Stories the Mainstream Media Doesn't Want to Cover #2

The Largest Prison Strike in U.S. History 
On September 9th a nationwide prison strike began resulting in work stoppages and and protests regarding the working conditions for incarcerated individuals in the United States. Although crime in the U.S. is approaching historically low numbers we continue to have one of the highest incarceration rates in the world. Although this fact may be common knowledge, the extent to which prisoners are used for labor is rarely talked about and the conditions of their employment even less.

Having prisoners work isn't inherently a negative thing. Programs to train and employ workers have been reviewed academically for their effectiveness at preparing inmates for their return to society and their likelihood to fall back into patterns of criminal behavior. Some states, like Florida, offer programs for prisoners to use work as a means of shortening their sentence and some supporters of the practice claim that working provides structure to prison life and incentive to remain on good behavior.

One glaring flaw in these notions are the conditions in which prisoners work, and their overall powerless role in shaping those conditions. Most state and federal prisons make manual labor mandatory. States like Texas, Georgia, and Arkansas refuse to pay prisoners for their work. When prisoners are paid it is almost universally less than one dollar an hour, even in federal work programs. In fact federal and state work programs often end up taking most of the wages earned through taxes as well as paying back victims and in some cases the cost of their incarceration itself. Additionally prison workers have no union to organize or bargain for them, and working conditions have little to no oversight.

Prisoners are not a population that earns much sympathy, but they are still people. Many prisoners suffer from undiagnosed or untreated mental illness, and many of the folks we categorize as aggressors were victimized themselves at some point in their lives. It's pretty safe to say that most prisons are less than peaceful, and inmates typically find more things to fight about than work together for. Perhaps this is what is so shocking about over 20 thousands prisoners from more than 29 prisons in 12 different states uniting and protesting over a single common issue.

The inmates protesting compare their servitude to slavery. Considering the disturbingly concentrated distribution of minorities in prison and the wages prison workers earn, the comparison is chilling. In addition to doing a large amount of the work that is required to maintain the operation of prisons, workers in some states are employed by private contractors for labor. This recent article highlights 7 major corporations that rely on prison workers.

It is easy to write off this widely ignored moment in history because prisoners have little to no ability to be heard, and don't elicit much compassion or sympathy. Perhaps working is a good form of rehabilitation, but workers of any kind should at least be heard when voicing grievances against working conditions. Nelson Mandela once said that "A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones". Prisoners who have refused to work in poor conditions for abysmal pay are now sitting in solitary confinement right this moment, and yet their plight remains almost entirely invisible.

Sure, part of me wants so say it's justified because who knows what those people have done. The larger part of me wonders how civilized or morally sound we can be if our version of justice relies on the isolation of individuals and profiting off of their misery. These people are locked up, their dignity and life has been completely taken - isn't that enough? Should we perhaps re-evaluate how we treat these lost souls when rival gangs of criminals collaborate and work together?

Stories the Mainstream Media Doesn't Want to Cover #1

With November 7th rapidly approaching, the presidential race has dominated most media coverage for the past few months. The national consciousness has been given the troublesome conundrum of figuring out who to vote for in this disgraceful contest. Personally, I've been guilty of falling victim to the allure of political ping pong. Between the news on television, watered down or repetitive articles, and the impossibly large wealth of information on the internet it has become very easy to believe you are thinking for yourself while actually being kept in the dark on as host of important issues. Yes, being engaged in the presidential race is enormously important, but what have we missed in the meantime?


The U.S. Senate Passed $1.15 Bn Arms Deal With Saudi Arabia 
Just yesterday the Senate Bill designed to block a $1.15 Billion Dollar exchange of weapons with Saudi Arabia was voted down 71-27. The effort was led by Senators Rand Paul and Chris Murphy. The misgiving over the deal stem from the disconcerting developments with the conflict unfolding in Yemen. The Houthis are a religiously fueled group from Northern Yemen who have been fighting the Yemeni government continuously for over a decade.

The conflict has several moving parts. To begin with, the Houthis represent the Zaidi branch of Islam which is a sect that emerged from Shi'a traditions. However Sunni in Yemen account for over half of the population. The Yemeni government accuses the Houthis of being backed by Iran and Hezbollah, trying to destabilize the Yemeni government and inspiring anti-American views. The Houthis have in turn accused the Yemeni government of being beholden to Saudi Arabia and al-Qaeda. In 2009, Wikileaks released an intercepted document revealing that the U.S. State Department believes the Houthis acquired their weapons through the Yemeni black market and by former members of the Republican Guard rather than Iran.

The Houthi insurgency in Yemen has become a full blown civil war and the conflict is far from over. More recently a large Saudi-led coalition (comprised of Egypt, Jordan, Sudan, Bahrain and the UAE) has been intervening in the region in what some view as an attempt to prevent similar uprisings in neighboring countries.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the resolution to prevent the arms trade would reinforce the idea that the United States is "retreating" from conflicts in the Middle East. Critics of the deal believe it will contribute to more violence in the Middle East that can be connected with the interests of the United States. The deal's opponents believe this will perpetuate the sentiments that have proven to inspire more of the terrorism which we are officially trying to destroy in the first place.

With the Islamic State now bombing Sunni and Shiite populations with equal measure in Yemen, it is unclear whether the region will ever find stability. Both sides of the conflict have been accused of working with hostile actors and organizations notorious for terrorism. Instability in Yemen is likely to make it a training ground for terrorist groups like the Islamic State, and U.S. support of the Saudi coalition will be used as a propaganda tool for radicalization.

Perhaps the United States is trying to mend fences with Saudi Arabia after finalizing the agreements over the nuclear program in Iran. Either way adding more weapons to conflict appears counter productive to any long term peace strategies, and it is doubtful that these actions will diminish the perception of imperialism regarding U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.

Why Hillary's emails are still important

Why Hillary's emails are still important

By Scott Robbins

The FBI won't indict her, but that's petty compared to meddling with the global economy. Wikileaks may have revealed a new economic "global order", courtesy of Hillary and the Clinton Global Initiative.

I'm not sure whether people simply don't care about integrity, or have forgotten what it means. The presumptive nominee for the Democrats has been under investigation by the FBI for over a year. At first I didn't take the email "scandal" very seriously, but curiosity got the best of me and I poured over hundreds of these emails. What I saw is that since 2009 Hillary seems to have been using the Clinton Global Initiative as a diplomatic tool to establish trade relations and form policy with foreign nations.

Wikileaks published the enormous cache of 30,322 Hillary's emails. Wikileaks is not 100%  morally pure, but if technology allows individuals to reveal information that will affect the entire world isn't there a moral imperative to share this information?

Many of the emails I read were not interesting. However, I stumbled across a few abnormal exchanges between Abedin and Hillary, and upon further investigation these correspondences seemed to be the most interesting and cryptic. Naturally, I continued digging. Abedin, simultaneously worked within the State Department, the Clinton Foundation and for Teneo. This appears to be a direct conflict of interest and perhaps an example of collusion. Abedin's concern about the security of Hillary's server only helps to validate the potential power of what it contains.

Abedin and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at a campaign rally, 2008. By Charles Dharapak/A.P. Images.

This was the first one to catch my eye. It's a very detailed security brief, followed by bizarre dialogue between Hillary and Abedin that reads like a conversation between paranoid drug dealers. I've always loved a good puzzle, so after reading this email I decided it was worth investigating.

8/9/09: Hillary staffer suggests using the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) as a means of diplomacy, saying the "theme could be 'Implementing Peace'." She goes even further saying, "obviously a session could have wider application into say the Middle East peace and political process."

9/15/09: Abedin and Clinton's exchange appears to be pre-emptive preparation for defending the accountability of defense spending or development of some kind, but it's unclear what is going to be developed and where... On the same day, HRC plans to meet with Sheikha Mosa of Qatar, which is intriguing and will come up later.

9/20/09-9/24/09: Corporate money flowing into government (9/22), and it's unclear why. This email, from later that day, clarifies that Hillary and the CGI were preparing for the "Philanthropy Oscars" in Ireland, with the goal of proving that "The big win is in remaking government through innovative partnerships with the private sector. Mrs Clinton has been mulling over what to do with USAID for nearly a year. What better opportunity than the CGI to announce a bold new strategy for smart aid?"

The hair stood up on the back of my neck. Why are state department officials so closely linked with the CGI? How can Hillary blatantly use her own private organization to further the agenda of the nation she holds public office for? This would be a new form of diplomacy.

The next day in this 9/24/09 email, Abedin relays to HRC that Congress  "earmarked 2.5 mil dollars for democracy stuff in Libya" and that the money was intended to go to NGOs, but some of the money  "was going to an NGO with links to an NGO in Libya run by a Qadhafi."

6/7/10: Sheikha Mosa of Qatar apparently wants her son to "build a wider international profile" because he's " keen to talk more generally about US/Qatari cooperation ". (Qatar is one of the world's largest exporters of liquified gas, among other things...)

On 10/3/10 HRC met with FM Judeh again, and later held private meeting with retired General Jack Keane (now on the Board of Directors for General Dynamics, a multinational defense conglomerate that is also the world's 5th largest defense contractor). General Dynamics financial reports from 2010 and 2011 would indicate that the business of war was booming.

9/14/2011: Explicitly states that the Dept. of State will be attending a conference with CGI and Goldman Sachs. Is it not inappropriate for a State Dept. official (Hillary) to start getting the DoS, CGI, and Private banks in the same room to discuss world affairs?

11/10/11: Apparently the meetings between Qatari's and the US manifested as cooperative conflict in Libya.

6/22/12: Speech given by Hillary. I recommend you read the whole thing, but the last paragraph is truly shocking, for good or ill, saying "I am confident that we will continue to serve and defend a peaceful and prosperous global order for many years to come."

Last Paragraph of draft of HRC speech. From Wikileaks Email ID #: 20393

9/22/12: Schedule of Annual CGI meeting. The opening session remarks: "In a world of seven billion people, the demand on natural and man-made resources is greater than ever before. Yet we also have more human capital than ever before." It's hard to tell if this is a path to world peace or a new world order. With the events hosted by various CEO's (Walmart, Lego, Goldman Sachs...etc.), Presidents, and a representative of the World Bank Group. Call me cynical, but it's hard to imagine these entities being driven by magnanimity.

 

Wikileaks Email 7058. Clinton Global Initiative becomes diplomacy?

I have expressed my doubts about Hillary before. Hillary is unbelievably active, and communicates daily with half a dozen nations. She seems almost too good at facilitating communication between so many nations.

Her methods work because all leaders like money. Apparently, offering people a piece of a new globalized economic agenda is compelling.

With the TPP, TTIP, and TiSA (when combined, will isolate trade of 2/3 of the world's GDP) already being drafted, the foundation has been built, and the right people have been connected.

The Clinton Global Initiative appears to have become the most "successful" diplomatic strategy in history; quite the achievement for a non-profit with the namesake of a candidate for the Presidency.

So are you excited for the new "prosperous global order"?