Greenpeace Activists Damage Ancient Peruvian Cultural Landmark

When the stunt-planners at Greenpeace sent teams of activists to trespass this week at Peru's Nazca archeological site, they must have thought their bumper-sticker messaging would look good on a Facebook page next to the 2,000-year-old geodesic drawings.

After all, the group is known for stringing banners from bridges and skyscrapers to draw attention to its environmental campaigns, and with U.N. climate talks taking place in Lima this week, the activists clearly wanted to make an impact.

And so they have. The impact of their footprints on the fragile desert site, in fact, will last "hundreds or thousands of years," according to outraged Peruvian officials.

So furious is the Peruvian government that it has barred the Greenpeace activists from leaving the country and is preparing criminal charges for "attacking archeological monuments," punishable by up to eight years in prison.

Read the rest here.

Is there no limit to what these so called liberal activists will do to gain attention for themselves? They habitually act in a manner that screams "IT'S ALL ABOUT US AND OUR CAUSE!" Nothing, and no one else matters including the rule of law. And now apparently even minimal respect for incredibly fragile ancient cultural landmarks must yield to their left wing narcissism.

These self absorbed spoiled brats are in serious need of a "time out." Lock them up and throw the key away. It's long over due.

Russia Seizes Greenpeace Ship for Investigation

MOSCOW — Russia’s Federal Security Service announced on Friday that it had seized a Greenpeace International ship and its crew after a series of protests at an offshore oil rig in the Arctic Ocean and would tow the ship to port in Murmansk to conduct an investigation.

The seizure of the ship on Thursday night, which was carried out by armed border guards dropped by helicopter, threatened to escalate into a diplomatic confrontation, since the crew includes citizens of several countries, including the United States. Russia’s Foreign Ministry had already issued a protest to the Dutch ambassador, since the ship, the Arctic Sunrise, is registered in the Netherlands and Greenpeace International is based there.

Read the rest here.

New York: Judge rules OWS protestors can't camp in park

Hours after baton-wielding cops cleared Occupy Wall Street protesters and their tents from
Zuccotti Park on Tuesday, a judge backed the clean sweep.

The ruling by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Michael Stallman says that city can stop protesters from bringing tents, tarps and other camping equipment into the park.

The decision is likely to be appealed, so it was unclear if the city would immediately reopen the park to people without tents.

Some Occupy Wall Street protesters had already moved to another public space, owned by Trinity Church, at Canal St. and Sixth Ave., where they used bolt cutters to open a fenced-in area.

Read the rest here.

Occupy protestors block roads, some are struck by car (no charges)

Three people were injured after apparently being struck by a car, authorities said.

Lt. Christopher Micciche of the D.C. police told the Associated Press that the driver was not cited because he had a green light when his vehicle struck three people.

He said witnesses told police that the three pedestrians “either ran toward or jumped in front of the moving vehicle.” He said one pedestrian jumped on the hood of the car. One of them was cited for being in the roadway.

“The protesters were apparently trying to block the roadway,” Micciche said. “It was essentially an accident where three individuals were injured but they were in violation by being in the roadway.”

D.C. fire department spokesman Lon Walls said Saturday morning that the three were transported to two area hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries.

The witness accounts provided by the police contradicted the description of the events some protesters gave The Post.

About 500 protesters stood in the streets at half a dozen intersections around the building, preventing cars from coming or going.

Several said that their aim was to prevent those inside from leaving.

Read the rest here.

Anyone is free to protest. No one is free to abduct people or block roads. These people should all be in jail.

Washington Post: Who is Bradley Manning?

In January 2010, more than 130 people gathered to celebrate the opening of Room B-28, a “hacker space” in the basement of the computer science building at Boston University. The room had two rows of computers running open-source software, and, in conformity to the hacker ethic, its walls were painted with wildly colored murals, extensions of the free expression to be practiced there. That was the reason for the power tools, too — in case someone wanted to build something amazing and beautiful, such as the musical staircase, under construction now, that chimes when you step on it.

One of the visitors was a young Army specialist named Bradley Manning, on leave from duty in Iraq. He had been working with computers, modifying code, since he was a kid. David House, founder of the hacker space, said he immediately sensed that Manning “was in the community,” someone who understood how technology could be empowering. This was the sort of world Manning hoped to inhabit one day, friends said. He had joined the Army so the GI Bill would finance his education. He had his eye on a PhD in physics.

Days later, he would be on a plane back to Baghdad and a culture where rule-breaking was not celebrated. And eight months after that, House — who had chatted with the man for barely 15 minutes — went to visit him in the brig at the Quantico Marine Base in Virginia, where Manning was being held as the prime suspect inthe largest national security leak in U.S. history.

He is accused of violating military computer security and leaking classified information to the insurgent Web site WikiLeaks. He faces 22 charges, including “aiding the enemy,” a capital crime. The material includes a video of an Apache helicopter firing on civilians in Baghdad, daily field reports from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a quarter-million cables from U.S. diplomats around the world. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has called the cable leaks “an attack on America’s foreign policy interests.”

For most of the past year, Manning spent 23 hours a day alone in a 6-by-12-foot jail cell. His case has become a rallying point for free-information activists, who say the leaked information belongs to the American people. They compare the 23-year-old former intelligence analyst to Daniel Ellsberg, leaker of the Vietnam War-era Pentagon Papers, and decry excessive government secrecy. “What is happening to our government when Bradley Manning is charged with aiding the enemy?” asked Pete Perry, an organizer with the Bradley Manning Support Network. “Who is the enemy? Information? The American people?”

The case raises troubling issues. Placing information in the public domain has never before been construed as aiding the enemy. Manning had a history of emotional outbursts throughout his youth, and they continued during his Army service, culminating in a breakdown in Baghdad.

How did a young man of such promise wind up in a brig? And how was he in a position to potentially access sensitive material given what the Army knew — or should have known — about him? Who is Bradley Manning, and what made him the way he is?

Read the rest here.

Some thoughts on civil disobedience

SAN FRANCISCO -- Two women were arrested at San Francisco State University early today after a group of protesters broke into a campus building, angered by sanctions handed down to demonstrators at a December building takeover, authorities said.

The two women, who are not San Francisco State students, were among 19 people who broke into the Cesar Chavez Student Center at about 4 a.m., said university spokeswoman Ellen Griffin.

University police responded, pepper-sprayed the two protesters when they resisted and arrested them, Griffin said. Their names were not immediately released. The other protesters dispersed but remained on campus, Griffin said.

The protest was in response to fines that were leveled as part of misconduct charges against 11 students involved in a two-day protest in December in which activists barricaded themselves inside the business school to protest fee hikes.

Read the rest here.

Note to protesters: Martin Luther King wrote his famous letter from INSIDE the Birmingham Jail. Your conscience is not a get out of jail free card. If you feel very strongly on a matter then fine, break the law. There are some laws or proposed laws where I could see myself refusing obedience. BUT... true civil disobedience implies a willingness to take the punishment.

What is up with all of these spoiled brats who think they can seize or vandalize property that is not theirs, block traffic or do any number of other things and expect that they are going to get a pass? It doesn't work that way. Either man up and take the punishment or sign petitions like most normal people do when we are ticked with what the government is doing. But please shut up and spare me your whining about fines for things you are obviously guilty of.

Frankly I have a lot more respect for people who actually ASK to be sent to jail for their beliefs.