As we watch...

If you haven't called your senator or congress person yet to let them know your pissed about the tax breaks for the super wealthy, I'd highly recommend it- at the very least it's cathartic!

In Solidarity with British Students

As was the case a year ago here in California, the British state moved in a narrow vote this week to triple the tuition of UK students. Citing government budget deficits, the brits are following California and other US states in out pricing many students. Tens of thousands of students have protested in the last several days, denouncing the hikes, which will result in hike that is the equivalent jump from US$4,700 to $14,000.

I'm here in California reading about the protests, in mental solidarity with students across the Atlantic. This move by parliament is another step in the road towards the further fulfillment of a neoliberal agenda that were it to have its way, would not have any state sponsored services, but rather only fee-for-service. Moves like this will ultimately exclude lower class citizens from their right to education.

More on the protests if you click the title.

No Country is Free without Free Press

I am reposting this OP-Ed because it was not, nor will it be widely published in the US. I believe firmly that no country is free without free press, and though I value national security, I do not value it above the first amendment rights of free speech. I believe that a free press, that which Assange is just one of millions, is essential to a democratic government.

"The Truth Will Always Win"
By Julian Paul Assange, WikiLeaks Founder
Op-Ed for The Australian today:
07 December 10

In 1958 a young Rupert Murdoch, then owner and editor of Adelaide's The News, wrote: "In the race between secrecy and truth, it seems inevitable that truth will always win."

His observation perhaps reflected his father Keith Murdoch's expose that Australian troops were being needlessly sacrificed by incompetent British commanders on the shores of Gallipoli. The British tried to shut him up but Keith Murdoch would not be silenced and his efforts led to the termination of the disastrous Gallipoli campaign.

Nearly a century later, WikiLeaks is also fearlessly publishing facts that need to be made public.