy of lies, wet-dreaming things for which not only there are no evidence, but not even indications. Immediately after, warrants of arrest were issued for 6 people due to fingerprints found in the house and in objects contained in it which are in no manner related to the case (such as doors, windows, newspapers, plastic bags, guitars) or to the presence of their vehicles outside the house.

It is obvious that the police acted in this way in order to satisfy the need of the past administration to show that it is producing results, even at the last moment of the pre-election campaign. It would be catastrophic for any government to step down the stage leaving behind it a term filled with scandals and corruption without the slightest success, even the image of one. That is why they decided that they must baptise the house a “safe-house”, the group of friends an “organisation”, and the visitors of the house ruthless bombers and send them to prison, so that maybe someone will be convinced that they are producing results. After a few days the next administration took over. Mr Chrisochoidis, the minister with the most “respected profile” in the eyes of the public opinion, and “the great success against the November 17 [urban guerrilla group], could not make mistakes at the most difficult turn of his career. And the delirium began again…

Perhaps New Democracy [the previous right-wing administration] is supposed to have broken the spine of the Nuclei of Fire Conspiracy, but PASOK [the current 'socialist' administration] from the moment that it rose to power found through this organisation the end of the thread for the entire complex of terrorism. And the fever started rising…In one voice (as usual) cops and the media are announcing with all certainty that we 6 have perpetrated the latest attacks, that we have relations with other organisations, that we know persons…

While they are saying that there is a possibility that we are hiding together with the three warranted comrades [the 3 anarchists on whose head the ministry has placed a 600,000 Euro reward each] and together we are doing bank robberies and planning new attacks. How was all this deciphered? Perhaps the cops are watching “CSI MIAMI” and then inform their police reports. Get a little bit serious, thats not a way to work….

At the same time, a determining role in the issuing of my warrant was played by the fact that the police knew my relation with the anarchist scene, due to my arrest in January in an operation in several houses in Exarcheia after the attack of the Revolutionary Struggle in the ministry of culture [the 5th of Jaunary 2009 attack against a stationed riot police squad with automatic weapons]. Then in order to storm the house they claimed we were suspect (supposedly due to the location of the house), and after finding nothing at all, in order not to return empty handed, they arrested my (along two more people) on charges irrelevant to the case. Even though the court found my not guilty, my arrest was a great advantage in the hands of the police in order to be able to accuse me again, as now I am a person “with a criminal past”.

Thus, all those sick people are drawing the wrong conclusions based on linking irrelevant things. As far as I am concerned what I have to tell them is to shut their mouths, because I burst out laughing every time I hear them say that we do not give ourselves in because we are guilty. I am not giving myself in because I have no intention to become the pray of police ambitions for medals, and not because I am planning attacks. I did not choose to be in this position, others chose it for me. Others are trying to portray that I have gone underground, to set me outside everyday life, outside my daily activities and my life in general. I will not go to prison for those others that have decided that the cells of their democracy have too much space and must be filled. That’s why I am not presenting myself “voluntarily”, if you can get it…And why all these? For a single fingerprint on a plastic bag in a friend’s house? With a single fingerprint on a plastic bag we have become coordinators of the entire neoterrorism in Greece? The only thing they do not accuse us of yet is Al Qaeda…If they search more closely they will find my fingerprints all around the house, so what?

There was no scattered explosive powder, nor any bomb in an apparent place, so that they can accuse anyone who just enters the house. The antiterrorist police came in and turned the house into Kosovo. They placed on the table boxes with paint and paint-sprays and said: “these are the tools of the terrorists” as if paint is an explosive material. How come they did not tell us that the remote control was a hand-grenade…

As far as the minister of Public Order that asked the 6 wanted individuals to present themselves, I personally have to tell him that Its not my habit to apologise, especially to your police, and even more specially as there are no evidence against me. Go to justice to prove what? That my palls were turned into an organisations and the house into a safe-house so as that they can be free to accuse anyone they want? That they are throwing on us all the penal code and are arresting just anyone they come across just so that they can talk about arrests? Or should I finally go to prove that I am not an elephant? Go and negotiate what exactly? I am an anarchist, I am not a beggar to enter into negotiations and bazaars [haggling].

Thats why I shall be absolute in what I have to say, For despite the fact that I might not recognise the institution of your court, it recognises me as guilty. This petty little story must at some point come to an end, and I will have to face up to your justice, when the case comes.

Moreover, Mr Chrisochoidi, make up your mind and form a stable opinion: On the one hand you talk about “little children that live away from their families and democracy must show understanding”, and on the other hand all the case is uprgraded and moves into the hands of a high-commissioner inquisitor. I am not moaning. I am just pointing out at the petty games of political scheming.

I know I might be accused for the truths I speak, but thats the job of all kinds of peeping-tom representatives of the law: to erect bogus accusation cases, to exhaust people in questioning, to penalise friendly relations, to put consciousness to trial and to try to fill their dungeons with revolutionary souls. And of course, they are promoting snitching by promising rewards for our warranted comrades. Since they already knew that amongst certain people saliva will drool down the face at the sound of the big sum of the reward, and they will compete for who will be the first to give people in.

Mr Chrisochoidis has the audacity to place a reward on three people, while no-one has ever published a single photo of one of those cops who are rapping and murdering in prisons and detention centres, participating in circuits of child pornography and drug trafficking, torture, beat-up, break the heads, take out their weapons and backfire. For the simple reason that these, the current protectors of the citizen, are unapproachable – they cannot be persecuted. Society provides them with its guilty silence.

I am talking publicly not in order to prove my innocence, as the bipolarity of innocence and guilt do not fit in my logic (I have already referred to those I believe as really guilty), but because besides the slimy all-knowing quills of power, there is another truth.

THE ONLY ONES WALKING FREE IN THIS WORLD ARE THOSE STANDING AGAINST IT

KONSTANTINA KARAKATSANI

Not Guilty Plea by Smellie

Sergeant Delroy Smellie, 47, from Clapham in southwest London, pleaded not guilty to a charge of common assault by striking Nicola Fisher in the City of London on April 2 as the leaders of the G20 nations gathered for an economic summit.

Smellie denied the charge at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court in central London and was released on unconditional bail. A trial date was set for March 22 next year, the Press Association reported.

As Scotland Yard have been dumping all their images of cops not wearing identity numbers on their lapels at the G20 police riot, we can only assume he is about to deny the officer slapping and battoning a woman is infact……. NOT HIM!

The millions of images in the public domain of the incident will no doubt be deemed ‘immaterial’.