Greetings All.
Hello Erica, and welcome to the list. I missed your introductory
email, so my welcoming may be a bit late, but I wanted you to know how
good it is to see new virtual faces on the list. I had a call from
Miriam, I had no idea those tin cans and string would work all the way
from New York City to Quilcene, on the Great Olympic peninsula, but
after chatting on line for some several years today was the first time
we actually visited "live".
Miriam asked me to let you and the list know that she's having some
computer problems...again. The storm had knocked her off the
internet, but then it came back...until today. She's off again, and
putting out calls for help, but no idea how long it will be 'til the
Cavalry arrives.
One other thing. Bob Hachey used to be on this list. Some of you
might know Bob. He moderates the ACB Chat List. Bob indicated that
his cancer had returned...and then he dropped out of sight. Has
anyone information regarding how Bob is doing?
Take care to stay safe, and only breathe air that you know where it came from.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/6/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Erica,
You are a terrific asset to the list, or to me, anyway. You're young and
tech savvy and apparently, you can do all the things that I can't . I'm 83
and was never technically capable or confident from the day that I knew that
I had to get a computer to do the work that I did. But I'm into all the
things that the young journalists on the left are doing because of the
articles that I can access and because of the podcasts that I learned about
through those articles. Would you be comfortable telling us a bit more about
yourself? People on this list already know , probably more than they'd like
to, about me. But I'll tell you anything you're interested in knowing,
either publicly or privately.
I'm relieved to know that Rania is OK. The episodes of their podcasts have
been a bit irregular, recently. They used to appear on my VR Stream on
Sundays and sometimes on Mondays. Do you also listen to Pushback, Moderate
Rebels, and Clearing The Fog?
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Erica R
Sent: Thursday, August 6, 2020 10:49 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: can we say, Industrial/Military takeover?
I do not know anything about Liz's background.
I am not familiar with Unauthorized Disclosure but I will take a listen. I
just checked their social media. Rania is okay, and it says she might be
discussing the incident on the next episode of the podcast.
On Thu, Aug 6, 2020 at 8:37 AM Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > wrote:
Erica,
That's fascinating. It sounds like he has a rather sophisticated
understanding of the Syrian situation. On the podcast, he tends to act more
sort of clownish. Liz takes the more rational role. I know that she, too, is
a Leninist. Do you know any more about her history and background?
Do you listen to Unauthorized Disclosure? Rania, who is a journalist and
spends a lot of time in Lebanon, where her family comes from, has been
staying with family in the US but just recently returned to Lebanon. Seems
like her timing was really bad. I wonder what happened to her.
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > On Behalf Of Erica R
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2020 10:24 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: can we say, Industrial/Military takeover?
Hi Miriam,
Thanks for your reply. I am one of those young people who listens to true
anon. Haha. I know what you mean about the weird style. I don't know about
Ken Klippenstein's podcast.
Here is an interview with Brace Belden in the Yale Review of International
Studies if you want to learn more about why he went to Syria and his
experience there.
In May, YRIS Editor-in-Chief Elisabeth Siegel (MY ‘20) had the chance to
talk over the phone with Brace Belden, a former soldier for the YPG (In
Kurdish, Yekîneyên Parastina Gel), a mainly-Kurdish militia in Syria formed
in 2004.
The militia group fought against ISIS, and Belden spent 6 months among their
ranks as a foreign volunteer. In 2015, after a major victory against ISIS at
Kobane, the United States government began to send munitions to the YPG.
Most recently, Turkey, who considers the YPG a “terrorist organization” has
moved against YPG occupied areas in Northern Syria.
Belden himself achieved Twitter fame during his time in Syria as he posted
regular tweets and photos from the battlefield, often accompanied by
humorous observations in an iconically ironic, internet-native style. He was
among the foreign fighters profiled by the Rolling Stone in 2017, which
called him an anarchist, much to his chagrin.
In the interview with YRIS, Belden, an avowed communist, discussed his own
personal experiences during his time with the YPG, the situation facing
Kurds in Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria, and the political future of the
militia group and its associated political party, the PYD (Partiya Yekîtiya
Demokrat / Democratic Union Party).
_____
Elisabeth Siegel: To start out, could you give a short rundown of how you
got involved and why you wanted to join the YPG?
Brace Belden: I think, in 2014, I read about the story of this woman Ivanna
Hoffman who went there and fought with a Turkish group within the YPG, the
MLKP (The Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Turkey). She died in a fight,
and there was a hubbub in Leftist media about it, and it got me more
interested in it. After a long time of trying to figure out how to go, I
went. My political ideology — communism, specifically a kind of
Marxism-Leninism — that I subscribe to isn’t the same as the YPG, but it is
the same as some of the groups that fight alongside or under them, so I went
with the intention of joining them. I was there a little over six months and
got back about a year and a couple weeks ago.
ES: You came back before the big push to liberate Mosul, right?
BB: I was part of the beginning of the push to liberate Raqqa and then I
fought on a different front.
ES: So, what specific area of the fighting were you part of during your time
with the YPG, and what was day to day life like on the front lines?
BB: Originally I was part of this push at Ain Issa, two hours south of
Kobane, and all rhetoric we were getting was saying we were going to go West
to connect with Afrin, and we thought that going south was just a feint at
first. We covered a lot of territory, because it’s pretty barren desert out
there — it’s not like we have to fight for every inch or anything. We took
this big town, ten small villages around it, and then I went to a different
front that was west of there called Qalta and then fought around there.
It sucked. I wouldn’t recommend it. It was really hot and confusing. And
some strange maneuvers on everybody’s part. It’s scary. It’s pretty much
just like you read about, it’s not fun. The second part, I was with a
different unit and that was a little more organized.
ES: I hear they’re making a Jake Gyllenhaal movie about it.
BB: Not if I can help it. Apparently if you just write a story about someone
the author can sell the rights to it, which is surprising… and that’s what
happened to the Rolling Stone article, but I think I made a big enough stink
so that it probably won’t happen. 1% of movie ideas that get bought or
whatever actually get made, so I’m not too worried about it. However, if it
does start, I’m just going to do something really embarrassing and then have
them cancel it out of shame. Although they’re smart and so would just change
the name and story.
ES: Were you surprised at the level of popularity that your Twitter account,
with the handle of @PissPigGranddad, got?
BB: Sort of. I was at first, and then it kind of made sense. I speak the
same language of people of a certain age cohort and sensibility so people
kind of latched onto that. A lot of political stuff is spoken or transmitted
rather mechanically, and I am too stupid to talk like that. I think that
people got a better insight because of the way I spoke.
ES: Are you still in touch with anyone that you met in Syria?
BB: Quite a few people.
ES: Are they still there?
BB: Some of them are. Some of them are back. I went to a funeral for a buddy
named Jack Holmes and saw a lot of guys that I hadn’t seen since I was over
there.
ES: So now, in terms of what the YPG has currently been facing, from your
perspective of having been there on the ground, what do the areas that the
YPG liberated look like on the ground in the wake of the invasion of Afrin?
BB: Turkey sees YPG as its main — or only — enemy in Syria. While the Syrian
government is an enemy, it’s much more difficult to attack a sovereign state
rather than a separatist group up north — well, semi-separatist. The
Westernmost region of the Kurdish controlled zones has always been separate
from the main bulk area where the YPG and the PYD (Democratic Union Party)
are. It was separated first by a large group of ISIS fighters, and then
Turkey came down with the Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) which is the
regular FSA with Turkish army involvement. They came down there and replaced
ISIS in a weird quasi-battle, and it was even more isolated after that.
That happened like a year and a half ago. Ever since then, Erdogan has been
ratcheting up the rhetoric around Afrin — “We gotta destroy these terrorists
on the borders,” stuff like that — and they staged some cross-border
incidents, one of which I saw, but that was in the east, near Kobane. They
would fire across the border and try to provoke YPG, and obviously the
Turkish army, which is the largest or second largest army in NATO, is a
little better equipped. Any sort of retaliation they would point to as the
reason they would need to invade.
They started massing tanks and troops near the border with Afrin, and then
invaded. There was no hope that YPG would ever beat them — you’re going
against a NATO army with an airforce and advanced weaponry. They’ve lost
1500 people, and after two months, pretty much lost all of Afrin city and
most of the territory. They still have a little bit where they share a front
line with a Syrian government-aligned force. The main Turkish plan is to
make this rebel protectorate up north linking the Euphrates Shield area at
Al Bab, which is sort of the center of the north, with the new Afrin-based
FSA zone.
ES: What has been the effect on the Syrian Kurdish groups of the recent
referendum with the Kurdish population in Iraq, and what that has meant for
Kurdish unity or separatism?
BB: The way that I sort of saw it, and the way that a lot of people
interpreted the referendum, was that the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG)
in Iraq has been ruled by the Barzani tribe for a long time and are growing
increasingly unpopular. The peshmerga’s salaries hadn’t been paid in a year,
and the oil revenues were clearly being sapped by members of the Barzani
family, and tensions with the central [Iraqi] government were increasing. I
think that the ruling party, the KDP, saw their influence ebbing. They
weren’t doing very well and needed to shore up some support. They assembled
this bullshit referendum, which I don’t think anyone really believed would
succeed, and which of course would not, and people voted for it, but nothing
happened. [The KDP] basically tried to exacerbate tensions with the central
government to shore up support at home. And it didn’t work, it just
discredited the government more.
For overall Kurdish unity, the left-wing Kurdish groups that are involved
with the Kurdish freedom movement, like the PKK, had a cautious view towards
it — “We don’t support the referendum completely, but people should vote for
it if they want to” — which is a pragmatic thing. The baseline,
non-super-ideological Kurdish nationalists will vote for this — like, people
who support the PKK but also want Kurdish independence — and I think [the
PKK took that stance] not to alienate their base. They sort of played it
quiet on that.
ES: Having spent time with the YPG, how do you reflect on the way Kurds are
treated or referred to within the scope of domestic American politics?
BB: The American government treats Kurds as a monolith. They’ll just say
“Kurds” when they’re talking about pretty wildly different groups and
different political alignments. They mean “Kurds everywhere but Turkey,”
because they never talk about those Kurds. It’s funny, with the YPG and the
way they’re portrayed in the media, it really depends on who’s talking about
them. You’ll see these really idealistic takes from every side, from left
wing to right wing — they have no basis in reality. The American government
always tries to isolate these minorities and then boost them specifically to
divide people in certain regions, like the Hmong in Vietnam and stuff like
that.
The YPG is a left-wing nationalist movement. They use a lot of words like
democracy, which has a different connotation to them. They don’t mean
liberal democracy, and I think that a lot of American politicians — I mean,
some of them are dumb, and some of them are cynical, sort of use that and
use the “Syrian Democratic Forces,” which is a total f—ing sham. They try
and use the Kurds as, “These are the civilized people in that area. They’re
not like the Arabs. They’re different,” as their main point. I think a lot
of it has to do with cynicism and then racism, the way that the American
government talks about them and tries to use them. They think they’re the
most palatable group in the region for their audience.
ES: Yeah, and then there’s those articles about the YPJ [Women’s branch of
the YPG]…
BB: Those ones are really weird. Any sort of article written about the YPJ
is either by someone who is breathlessly regurgitating YPJ propaganda. And
like, I’m for YPJ propaganda, but it’s creepy to see people repeat it
basically word-for-word. Or [they’re written by] really horny people. The
worst kind of writers. It’s super weird. The way that articles are written
about the YPJ creep me the f— out.
ES: What do you see as the political future of the group that you were
involved with?
BB: It’s impossible to predict what’s going to happen in the Syrian Civil
War. The worst case scenario, and kind of a likely one, is that the Turkish
armed forces will probably move east and try to take out all of northern
Syria, like the YPG-held areas. I didn’t mention this before, but the
invasion of Afrin by Turkey came about because they made a deal with Russia
over what seemed to be Syrian government objections to have rebels surrender
in Douma and Ghouta and move to Idlib in exchange for Turkey getting free
reign in the north or the northwest. I hope a similar deal doesn’t happen.
Russia seems to play both sides in this. They flew a YPG leader to Moscow
and gave him a medal in a sort of semi-secret ceremony, but then a month
later gave the green light for Turkey to invade the north, so who knows.
What most people I know want to happen is, they want the Syrian government
to come to an agreement with YPG or PYD for not quite an autonomous area in
the north but one with more minority rights and representation for the
political parties they’ve started. Whether that’s likely I don’t know,
because the US government certainly doesn’t want that to happen and has
recently been trying to inflame tensions with SDF, the front group that the
YPG started. The group has a lot of either reformed FSA people or just
tribal militants — and I don’t mean tribal in the insulting way, but
literally they’re in tribes, that’s how they refer to themselves — and a lot
of those tribal elements especially those from Deir al-Zour and rocket
country are political and occasionally descend into gangsterism. I think the
US is trying to use some of those unreliable elements to fight the Syrian
government to inflame tensions between the SDF-YPG and the Syrian
government. It’s their last chance to topple Assad, which won’t work.
ES: Is there anything else you’d like to say to our readership about the
Syrian Civil War or your personal experience?
BB: I hope [the YPG] are able to overcome what I think is mistaken tactical
alliance with the United States, because if history guides us at all, which
it should, that won’t turn out well for them. I think that the only hope is
to come to an agreement with the Syrian government, and they should do
whatever it takes for that.
There’s a lot of cyclical propaganda in the US government — Assad is, of
course, the devil and the “Free Syrian Army is democratic” rhetoric — but
that FSA line disappeared when it became too obvious that most of them were
in Al-Nusra. If there’s one thing [my time in Syria] taught me it’s just
that all of the press that comes out in America and a lot of the takes on
the Syrian Civil War you see from America or even Lebanon-based writers is
just bullshit. A lot of it is almost state department propaganda, which
makes it very difficult to navigate any news sources for actual truth about
it. I hope the conflict ends soon.
On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 8:45 PM Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > wrote:
Erica,
Wow, am I glad that you posted this whole article! First, it's interesting.
Second, I've seen articles by Ken Clippenstein or his name as author of
articles and I didn't know he has a podcast. I wonder what the name of the
podcast is and what it's about. But most interesting to me is what is in the
discussion of antiFa. It isn't an organization or anything. It's just a lot
of people on the left who have been labeled that way. Some of them actively
identify with the label, while others don't. But most interesting to me was
the explanation of who Brace Belden is. For many weeks, I listened to the
podcast, gtrueanon which focuses on the Jeffrey Epstein case, its background
and history, and the fallout. I listened because it's a fascinating case and
there is a set of multiple articles about it on the Mint Press website that
were difficult to access, or at least some of them were, and they were very
long. So when I heard about the Trueanon podcast on Useful Idiots, I
subscribed. But it is a podcast for much younger people and its style is, I
thought, sort of weird. I listen to other podcasts for young people like
Unauthorized Disclosure, but this was different. Anyway, what I learned
about Brace Belden from his participation on Trueanon, is that he had been
drug addicted, is Jewish, and did some kind of manual labor. It was very
strange. Now, having read this article, I understand a bit more about him,
but not why he went to fight in Syria. I suppose he's like some of the other
young Americans who, because of their own personal inner conflicts, went off
to fight other people's wars in Israel, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > On Behalf Of Erica R
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2020 8:45 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: can we say, Industrial/Military takeover?
Thank you Miriam. Here is the text of the article for those who are
interested.
Homeland Security Is Quietly Tying Antifa to Foreign Powers
An intelligence report obtained exclusively by The Nation mentions several
Americans, including a left-wing podcast host.
Ken Klippenstein
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) intelligence officials are targeting
activists it considers “antifa” and attempting to tie them to a foreign
power, according to a DHS intelligence report obtained exclusively by The
Nation.
The intelligence report, titled “The Syrian Conflict and its Nexus to the
U.S.-based Antifascist Movement,” mentions several Americans, including a
left-wing podcast host who traveled to Syria to fight ISIS. The report
includes a readout of these individuals’ personal information, including
their Social Security numbers, home addresses, and social media accounts,
much of the data generated by DHS’s Tactical Terrorism Response Teams. As
the intelligence report states, “ANTIFA is being analyzed under the 2019 DHS
Strategic Framework for Countering Terrorism (CT) and Targeted Violence.”
Dated July 14, the document, marked for official use only and law
enforcement sensitive, draws on a blend of publicly available information
and state and federal law enforcement intelligence. It was provided to The
Nation by a source who previously worked on DHS intelligence.
“They targeted Americans like they’re Al Qaeda” a former senior DHS
intelligence officer with knowledge of the operations told The Nation. The
officer, who served for years in the DHS’s Office of Intelligence & Analysis
(I&A), compared the operations to the illegal surveillance of activists
during the civil rights era. “They essentially were violating people’s
rights like this was the ’60s…the type of shit the Church and Pike
committee[s] had to address.”
While the law generally prohibits intelligence agencies from spying on US
residents, many of those protections do not apply if the individual is
believed to be acting as an agent of a foreign power.
“Designating someone as foreign-sponsored can make a huge legal and
practical difference in the government’s ability to pursue them,” explained
Steven Aftergood, who heads the Project on Government Secrecy at the
Federation of American Scientists. “It’s a crucial distinction. Once someone
(or some group) is identified as an agent of a foreign power, they are
subject to warrantless search and surveillance in a way that would be
illegal and unconstitutional for any other US person. The whole apparatus of
US intelligence can be brought to bear on someone who is considered an agent
of a foreign power.”
Last week, the DHS reassigned its intelligence chief after The Washington
Post revealed that the agency had been compiling intelligence reports on
American journalists and activists in Portland. In response to President
Trump’s executive order to protect monuments and other federal property, the
DHS created the “Protecting American Communities Task Force,” which sent DHS
assets to Portland and other cities. The agency has found itself in
transition under the Trump administration.“They are always pressuring I&A
for political reasons; it’s been like that since the election,” the former
intelligence officer said.
This weekend, Politico reported that DHS Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli
loosened oversight of I&A. Cuccinelli, at I&A’s request, curtailed the
requirement that the DHS’s Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties
approve I&A’s intelligence products prior to distribution to law enforcement
partners.
The intelligence report’s executive summary states:
In June 2020, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) National Targeting
Center (NTC) Counter Network Division (CND) compiled CBP encounter data on
individuals who returned from Syria and fought with the Yekîneyên Parastina
Gel (YPG, translation: PEOPLE’S PROTECTION UNITS), and had some with
reported ties to a U.S.-based ANTIFA (Anti-fascist) movement. CBP concerns
about and interest in these individuals stem from the types of skills and
motivations that may have developed during their time overseas in foreign
conflicts.
These skills were also appreciated by the US military, which cooperated with
the YPG in fighting ISIS for years. Last year, President Trump enraged many
in the US military when he green-lighted a Turkish offensive against the
Kurdish militia. Jim Mattis reportedly resigned as defense secretary in part
because of what he considered a betrayal of our Kurdish allies.
The intelligence report describes over half a dozen people who traveled to
Syria in order to fight alongside Kurdish factions—usually the YPG, but also
other Kurdish groups like the PKK and the Peshmerga. Some of the individuals
described have denied membership in antifa but variously identified with
far-left causes. The DHS appears to define antifa broadly, to encompass
various left-wing tendencies: “[A]ntifa is driven by a mixed range of
far-left political ideologies, including anti-capitalism, communism,
socialism, and anarchism.” In two cases, evidence of antifa affiliation was
limited to photos taken in front of an antifa flag. As the intelligence
report itself notes, “ANTIFA claims no official leadership,” raising
questions about whether antifa even exists in any sort of operational
capacity.
The first individual mentioned in the intelligence report, Brace Belden,
cohosts the popular left-wing podcast TrueAnon, and fought with the YPG in
2016. The information appears to be partly drawn from a 2017 article on
Belden in Rolling Stone. Belden is described as “a minor criminal and drug
addict who started reading Marx and Lenin in drug rehabilitation treatment
and became involved in a number of political causes before deciding to fight
alongside the YPG.”
The report goes on to describe an encounter between Belden and border
authorities.
U.S. citizen (USC) Brace BELDEN was encountered on 08 April 2017, arriving
in San Francisco, California from Frankfurt, Germany. BELDEN was returning
from a six month tour of volunteering to fight with the YPG under the
umbrella of the Syrian Democrat Forces (SDF) fighting ISIS in Syria as part
of the ongoing Raqqa offensive starting in November 2016 to retake Raqqa
from ISIS. BELDEN stated he recently learned that an open source article had
been written about him and his “Anarchist” fighters.
Belden scoffed at the association. “I am not now nor have I ever been a
member of any antifa organization,” he told The Nation. “The US government
has been spying on and smearing communists for 100 years, but they usually
have the decency not to call a Red an anarchist!”
“There appears to be a clear connection…between ANTIFA ideology and Kurdish
democratic federalism teachings and ideology,” the intelligence report
states. At least one of the activists listed is described as being
ethnically Kurdish.
On May 31, Trump vowed to designate antifa a “terrorist organization.” While
antifa groups have engaged in acts of property destruction, antifa has not
been linked to a single murder in the United States, according to data
compiled in the past 25 years by the Center for Strategic and International
Studies. By contrast, the same data found that far-right extremist groups
had killed 329 people.
The intelligence report appears to conclude that the individuals described
were not acting on behalf of a foreign group—save for one unnamed person.
“Aside from a single instance derived from open-source reporting, there does
not appear to be evidence of a centralized effort to give marching orders to
returning ANTIFA-affiliated USPER [US person] foreign fighters once they
return to the United States.”
On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 4:25 PM Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > wrote:
Hello Erica,
Yes, it's fine to share a link. I try, when it's not too difficult, to share
the article because it's more difficult for some of us to get to some links
than for others of us, me included. I guess I don't try to read more of
those online Nation articles than three because I've never been barred when
I access an article from that free daily email I receive each day.
That reminds me, I do read The Nation which I download from BARD, or some of
it, and also, The New Yorker. Just now, I've been reading an article in the
August 3/10 issue of The New Yorker about the 1960 Kennedy campaign by Jill
Le Por. It reminds me that political campaigns are run by incredibly cynical
people and some of what happened, is reminiscent of the 2016 primary
campaign between Clinton and Sanders.
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > On Behalf Of Erica R
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2020 5:14 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: can we say, Industrial/Military takeover?
Thanks for the share. I was particularly struck by this passage: "AIC acting
director Nand Mulchandani advanced this narrative when he claimed China had
“the world’s most advanced [AI] capabilities, such as unregulated facial
recognition for universal surveillance and control of their domestic
population, trained on Chinese video gathered from their systems.”
Mulchandani, nevertheless, conceded that the “U.S. is capable of doing
similar things,” but offered only the U.S. Constitution as the barrier that
would prevent America from building “such universal surveillance and
censorship systems.”"
Regarding the constitutionality of surveillance--I was reminded of reports
released earlier this week by The Nation's Ken Klippenstein revealing DHS
surveillance of Americans with previous involvement in the YPG. Linked here
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/dhs-antifa-syria/
I am new to the list. Let me know if this is an appropriate way to share
links. The Nation does have a paywall after 3 articles have been read in a
month, I believe.
Erica
On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 9:52 AM Carl Jarvis <carjar82@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:carjar82@xxxxxxxxx> > wrote:
Of course we can!
Miriam, I was going to comment on the post, along with my complaining.
When we look at our military expenditures and the profits "earned" by
the Corporations profiting directly off the military, and the huge tax
supported employment of military personnel(servicemen and service
women, generally known as Grunts)what more proof will it take?
Strange behavior for a nation that professes to be able to communicate
directly with God, but can't hear the rattle of sabers and the
explosion of many bombs.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/5/20, Carl Jarvis <carjar82@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:carjar82@xxxxxxxxx> >
wrote:
Miriam,
I thought I'd sent out several messages, but happened to check to see
if I'd entered the right address on an email, and discovered that the
process of entering only part of an address, and having the entire
address appear, no longer worked. Since I have over 800 names in my
Contact file, having to search for each address makes me feel like
shutting down my computer and getting some long overdue work around
the house taken care of.
I've tried everything including contacting the google help center.
They gave me a huge number of suggestions, and people who had the same
problem, but most of it was not helpful, and the rest did not work on
my ancient machine.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/5/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > wrote:
The reason I couldn't send this article last night was that as I was
trying,
my internet went down. We had a severe tropical storm yesterday. Up to
that
point, we'd been unaffected because when this house was purchased, I
purchased a generator for it, having been traumatized by Hurricane
Sandy.
But the cable? That, I had no control over. It just came back now.
Miriam
From: Raul at MintPress News <share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> >
Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2020 8:09 PM
To: =?utf-8?Q??= <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> >
Subject: US aggression against China's AI officially a bipartisan effort
Add <mailto:share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ;<mailto:share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> >
share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:share@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> to your
address book to avoid spam filters.
<https://mailchi.mp/mintpressnews/us-aggression-against-chinas-ai-officially-a-bipartisan-effort?e=963fedaebb>
View this email in your browser
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=6b4d8bbd08&e=963fedaebb>
&id=6b4d8bbd08&e=963fedaebb>
Raul Diego
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=ee94ae5408&e=963fedaebb>
&id=ee94ae5408&e=963fedaebb>
reports on the bipartisan anti-China plan for Artificial Intelligence
Does anyone really believe the US has public interest in mind when it
comes
to technology and artificial intelligence?
The bipartisan plan on AI offers five “Key Principles” the first of
which
involves the implementation of the DoD’s “Ethical Principles for AI,” a
set
of broad
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=a957f46f04&e=963fedaebb>
&id=a957f46f04&e=963fedaebb>
rules meant to guide “both combat and non-combat functions” of AI, which
are
to be enforced by the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC);
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=7f1b73e012&e=963fedaebb>
&id=7f1b73e012&e=963fedaebb>
an agency established in 2018 within the Pentagon.
Should the Pentagon be trusted to dictate AI ethics?
Read more
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=0e02ed83d5&e=963fedaebb>
&id=0e02ed83d5&e=963fedaebb>
about the plan and make sure to share the article with a friend.
In solidarity,
Raul at MintPress News
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=25554b651d&e=963fedaebb>
&id=25554b651d&e=963fedaebb>
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=e0486e21a6&e=963fedaebb>
&id=e0486e21a6&e=963fedaebb>
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=884d5aa55a&e=963fedaebb>
&id=884d5aa55a&e=963fedaebb>
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=d259b7d84a&e=963fedaebb>
&id=d259b7d84a&e=963fedaebb>
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/track/click?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=69531b6e65&e=963fedaebb>
&id=69531b6e65&e=963fedaebb>
Copyright © 2020 Mint Press News, All rights reserved.
Our mailing address is:
Mint Press News
3500 Vicksburg Ln N #312
Minneapolis, MN 55447
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/vcard?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/vcard?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=51e062931b>
&id=51e062931b>
Add us to your address book
You received this email because you signed up for our newsletter!
Changed your mind?
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
U
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
nsubscribe
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb&c=fa299891e8>
here.
Or you can
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/profile?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156
<https://mintpressnews.us5.list-manage.com/profile?u=3b33b8b02bdc833e727219156&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb>
&id=51e062931b&e=963fedaebb>
update your preferences.