This is an ICSR Insight written by Research Fellow, Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens
On the ten year anniversary of 9/11 earlier this month ICSR published an authoritative report on Anwar al-Awlaki, As American as Apple Pie: How Anwar al-Awlaki became the Face of Western Jihad.
The demise of Anwar al-Awlaki, if reports of his death are accurate, represents a significant milestone in the fight against al-Qaeda. Despite his involvement with a number of both successful and abortive terrorist attacks against the West, it is Awlaki’s ability to project Salafi-jihadi ideology
. . . . . .
The story of Anwar al-Awlaki, and in particular his intellectual progression to jihad, reveals a unique
trajectory of jihadism in the West. This movement is not just confined to Muslim majority countries,
and through arguments he and others have provided, its message now resonates with a small section of
Western Muslims. The movement has achieved this level of resonance through a process which
includes the appropriation of contemporary Western political discourse about human rights, injustice
and foreign policy, interwoven with the history of Islam and the fostering a of global Islamic
consciousness which demands violent action in order to survive and expand.
As American as Apple Pie: How Anwar al-Awlaki Became the Face of Western Jihad PDF 96 Pages
This document was accepted by the NYC General Assembly on september 29, 2011As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies. As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments.
We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.
They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage. They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses. They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one¹s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation. They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization. They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices. They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions. They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right. They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers' healthcare and pay. They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility. They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance. They have sold our privacy as a commodity. They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit. They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce. They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them. They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil. They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people's lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit. They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit. They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media. They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt. They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas. They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.*
To the people of the world,We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power. Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone. To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.Join us and make your voices heard!
I know you’ve been waiting for this one — here you go! Enjoy all 196 pages of it, and let me know what you find: Matthew Goldstein has already found a Goldman conflict of interest on page 71 (page 77 of the PDF) — the “Initial Collateral Security that is a CLO Security” turns out to be another Goldman product. Which is not obvious from the prospectus at all, since it isn’t even named.
“The Protection Buyer or its affiliates and/or the Portfolio Selection Agent or its affiliates may have information, including material, non-public information, regarding the Reference Obligations and the Reference Entities.”
Looks like a lot of subprime shorts knew exactly what these servicers were up to. In terms of CDS payouts, default is a default…doesn’t matter how you come by it. Was this reference collateral selected on the basis of complicit servicers’ expertise in fabricating defaults?
If these reference obligations were selected and shorted with knowledge of subsidiary servicer complicity, this will turn out to be the largest insider trading scheme the world has ever seen.
Phi Beta Iota: Emphasis added. “But enough eyeballs on it, no crime is invisible.” We are entering an era where Goldman Sachs and others are going to be subject to both enormous amounts of individual public scrutiny, and scorched earth legal campaigns by governments as well as Main Street corporations to extract compensation from Goldman Sachs and others for their many deliberate crimes that some call financial terrorism.
The Obama administration has demonstrated once again, as it did in Libya and as it’s done in a variety of surveillance cases, that its view of executive power in the arena of national security is hardly any less expansive than Dick Cheney’s was. The fact that this was predictable makes it no less alarming.
Just as the leaders of US national security thinking led America into the war in Iraq based on the false premise of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction and reckless, but politically powerful, rhetoric, Washington's elite are now circling the wagons around the defense budget. They are using the same disingenuous tactics and the same kind of rhetorical gibberish. While they have successfully intimidated the rest of the political system, they are also making huge fools of themselves.
I express my views on this and some defense budget facts you have not heard from these people in a commentary. Titled “The Stench of Elitism in Defense Spending,” it is available at the Politics page of the Huffington Post. Under the better mannered title “Elites Are Wrong,” an edit is also available at AOL Defense.
Why do you think I moved to Canada after the 2004 election was stolen in Ohio? I had direct experience as an election observer for the Democratic party at the Ohio recount in 2004, the Ohio 2006 elections, and the 2008 election. All were defrauded. I was on a citizen lawsuit filed in the Federal courts, and the judge refused our original evidence. We have a huge paper trail of evidence. Here’s the public record.
I personally tried to save the Republican IT guys whose plane went down in 2008 after he was deposed by the King Lincoln attorneys. I spoke with his attorney before he deposition and tried to keep him from speaking, even though that put the theft on record. We needed to save him for a protected testimony. Yes, that’s how it ends when you try to come clean.
Many MANY activists have worked on this since 2004. We were told by Salon and by Daily Kos, by all the bloggers we were conspiracy nuts, until Robert F. Kennedy Jr published his piece in Rolling Stone, I believe, in 2006. I realized we could not win this by activism or legal means. I moved to Canada and became a permanent resident. There are some wars you cannot win.
Almost two weeks into an anti-greed sit-in, the ‘leaderless resistance movement' is at a crossroads.
By Tina Susman
Los Angeles Times
September 29, 2011, 5:48 p.m
Reporting from New York—
Michael Moore and Susan Sarandon have dropped in. A seasoned diplomat dispenses free advice. Supporters send everything from boxes of food and clothes to Whole Foods gift cards. They even have their own app, for the legions of fans following them on iPhones and Androids.
Day 13 of Occupy Wall Street begins with a march through the streets of Lower Manhattan around the time the opening bell rings on the stock exchange. (Carolyn Cole, Los Angeles Times / September 30, 2011)
Nearly two weeks into a sit-in at a park in Manhattan's financial district, the “leaderless resistance movement” calling itself Occupy Wall Street is at a crossroads. The number of protesters on scene so far tops out at a few hundred, tiny by Athens or Cairo standards. But the traction they have gained from run-ins with police, a live feed from their encampment and celebrity visits is upping expectations. How about some specific demands, a long-term strategy, maybe even … office space?
So far the group, which generally defines itself as anti-greed, has none of those.
