"Berkeley Says No to Torture" Week, October 10-16

I'm happy to announce that I will be participating with some great people during Berkeley's "Say No to Torture" week event, held mostly at the UC Berkeley campus. The week of activities was proposed via resolution by the Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission, which was passed by the Berkeley City Council on September 21, "making clear that the community finds it unacceptable for an American torture apparatus to remain operational while those responsible remain unaccountable."

Participants during the week of protests, readings, panel discussions, and film showings will include Barry Eisler, Jason Leopold, Andy Worthington, Marjorie Cohn, Ray McGovern, Justine Sharrock, Shahid Buttar, Mimi Kennedy, Adrianne Aron, Fr. Louis Vitale, and more. Sponsors of the various events include World Can't Wait, School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) East Bay/SF, National Lawyers Guild, Boalt Chapter (NLG-Boalt), Code Pink, Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Social Justice Committee, Progressive Democrats of America, Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, and FireJohnYoo.org.

For more information, go to the website wesaynototorture.net. Also see the Facebook page here. Additionally, those interested should read Andy Worthington's post describing the importance of the event.

“Berkeley Says No to Torture” Week: EVENTS LIST

Sunday October 10, 2010, 7 pm: Author Readings and Discussion with Andy Worthington and Justine Sharrock.
Revolution Books, 2425 Channing Way, Berkeley.
Andy Worthington, author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison and Justine Sharrock, author of Tortured: When Good Soldiers Do Bad Things, read from their books and discuss Guantánamo, the “War on Terror” and the corrosive effect of torture on US soldiers as well as the Bush administration’s victims. Also see the Facebook page here.

Monday October 11, 7 pm: Screening of “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo.” Followed by Q&A with Andy Worthington.
Fellowship Hall, 1924 Cedar Street (at Bonita Avenue), Berkeley.
Andy Worthington, the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo,” described by Time Out as “a strong movie examining the imprisonment and subsequent torture of those falsely accused of anti-American conspiracy,” attends the screening, and will talk and answer questions afterwards. This event is sponsored by Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Social Justice Committee.

Tuesday October 12, daytime, 11:00 am: Protest action against John Yoo.
UC Berkeley Law (Boalt Hall), on Bancroft at College Avenue.
Protest at the location where John Yoo teaches constitutional law and a second class every Tuesday. Sponsored by World Can't Wait and others.
Location: Boalt Hall, 2778 Bancroft Way (at College Ave.)

Tuesday October 12, evening, 6:30-8:00 pm: The Giant John Yoo Debate.
UC Berkeley campus. Location and time TBA.
Join the World Can’t Wait, lawyers, law students, and other surprise guests for a real debate about John Yoo’s theories and legal work defending torture.

Wednesday Oct 13, 12:00 noon: Protest Action – Say No to Torture
Banner, posters provided. Sponsored by CodePink
Location: Marine Recruitment Station, 64 Shattuck Square, 1/2 block south of University Avenue

Wednesday October 13, 2010, 4:30 pm: Defying Torture - The Art of Dissent.
UC Berkeley Art Museum Theater, 2621 Durant Avenue, Berkeley.
A conversation with Peter Selz, art historian and Professor Emeritus of Art History at UC Berkeley, and political artist Clinton Fein, famous for his series, “Torture,” based on the Abu Ghraib photos, along with artist Richard Kamler.

Wednesday October 13, 2010, 7:00 pm: Roundtable – Writers on Torture: Barry Eisler, Andy Worthington, Justine Sharrock.
University Lutheran Church, 2425 College Ave., Berkeley.
Barry Eisler, best-selling thriller writer and author of the new rendition- and torture-based novel Inside Out joins Andy Worthington and Justine Sharrock to discuss fact, fiction, the crimes of the “War on Terror,” and approaches to writing about these topics and disseminating them to the public. Moderated by Shahid Buttar (Bill of Rights Defense Committee).

Thursday October 14, 2010, 7:00 pm: Forum on Torture and the Law, Torture and Human Rights, with Marjorie Cohn, Andy Worthington, Shahid Buttar and Debra Sweet.
Boalt Hall, UC Berkeley Law, Rm 105, 2778 Bancroft Way
Marjorie Cohn (author and past President of the National Lawyers Guild), Andy Worthington (journalist, author and filmmaker), Shahid Buttar (Bill of Rights Defense Committee), and Debra Sweet (National Director, the World Can’t Wait) discuss torture, human rights and the law. Moderated by Ray McGovern.

Friday October 15, 2010, afternoon, 1:30-3:00 pm: Panel: Torture, Human Experimentation, and the Department of Defense
Jason Leopold (Truthout) interviews psychologist, blogger, and activist Jeffrey Kaye.
Location: Booth Auditorium, UC Berkeley Law, 2778 Bancroft Way (at Piedmont)

Friday October 15, 2010, afternoon, 3:00-4:30 pm: Panel: Psychologists and Torture.
UC Berkeley Law (Boalt Hall) campus, Booth Auditorium, UC Berkeley Law, 2778 Bancroft Way (at Piedmont).
With anti-torture psychologists Adrianne Aron, Ruth Fallenbaum, Adrianne Aron, Pierre LaBossiere, and Patricia Isasa. Co-sponsored by School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) East Bay/SF. See Psychologists for an Ethical APA for more information on psychologists’ opposition to the torture program implemented by the Bush administration.

Friday October 15, 2010, evening, 7:00 pm: Reckoning with Torture - An Evening of Conscience with Andy Worthington, Marjorie Cohn, Ray McGovern, Ann Wright, Mimi Kennedy, devorah major, Jeffrey Kaye, Fr. Louis Vitale, Renee Saucedo, Jason Leopold, Kathy Roberts, Abdi Soltani and more.
UC Berkeley Law (Boalt Hall) campus, Booth Auditorium.
“Reckoning with Torture: An Evening of Conscience” contains a powerful script, originated by the ACLU and American PEN Center, based on memos and testimonies from the “War on Terror,” which has been produced in New York and Washington, D.C., but has never before been performed on the West Coast. Guests including peace activists Ray McGovern and Ann Wright, Mimi Kennedy, devorah major, Jeffrey Kaye and Jason Leopold of Truthout will be joining “Berkeley Says No to Torture” Week regulars Andy Worthington and Marjorie Cohn to read these powerful texts. This event is sponsored by the Boalt Alliance to Abolish Torture (BAAT) and the National Lawyers Guild, Boalt Chapter (NLG-Boalt), and the performance will be followed by a reception with the readers and audience. For ticket sales/reservations please email.

Saturday, Oct 16, 7:00 pm: “Pedro and the Captain”
Dramatic reading from the play by Mario Benedetti, with Mark McGoldrick and Youseef Elias, directed by Angelina Llongueras.  Performed in honor of "Berkeley Says No To Torture" Week.
Fireside Room, Live Oak Community Center, 1301 Shattuck Avenue

Police State Tactics at Pittsburgh G20 Protests

Essential reporting from Amy Goodman's Democracy Now! Apparently, the use of sound cannon is the first reported usage in the United States.

Nearly 200 Arrested as Police Unleash Tear Gas, Sound Cannons at G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh

As leaders of the world’s richest nations gathered in Pittsburgh for the G-20 summit, thousands took to the streets in protest amidst a heavy police crackdown. Heavily armed riot police were out in force and used tear gas, stun grenades, smoke canisters and sound cannons, which direct extremely loud shrill sounds. Democracy Now! producer Steve Martinez files a report from the streets of Pittsburgh.

Watch the whole video report at Democracy Now!

In Time for G20, CCR Re-Issues Its Pamphlet, "If an Agent Knocks"

Just in time for the G20 summit meeting in Pittsburgh, Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) has issued a new edition of its 1989 pamphlet, If an Agent Knocks (PDF).

Bill Quigley, legal director at CCR, describes in an article at Alternet the circumstances surrounding the G20 summit and accompanying protests:

The recent decision of Federal Judge Gary Lancaster in Pittsburgh allowing protests at the upcoming G20 summit is an important one because, since 9/11, protesting against the government has become quite a bit harder.

Six peace and justice groups sued local state and federal government officials over severe restrictions on protesting at the gathering this month of the industrialized world's leading Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors -- precisely the sort of public event that free speech rights were designed for. The case, brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Pennsylvania ACLU, resulted in the government giving more permits to protest and the court allowing a tent city protest.

.... government has poured billions into law enforcement with the result that their response to protests are in many cases no longer civil law enforcement but now quasi-military, a chance to both show off their new toys, and an opportunity for security forces to practice their mass response actions.... federal forces have taken over the leadership for security at any large protest so that local and state law enforcement have less and less to say in how the event is managed.

Additionally, local and state law enforcement forces have been given billions of extra dollars to fight terrorism. Hundreds of millions of these dollars have gone into special riot control and high tech security equipment. This means all police departments have lots of extra headgear, shin guards, shields, batons, pepper spray, tasers, bigger weapons and communication equipment. Most big city police departments have new armored vehicles and helicopters to fight terror. Every big police department has an anti-terrorism squad now. At big protests it is now common to see local police dressed up like and acting like military commandos. This militarization of law enforcement clearly inhibits the free exercise of the First Amendment right to protest.

As an email announcement for the re-release of If An Agent Knocks (PDF) explained:

Right now, thousands of activists who have gathered in Pittsburgh to protest at the G20 summit have been met with what we have come to expect: overreaction by authorities and illegal preventive tactics by law enforcement officials at all levels. A secret communications hub with "electronic eyes" has been established by the Secret Service, working with over 40 other agencies to infiltrate, spy on, and disrupt all forms of opposition. Raids and arrests are mounting, and the aggressive and well-planned system of cracking down on dissenting voices and reducing media coverage is strongly in effect.

CCR has responded to the increasing threat to dissent in a number of ways. For months now a CCR board member and cooperating attorney, Jules Lobel, has worked with on the ground organizations to secure permits and challenge restrictions to protests. Last week, in collaboration with the ACLU, he successfully represented several organizations in court and secured the right to demonstrate in a city park during the G20 gathering. And in a filing on Monday, we charged the local police with illegal searches, vehicle seizures, raids and detentions of Seeds of Peace members aimed at preventing them from providing food to protestors. CCR's legal director, Bill Quigley, is in Pittsburgh advocating on behalf of the protestors, and CCR will continue its support....

Since its original release in 1989, CCR's "If an Agent Knocks" [PDF] has been widely circulated in progressive activist communities across the country. This guide includes both the timeless advice included in the original version and extensive updates to reflect the current state of the law and law enforcement tools. It also includes a comprehensive discussion of today's technology, including cell phones, e-mail and Web browsing.

"If An Agent Knocks" is an invaluable tool for activists in a time when efforts to repress expressions of opposition are intensified. We want to get this publication into as many hands as possible. To obtain a free copy, please email iaak@ccrjustice.org. You can also download it in pdf form. Tell your friends and fellow activists about "If An Agent Knocks," and urge them to place an order too.

Psychologist Statement to Yoo Protesters

John Yoo has returned to Boalt Law School, UC Berkeley, where he is a tenured professor, and was met by protesters calling for his dismissal. They also demanded he be disbarred and prosecuted. Ultimately, campus cops arrested four of the protesters, who were later released. The protest was organized by Code Pink and World Can't Wait.

Yoo infamously is one the primary authors of a series of memos put out by the Office of Legal Counsel during the Bush administration that justified the use of torture. I suppose that in his civil law class at Boalt, students won't be subjected to Yoo legal opinions such as the President's right to order the torture of a child, even unto crushing its testicles.


Psychologist and anti-activist Ruth Fallenbaum sent the following statement which was read at the 17 August demonstration:

Psychologists for an Ethical APA, which I represent, feel a special bond with you here who are enraged by the knowledge that John Yoo is still employed by the University of California, Berkeley, to teach law to future attorneys. We share the sense that there is something particularly ugly about people taking the skills and expertise of their profession and contorting them in such a way as to hurt people as well as to violate the core values of their respective professions. American psychologists have their own John Yoos, and what’s worse is that our professional association, the American Psychological Association, has quietly but firmly protected and encouraged them since the onset of the so-called war on terror.

If you are interested in the story of psychologists’ complicity in programs of torture at Guantanamo and elsewhere, I encourage you to go to our website at www.ethicalapa.com for links to articles etc. But the quick version is that psychologists have been at the center of designing methods of psychological torture that probably remain in use as we speak – sleep deprivation, humiliation, etc. Their presence at detention settings like Guantanamo has been used to suggest that the presence of mental health professionals at these settings proves that the treatment of the detainees is proper, yet the reports by detainees and their lawyers, as well as the incidence of suicide, clearly suggest the contrary. When knowledge of the presence of psychologists in these settings became known to the public 3-4 years ago, some psychologists began to challenge APA to do something, to speak out, to discipline participating psychologists and tell them that participating in programs where torture is taking place is unethical. To our dismay, APA took the opposite stance, asserting that psychologists belonged at Guantanamo and were aiding the fight against terrorism. Furthermore, we discovered, in 2002, APA’s ethics committee changed the ethics code to allow psychologists, when confronted with a conflict between their ethics and orders from a legal authority, to go ahead and follow the orders. I kid you not. The same defense used by Nazis and nullified during the Nuremberg trials was actually written into the APA ethics code.

A number of psychologists leaped into action, and we have been busy ever since. A movement to withhold dues led to two years of rallies and leafleting at APA’s annual conventions, first in San Francisco, then in Boston. When names emerged of offending psychologists, individual members filed ethics complaints – all of which have languished in the bowels of APA. Last year we used a little-known and never before used provision in APA bylaws to initiate a referendum calling for the barring of all psychologists from working in settings that violate the Geneva Conventions unless they are working directly for the detainees or for human rights organizations. We managed to gather enough signatures to call the vote, and one year ago, a ballot went out to every one of APA’s approximately 90,000 members in which we were able to state our pro position and rebut APA’s con position. By mid September the vote was final, and we had won. The ban on psychologists working at Guantanamo and any site where people are detained outside of or in violation of Geneva was now official APA policy. Nice, but in the intervening year very little has actually happened. True, letters were sent from APA’s presidents, first to Bush and his administration, then to Obama and his crew, informing them of the new policy. But the many further steps needed to make it actually happen have not been taken. Within APA, bureaucratic and procedural stalling has been the order of the day.

We are trying to deal with that reality, protesting to this person, lobbying that one, attacking the Nuremberg section of the ethics code and trying to get that changed, pushing to get information of the new policy distributed to the folks who need the information. And so on.

Back to John Yoo and to U.C. Berkeley. Our experience should not be lost on American attorneys. It is particularly important that Yoo’s fellow attorneys – whether colleagues in teaching, the Bar Association, and or students of law – make their anger known. His actions are a stain on your profession, and you will feel a lot better about your own work if you take action to discipline him and his fellow abusers.

And finally, as a member of the UC Berkeley class of ’71, I will certainly not give a dime to my alma mater until the university takes responsibility for providing a safe haven for John Yoo and conducts a thorough and immediate investigation of his actions as grounds for dismissal.

Rallies for Torture Accountability Day, Thursday, June 25

Hat-tip to David Swanson at AfterDowningStreet.org

Rallies Around U.S. To Demand Accountability for Torture
http://accountability4torture.com

Thursday, June 25, 2009, has been designated Torture Accountability Action Day by a large coalition of human rights groups planning rallies and marches in major U.S. cities, including a rally in Washington, D.C.'s John Marshall Park at 11 a.m. followed by a noon march to the Justice Department where some participants will risk arrest in nonviolent protest if a special prosecutor for torture is not appointed.

Events are planned in Washington, D.C.; San Francisco, CA; Pasadena, CA; Thousand Oaks, CA; Boston, MA; Salt Lake City, UT; Seattle, WA; Portland, OR; Las Vegas, NV; Honolulu, HI; Tampa, FL; Philadelphia, PA; and Anchorage, AK, with details available online:
http://tortureaccountability.webs.com/eventsacrossus.htm

In Washington, D.C., groups will maintain literature tables from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at John Marshall Park, 501 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. A rally will begin at 11 a.m. with speakers including:

* Marjorie Cohn, President of the National Lawyers Guild, professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law;
* Njambi Good, Director of Counter Terror with Justice Campaign, Amnesty International USA;
* Enver Masud, Founder and CEO of The Wisdom Fund, recipient of the 2002 Gold Award from the Human Rights Foundation for his book "The War on Islam";
* Max Obuszewski, member of the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance;
* Marcus Raskin, Cofounder of the Institute for Policy Studies;
* Patricio Rice, torture survivor;
* Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, Cofounder of the Partnership for Civil Justice;
* Kevin Zeese, Director of VotersForPeace.US, Board Member of VelvetRevolution.US.
With performances by Jordan Page, Tha Truth, and David Ippolito.

Participants will march at noon to the Department of Justice, where some but not all of the participating organizations will engage in nonviolent resistance if the Attorney General has not yet agreed to appoint a special prosecutor for torture. (Some of the organizations sponsoring the day of rallies do not engage in civil disobedience.)

In Pasadena, Calif., at 12 p.m. PT citizens will submit a formal judicial misconduct complaint against 9th Circuit Judge Jay Bybee, former Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel: Courthouse steps, Chambers Courthouse, 125 South Grand Ave., Pasadena, CA 91105.

Statement of Purpose:

The highest officials in our government have trampled on our traditional ideals of making America a nation of laws, not of men, by illegally narrowing the scope of torture and authorizing waterboarding, walling, and other inhumane interrogation techniques. In doing so, they have violated the Anti-Torture Act, the War Crimes Act, the Geneva Conventions, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Convention Against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment.

In order to enforce our laws and restore the free society that our forefathers envisioned, citizens must demand accountability for abuses of the laws pertaining to torture. In the tradition of the Civil Rights movement, change will not occur unless citizens stand up for their rights under the law.

Torture Accountability Action Day Is Sponsored By:

Action Center for Justice
After Downing Street
Amnesty International
Bryn Mawr Peace Coalition
BuzzFlash
Coalition for Peace Action
Code Pink
Consumers for Peace
Democrats.com
Eldoradans Against Torture
Global Exchange
High Road for Human Rights
Hip Hop Caucus
Historians Against the War
IndictBushNow
Individuals for Justice
Marcus Raskin
National Accountability Network
National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance
NJ Peace Action
NJ People's Organization for Progress
Northern Virginians for Peace and Justice
Polygraph Radio
Peace Action
Peace and Justice Forums Billings Montana
Portland Peaceful Response Coalition
Progressive Democrats of America
Project Vote Count
School of the Americas Watch
Senior Action Network
The Torture Abolition Survivors Support Coalition
US Labor Against War
Veterans for Peace
War Criminals Watch
Washington Peace Center
We Are Change LA
Witness Against Torture
World Can't Wait