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Thursday, June 19, 2008
Beijing Olympics Draws Electronic Eyes
Less than two months before the start of the summer Olympic Games in Beijing, the Chinese government has installed 300,000 new surveillance cameras in subways, parks and other public places, a human rights activist said Thursday.
The cameras have “vastly increased” the government’s ability to monitor citizens’ activities and to thwart potential protests, said Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China, a non-profit watchdog group.
“There are real dangers,” she said during a panel discussion sponsored by the National Endowment for Democracy, a Washington advocacy group.
Beijing expects the games to draw half a million tourists, largely foreign, and the government will collect fingerprints and other biometric data from each one, said Hom.
Her group has asked the government what safeguards it would use to protect the privacy of visitors. The government response, she said, was that the biometric data would be “only released to the appropriate people.”
Coming from the architects of the Tiananmen Square crackdown 19 years ago, that’s hardly a comforting thought.
China has fallen short on its vows to respect human rights and press freedoms in its bid to host the Olympics, said another panelist, Minky Worden, spokeswoman for Human Rights Watch, a New York-based advocacy group, and editor of the new book, “China’s Great Leap: The Beijing Games and Olympian Human Rights Challenges.”
“At this point,” said Worden, “a lot of promises have been broken.”
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Obama-McCain contest could come down to … Montana?
Barack Obama’s campaign has shown an unusual fascination with Montana, even though the state has only three electoral votes.
Obama has an up-and-running organization in the state already, even though it has voted Democratic in only one of the last 10 presidential campaigns. And last week, Obama tapped Jim Messina, the chief of staff of Sen. Max Baucus, Montana’s senior senator, to be the chief of staff for his presidential campaign.
“Well, there are some credible 269-269 scenarios,” said Obama communications chief Robert Gibbs, referring to a possible tie in the Electoral College. In such a case, even Montana, with just three electoral votes, could put Obama over the 270-vote threshold and make him the 44th president of the United States.
“Besides,” Gibbs added, “it’s really beautiful out there.”
But it could also be guns.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) has begun warning voters that during the Democratic presidential primaries, Obama tried to hide anti-gun positions “behind vague statements of support for ‘sportsmen’ or … claims of general support for the right to keep and bear arms.”
One way to counter such charges was for Obama to reach into the office of Baucus, perhaps the most pro-gun Democratic member of the Senate, and make Messina the chief of staff of his entire presidential campaign.
The trouble is, however, that before he worked for Baucus, Messina was chief of staff to Democratic Rep. Carolyn McCarthy of New York, the most anti-gun member of Congress. McCarthy was propelled into politics by the gun control issue in 1993 after a crazed gunman opened fire on a Long Island Rail Road commuter train, killing her husband and seriously injuring her son.
With Messina as his campaign chief of staff, Obama could also run into questions about his opposition to the Bush tax cuts of 2001, which, just this week, the presumptive Democratic nominee criticized as “rewarding wealth” at the expense of middle class taxpayers.
Baucus was the key Democratic defector to help pass the Bush tax cuts. And Messina, in a subsequent interview, was asked to name the most important bipartisan accomplishment of Baucus. Messina replied: “Senator Baucus was the chief reason bipartisan tax cut legislation was enacted in 2001.”
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Worker abuse and greedy pigs alleged at Smithfield
Area activists launched a month-long bus and metro station ad campaign against the Smithfield Pork factory in Tar Heel, N.C., on Thursday, with some passionate speeches from local religious leaders and council members.
While the ads spotlight several workers from the North Carolina hog-producing plant who claim to have been fired unjustly for getting hurt at work or abused mentally and physically, one has to wonder why members of the Justice at Smithfield group would want to go shoulder-to-shoulder with a demonic pig mascot in a butcher jacket that represents the executives at Smithfield.
Members of the group said a local artist made the pig sculpture and contributed it to the group, which takes it nearly everywhere it goes to remind people of the injustice at Smithfield.
The ads though, are much less frightening and much more sensitive. A 22-year-old woman who will be featured on one of the ads said she developed carpal tunnel syndrome while working at the plant. When she went to get surgery, she said Smithfield fired her without helping pay for the procedure.
Several other ads feature former employees with the same story, and others feature employees who say they were called racial slurs and beaten when they tried to form a union.
Leaders from several churches shared prayers for the Smithfield workers and started chants like “No justice, no peace,” “Let’s stand, let’s fight” and “Let’s bury this abuse.”
“We want to raise the consciousness of the people, that you might know every time you eat one of those Smithfield sausages, every time you eat one of those Smithfield hams perhaps you are aiding and abetting and contributing to the injustice and abuse of these hard-working workers,” said the Rev. Donald Robinson.
Smithfield is the biggest hog and pork producer in the U.S. and produces products under popular brands like Smithfield Premium, John Morrell, Patrick Cudahy, Farmland Foods and many others.
In an interesting turn of fate, the Wall Street Journal reported in June 6 that Smithfield Foods reported a 94 percent drop in fourth-quarter net profit.
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FISA agreement reached
Congressional leaders announced today that after months of wrangling, they have agreed to a compromise on a new version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
A key sticking point had been whether to grant retroactive immunity to telephone companies that helped with warrantless surveillance programs. Republicans have pushed for that immunity, and they seem to be happy with what they got.
“This bill represents a strong compromise between Republicans and Democrats, giving our intelligence officials the tools the need to keep America safe and strengthen civil liberties protections,” said Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican and ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee. “Additionally, the bill offers communications providers — who assisted the government in the wake of 9/11 — essential civil liability protections.”
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., praised the compromise in different terms.
“This FISA bill will prevent any repeat of warrantless surveillance undertaken by the president and will hold our government accountable for its actions, past and future, through strengthened court review and congressional oversight,” Rockefeller said.
