Music:

Member Since: 07/11/2006
Band Members: Gerry RivalAnd i guess anyone who lends him their instruments....
Influences: Billy Bragg, Crooked Fingers Aginst Me!, Mike Ness, Joe Strummer, Johnny Cash, Hot Water Music, fingers-cut, megamahcine, Gainsville Liberation Orchestra, Blueline Medic, Fear Like Us , the Pogues, Elvis Costello, The Lawrence Arms, The Weakerthans, The Honor System, The Bouncing Souls, Propagandhi, Avail, Defiance Ohio.... Science Fiction of the screen and print....... Gandhi, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Bob Brown (well he's just a hero) ....

With lots of alcohol and late nights....

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Corporate Accountability Project

http://www.corporations.org/

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Electronic Civil Disobedience (ECD)?

What is electronic civil disobedience (ECD)?

In 1848 Henry David Thoreau published Civil Disobedience stemming from his own personal refusal to pay a poll tax as an expression of his opposition to the United States' war against Mexico. Throughout the last few decades, this tactic has been utilised by numerous grassroots social movements as an effective tool to voice their opinion. In 1996 with the growing use of the internet to exchange information the Critical Art Ensemble published their own book, Electronic Civil Disobedience. For more information see On Electronic Civil Disobedience by Stefan Wray available at http://www.thing.net/~rdom/ecd/oecd.html

- Taken from the Stop G20 webpage

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..........................ARTICLES..........................

Taken From Refugees International website.

" Human Rights in Burma: Fifteen Years
Post Military Coup "

RI intern Naw Mu Si, who grew up in a refugee camp
along the Thai-Burma border, testified today before
the House Committee on International Relations on
the plight of Burmese refugees and Internally
Displaced People (IDP).

_______________________________________________________

Committee on International Relations
Subcommittee on International Terrorism, Nonproliferation
and Human Rights and Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515

HEARING ON " Human Rights in Burma: Fifteen Years Post Military Coup "
HOUSE COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS WASHINGTON, D.C October 1, 2003

TESTIMONY BY Naw Mu Si Intern, Refugees International 1705 N Street, NW Washington, DC 20036

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for giving me this
important opportunity to speak on behalf of millions of
people in my country, especially for those who, by no means,
could reach this floor to tell us the stories of their lives under
the most brutal and racist military regime.

I thank Senators McConnell and Feinstein, and the members
of the United States Senate as well as the Congress, particularly
Congressmen Joe Pitts, Tom Lantos, Henry Hyde, Peter King and
other colleagues, for working so hard to get the Burma Freedom
and Democracy Act passed. By supporting this legislation, a clear
message was sent to the people of Burma that their struggle,
our struggle, for freedom is well supported.

My name is Naw Mu Si and I am an ethnic Karen from Burma.
I was born in the Delta Region. However, I actually grew up
in the refugee camp along the Thai-Burma border as my parents
were fleeing from the persecution by the military government.
I went to school in the refugee camp called Hway K'loke until I
finished my high school in 1995.

We are all aware of what happened to our leader, Daw Aung
San Suu Kyi and her supporters, on May 30, 2003. I think it
is important that this Committee is also informed on what else
has been happening simultaneously in and around the
Thai-Burma border to the ethnic people of Burma.

Recent reports from human rights and aid organizations along
the Thai-Burma border indicate that the human rights situation
is getting worse not only in Rangoon, but also it is worsening in
frontiers that ethnic minorities call home. My family, my father
and siblings, continue to live in the refugee camp as well as
inside Burmese forests.

As a result of the ongoing war in minority group areas and
deteriorating economic conditions in Burma, more than two
million people have fled Burma to Thailand, excluding people
who fled to India and Bangladesh, and an estimated 1.5 million
more remain inside Burma as internally displaced people.
Of the population that fled Burma, approximately 155,000 reside
in refugee camps in Thailand and Bangladesh and several million
more are forced to live as illegal migrant workers in Thailand,
Bangladesh, India, China, and Malaysia.

Mr. Chairman, while working with EarthRights International in
Thailand as a Women’s Rights Project Coordinator, I have
documented hundreds of women’s human rights abuses committed
by the military regime; most of the stories are hard to hear.
Women, in particular, are singled out as human shields and mine
sweepers during their tenure as forced laborers, as the regime’s
army, the Tatmadaw, believe they are less likely to draw enemy
fire, thus treating them as if they are expendable. Furthermore,
women conscripted as forced laborers are sometimes required to
perform twenty-four-hour guard duty, since they are deemed unfit
for any other work. These women, as many other women engaged
in forced labor, are often subject to sexual abuse including systematic
rape at the hands of the soldiers.

For thousands of women from Burma's ethnic minority groups, our
social, economic, and cultural rights are diminished by our refugee
status. Or, to be even more precise, if we are forced to flee our country
due to oppression and persecution to Thailand, we are not even
acknowledged the status of refugees, as Thailand has not signed
the refugee convention. Socially, we are people without a country;
economically, we are people without livelihoods; and culturally, we
are people without a community. We cannot teach our children
properly, and there is no chance to develop and propagate our culture.
We cannot feed our families, and must rely on the well-meaning but
insubstantial donations of kind-hearted NGOs. As this esteemed body well
knows, human rights must go hand in hand with regular access to meals.
The Burmese regime has destroyed tens of thousands of villages
deliberately in areas that were home to members of ethnic minorities.
Mr. Chairman, the regime's use of ethnic cleansing policies against the
minorities, namely the Karen, Karenni, and Shan on its eastern border
and the Rohingya on its western border, are well documented and
qualify the regime to be held accountable for crimes against humanity.
Ethnic cleansing, rape as an official tool of repression, heroin and
HIV/AIDS as primary exports, and slave labor are only some of the
crimes to mention under international law. Thousands upon thousands
of civilians have died and continue to die in the course of this
over-50-year old unacknowledged civil war.

It has also become clear to the world that rape is used expressly against
non-Burman ethnic women as a weapon of war. This was most recently
documented by Refugees International in their report, No Safe Place.
In addition to the ever increasing number of refugees in the camps along
the Thai-Burma border, the estimated one million or more internally
displaced persons (IDPs) whose condition of existence is even below
that of the poorest of human beings – illustrates the depth of
humanitarian crisis in Burma. On a daily basis, these IDPs are literally
hunted down like animals by the repressive Burmese army.
The Public Health authority in Thailand complained repeatedly that illegal
Burmese migrant workers are the human carriers of infectious and
communicable diseases such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis.
The information that I have mentioned above is the result of military
rule in Burma for decades.

Burma today has reached the highest state of emergency in its chaotic
political history. The current situation in my country is a test for the
international community to challenge Burma’s pretend commitment to
the cause of peace, freedom, and justice. It is also a challenge for us,
the people of Burma, to continue our resistance and to never give up
on the hope – the hope for Burma as a free and prosperous country
where diversity presents the beauty and uniqueness through the peoples
and the cultures in Burma.

As a refugee from Burma, I would like to make four recommendations to
help bring change to Burma. First, on behalf of the people in Burma,
I would like to thank the United States for passing legislation increasing
economic sanctions against Burma’s military regime. So, we would like
to ask the United States again to not only simply put sanctions on Burma
but also help pressure the neighboring countries in the ASEAN States to
cooperate with the US on sanctions.

Second, the United States should press the United Nations Security
Council to immediately take action on Burma by citing the urgent need
for a nation-wide ceasefire; the United States should provide leadership
here.

Third, the United States should consider earmarking funds for Internally
Displaced People. We have heard rumors that the United States is
unlikely to do so. There are over one million people in Burma running for
their lives in the jungles like animals; they urgently need help, perhaps,
more than refugees who are currently in Thailand.

Finally, the United States should continue to pressure Thailand to allow
refugees to enter Thailand and give them assistance and protection.
We don’t want to cause problems for the Thais, but we have nowhere
else to go. We are running for our lives.

Thank you very much for all of your support and leadership on this issue.
We hope you continue to help us until Freedom, Peace and Justice are
achieved in Burma.
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ZEITGEIST (The Movie 2007) - TRAILER

.. .. ..

http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com

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NORTH AMERICAN UNION & VCHIP TRUTH

Ed Helms Looks At Christmas Commercials

DIY... Bitches