Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
You may not agree with the NFL protest but they do have the right, as you have the right to say you don't like it.
SUMMARY: Football stadiums across the country became fields of protests as more than 200 NFL players sat, kneeled or locked arms during the National Anthem in response to President Trump's remarks and tweets about professional athletes. Jeffrey Brown reports on the player's protests, then Judy Woodruff speaks with Jerry Brewer of The Washington Post about the debates these acts have sparked.
SUMMARY: In the Trump administration, questions of transparency start with the President's tax returns and why he's not releasing them. But there are also questions about White House visitor logs and who's advising the President. John Yang reports and Judy Woodruff talks to Richard Painter of the University of Minnesota and Noah Bookbinder of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
SUMMARY: When British Prime Minister Theresa May met with President Trump in January, she extended a special honor; an invitation for a state visit, which only two Presidents have received since 1952. But the President's visit to the U.K. has become politically fraught, prompting protests and petitions, and every aspect of the trip is in flux. Special correspondent Ryan Chilcote reports from London.
SUMMARY: NewsHour's Hari Sreenivasan sits down with the President of the Black Police Association of Greater Dallas for a deeper look at police misconduct, the code of silence, and what it is like to be both a police officer and an African American in 2016.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): How long do you think until this community heals itself from this?
LIEUTENANT THOMAS GLOVER, President of the Black Police Association: I'd like to say we're on our way to healing now but all it takes is the next bad actor to upset that…
HARI SREENIVASAN: We went to see Lieutenant Thomas Glover in Dallas two days after the police shootings. He's the President of the area's Black Police Association and has the perspective on what it's like to be a police officer and an African American. I started by asking him if it's possible to want criminal justice reform while at the same time valuing the life of every police officer.
LIEUTENANT THOMAS GLOVER:I think it is, as an individual I'm that way, as an African American man, in America with over 35 years on the police department, I am that way. The majority of the police officers that I know, we all want to see behavior that is improperly exhibited by a police officer criminalized. You have to do your job as a police officer and then, on the other hand, when you remove your uniform and badge and you go home many of us spend our times in the black community. The social organizations we tend to become members of are black, the fraternities, sororities, alumni associations so we go from being police officers who work in a process where its our duty to do what we were sworn to do and that's uphold the laws but then you have some very heinous things that happen. I will not compromise my convictions, as an African American male for the convenience of being a police officer, just can't do it. I have reported misconduct. I have reported what I believe was to be excessive force and I have vigorously tried to call out people who openly practice what I would say were discriminatory acts or racist acts of treatment of people of color. And so that crossroads is very evident as an African American police officer because first of all you are a part of the community. There's nothing I will ever be able to do that will dissolve my black skin, nothing.
SUMMARY: Forty-nine years ago this week, Newark, in New Jersey burned in rebellion against police brutality and racial injustice. Today, activists and authorities continue to grapple with many of the same issues. In this segment, hear perspectives from protesters and police at a Newark rally in the wake of the shootings in Dallas, St. Paul and Baton Rouge.
SUMMARY: Last week, news broke on social media on the shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, and of police officers in Dallas. Platforms like Facebook Live provided audiences with a front row seat to violent and graphic imagery that sparked national debate about police brutality and race relations in America. At the same time, social media provided a platform for messages of support and pleas for unity. Hari Sreenivasan reports.
SUMMARY: Newshour Weekend special correspondent Chris Bury reports on new efforts in the Twin Cities of Minnesota to change how and when police interact with residents. In almost an opposite theory to what's been called “Broken Windows” policing, there is an organized move to eliminate many low-level offenses. This approach raises the question: Would many of the police shootings of young men of color happen, if they were never pulled over or stopped in the first place?
SUMMARY: Monifa Bandele, the senior campaign director of MomsRising.Org; Journalist Ian Tuttle, a fellow at the National Review; and retired NY police detective Marquez Claxton, director of the Black Law Enforcement Alliance, discuss their thoughts on how to find common ground on policing, protest and race.
SUMMARY: President Barack Obama will be in Dallas Tuesday for an interfaith service to mourn the five police officers cut down in last week's sniper ambush. The killings have done little to muffle growing national protests against police violence as rallies, marches and human roadblocks spread from cities like New York and Baton Rouge to St. Paul and Memphis. Gwen Ifill reports.
GWEN IFILL (NewsHour):The nation is still grappling tonight with a series of tragedies, recent police killings of black men, and the sniper attack in Dallas.
It follows a long weekend of crowds confronting police and of mass arrests. Protesters are taking to the streets across the country. But in Dallas, the anger is tempered by grief for the five officers killed Thursday night.
Police Chief David Brown said today he is running on fumes.
DAVID BROWN, Chief, Dallas Police Department: My brain is fried. The memorization it takes to run a major city police department just on a normal process day with all things that happen is overwhelming. So this transpiring along with the normal things that are continuing to happen in the city is difficult at best.
GWEN IFILL: Doctors who tried to save Thursday's victims grew emotional at a hospital news conference today.
DR. BRIAN WILLIAMS, Parkland Memorial Hospital:This killing, it has to stop, black men dying and being forgotten, people retaliating against the people that are sworn to defend us. We have to come together and end all this.
GWEN IFILL: Meanwhile, detectives are reviewing more than 170 hours of body camera video, plus 300 witness and officer statements. They're searching for more background on Micah Johnson, the gunman who opened fire during an otherwise peaceful protest.
His parents told TheBlaze Web site today that his time in the Army Reserve wasn't what he thought it would be. They say he changed from a fun-loving extrovert into a hermit. Johnson died after a lengthy standoff with police.
Chief Brown said today he has no regrets about the decision to kill him with a robot-delivered bomb.
DAVID BROWN: We knew through negotiations this was the suspect, because he was asking, how many did he get? And he was telling us how many more he wanted to kill. This wasn't an ethical dilemma for me. I would do it again.
GWEN IFILL: In Baton Rouge, Louisiana, authorities arrested nearly 200 protesters demonstrating over the killing of Alton Sterling, captured on video last week, apparently by two officers.
Among those arrested, prominent Black Lives Matter activist DeRay McKesson, who was released Sunday.
DERAY MCKESSON, Black Lives Matter Activist:The only people that were violent last Saturday night were the Baton Rouge Police Department. The protesters remain peaceful both here and across the country. Again, I remain deeply disappointed in the Baton Rouge Police Department.
GWEN IFILL: Last night, Baton Rouge officers in riot gear kept protesters from entering Interstate 110 with what activists described as heavy-handed tactics. Hundreds also marched over the weekend in St. Paul, Minnesota, where picture was shot to death during a traffic stop; 21 officers were injured Saturday night.
Today, city leaders said they were caught off guard.
MAYOR CHRIS COLEMAN, St. Paul, Minnesota: The folks that were out there will all tell you that the restraint that our officers showed was second to none, but at some point when our officers are being bombarded by concrete and rebar, to the point where they are being injured, we need to respond.
SUMMARY: These are especially difficult times for black law enforcement officers who, painfully sometimes, see that the complaints that some of their fellow cops are racist are real. Hari Sreenivasan holds a frank discussion with Lieutenant Thomas Glover, the president of the Black Police Association Of Greater Dallas, who makes a special plea for President Barack Obama to make a difference.
SUMMARY: The image was stark as President Barack Obama tried to comfort a country still reeling from days of bloodshed, protest and racial tension. Five chairs, holding flags and police caps, to represent the five officers killed by a sniper's bullets. In eulogizing the fallen, Obama also made the case that racism, institutional and otherwise, is real — and cannot be dismissed. Judy Woodruff reports.
SUMMARY: Pressure has been mounting between the U.S. and China on issues ranging from Chinese military activity to reining in North Korea's nuclear efforts. But tensions are also rising within that country, due to economic instability and a crackdown on dissent. Christopher Johnson of the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Andrew Nathan of Columbia University join Hari Sreenivasan for more.
HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour): For the Chinese leader, it’s a moment on the world stage, on issues ranging from the growing tensions over China’s military activity in the South China Sea, to Beijing’s ability to rein in North Korea’s nuclear efforts.
PRESIDENT XI JINPING, China (through interpreter): Especially, we want to enhance communication and coordination on the Korea nuclear issue and other regional and global issues, and to consolidate and expand our shared interests.
HARI SREENIVASAN:But Xi’s biggest challenge may be back home, where there are signs of growing discontent. Partly, it’s economic, a stock crash, sliding currency values and the weakest economic growth in a quarter-century.
Outwardly, at least, Xi’s government has remained upbeat.
LI KEQIANG, Premier, China (through interpreter): We are fully confident of China’s long-term economic growth. The economy will not suffer a hard landing.
HARI SREENIVASAN: But Xi has also raised hackles with his crackdown on dissent. Last month, he visited state media organizations, warning that absolute loyalty to the party is their highest priority. That drew criticism from real estate magnate Ren Zhiqiang, among others, and his social media accounts were suspended.
This month, a government-run Web site posted a letter calling for Xi’s resignation. It was signed “Loyal Communist Party Members.”
Soon after, a number of people, including well-known columnist Jia Jia, went missing, apparently as part of an investigation into the letter’s origin. Protesters in Hong Kong demanded to know his whereabouts.
SUMMARY: For the fourth day in a row, mass anti-government demonstrations by mainly secular Turks continued in major cities across Turkey. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan charged that extremists are behind the protests. Jeffrey Brown has the latest on how that country's police, government and media have responded to the unrest.
SUMMARY: When Turkish police broke up a peaceful sit-in against the redevelopment of a park, it spurred mass protests across the country. Jeffrey Brown talks with The Christian Science Monitor's Scott Peterson from Istanbul for more on how the demonstrations spread and why some Turks are disenchanted with their government.
SUMMARY: Sexual assaults are common in India, but a brutal gang attack that killed a 23-year-old medical student has outraged the public over what is seen as a lack of basic protection and justice for women. Ray Suarez talks to Julie McCarthy from NPR about the spontaneous demonstrations and greater protest movement against such attacks.
SUMMARY: A brutal gang rape in New Delhi may help force a sea change in India, a thriving democracy that is also a very conservative society based on a diversity of old traditions. Ray Suarez talks to Miranda Kennedy, author of "Sideways on a Scooter: Life and Love in India," about the taboos of coming forward as a rape victim.
GWEN IFILL (Newshour): And we turn now to Asia, where a land dispute has revived longstanding tensions between China and Japan.
Margaret Warner has more.
MARGARET WARNER (Newshour): Chinese police stood three rows deep today, keeping crowds of protesters at bay outside the Japanese Embassy in Beijing.
The demonstrators brandished posters of Mao Zedong, founder of China's communist state. Others set Japanese flags aflame and lobbed eggs and plastic bottles.
Officially, the protest marked a 1931 incident that triggered Japan's invasion and occupation of China.
But the immediate spark was a land dispute in the here and now. It involves five uninhabited islands and three reefs in the East China Sea known as the Diaoyu in China and Senkaku in Japan. The waters are rich in fishing grounds and promising oil and gas deposits and close to important shipping lanes as well.
Last week, Japan reignited the long-smoldering issue when it bought the islands from private Japanese owners. The Chinese responded by sending patrol ships into the waters around the islands, drawing objections from Tokyo.
SATOSHI MORIMOTO, Japanese defense minister (through translator): Well, there are no doubts that the Senkaku islands are an integral part of Japanese territorial land and international law.
So I deeply regret that the Chinese government vessels have intruded into Japan's territorial sea space.
MARGARET WARNER: Then, over the weekend, large protests erupted in Chinese cities, targeting Japanese embassies and businesses. In some places, they turned violent.
Major Japanese companies, including Toyota, Honda and Canon, temporary closed operations and urged their Japanese employees to stay indoors. Yesterday, the Chinese government moved to tamp down the demonstrations, stepping up police presence and announcing arrests.
But then reports surfaced of two more Japanese activists landing on one of the islands.
Chinese activists have done the same in the past month. And, today, Chinese media released images of more than 20 Chinese fishing vessels arriving at the islands, a move the foreign minister defended in Beijing.
HONG LEI, Chinese Foreign Ministry (through translator): China is no longer a victim of bullying. China will not see its territories violated.
The Japanese purchase of the islands will not get in its way. We urge them to take seriously the Chinese people's demand, correct the mistakes, stop their violations, and get back to the consensus with China and negotiate.
MARGARET WARNER: Amid the tensions, U.S. defense secretary Leon Panetta was in Japan yesterday and China today. In Japan, he urged caution on both sides.
DEFENSE SECRETARY LEON PANETTA: It's in everybody's interest, it is in everybody's interest for Japan and China to maintain good relations and to find a way to avoid further escalation.
MARGARET WARNER: Today, after meeting with Panetta, China's defense minister, General Liang Guanglie, refused to rule out any options in dealing with Japan.
GEN. LIANG GUANGLIE, Chinese defense minister (through translator): In the future, we will continue to follow very closely the evolvement of the situation with regards to this dispute. And we reserve the rights for further action. Of course, that being said, we still hope for a peaceful and negotiated solution to this issue.
MARGARET WARNER: Secretary Panetta continues his three-day visit to China tomorrow.
SUMMARY: As Chinese protesters have been taking out frustrations on Japanese foreigners and businesses, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace's Douglas Paal and the Atlantic magazine's James Fallows discuss how the conflict between Japan and China is just as much about national pride as it is about potential natural resources.
JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): Finally tonight, we come back to the unrest in the Muslim and Arab world.
Pope Benedict wrapped up a three-day visit to Lebanon today, a long-planned trip that was overshadowed by the anti-American protests in the Middle East. But the flare-up in violence was just the latest in a series of events and conflicts that have many Christians in the Middle East uncertain about their future.
Ray Suarez has the story.
RAY SUAREZ (Newshour): Thousands turned out throughout Lebanon to get a glimpse of the leader of the Roman Catholic Church. But, while many were focused on the pageantry of the visit, the region's problems weren't far away.
JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): The fury over a film that attacks the Prophet Mohammed spilled into more of the Muslim world today, even as the Middle East calmed.
In several countries, including Afghanistan, police used force to defend U.S. diplomatic and military sites.
For the first time, violent protests that erupted last week spread to Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. Outside the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, hundreds of people threw rocks and firebombs and battled with police in their fury over an anti-Islamic film made in the U.S.
MAN (through translator): There is no other way. Those who insult the Prophet Muhammad, whoever he is, must die.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Meanwhile, in Southwest Asia, hundreds of Pakistanis chanted "Down with America" and tried to scale barriers outside the U.S. consulate in Lahore. Police fought back with riot batons.
MAN (through translator): The police are carrying out atrocities against us. The world is watching.
We are condemning this anti-Muslim film through this protest and saying to the government that all the consulate and embassy diplomats should be sent back to the U.S.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And there were similar scenes in neighboring Afghanistan, where crowds set fires and lobbed rocks at a U.S. military base in Kabul.
MAN (through translator): The infidels should correct themselves. Otherwise, we will continue to protest.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The new unrest in Afghanistan came as American and NATO forces face deadly new attacks.
The first came Friday when Taliban fighters disguised in U.S. Army uniforms struck a major base, Camp Bastion, near the capital of Helmand Province. The attackers killed two U.S. Marines and destroyed six fighter jets, plus refueling stations and aircraft hangars.
The total dollar damage is estimated at $200 million. That was followed by a new series of attacks by men wearing Afghan police or army uniforms, firing on coalition troops.
On Saturday, a gunman in an Afghan militia unit killed two British troops in Helmand Province. On Sunday, in Zabul Province, an Afghan police officer killed four American service members.
And last night, an Afghan soldier shot at a vehicle at Camp Garmsir, also in Helmand, wounding a foreign civilian worker.
There had already been a dozen such attacks by Afghan forces on foreign troops in August alone, killing 15. And that was before the explosion of outrage over the anti-Islamic film.
On Sunday, the top-ranking U.S. military officer, Joint Chiefs chairman General Martin Dempsey, called the insider attacks a very serious threat, and he strongly suggested Afghan authorities must do more.
He said -- quote -- "You can't whitewash it. We can't convince ourselves that we just have to work harder to get through it. Something has to change."
Today, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta weighed in while traveling in Japan.
LEON PANETTA, U.S. Defense Secretary: There are serious risks that confront those who fight the war. And we will do all we can to minimize those risks.
But we will not lose sight of the fundamental mission here, which is to continue to proceed to assure a peaceful transition.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The strains in the U.S.-Afghan relationship were further aggravated by civilian deaths in a NATO airstrike. Afghan officials said the victims were eight women and children who had gone out to gather firewood.
President Hamid Karzai condemned the deaths. The coalition said the strike also killed as many as 45 insurgents, but it issued an apology for the civilians killed.
SUMMARY: While the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is on the horizon, the death toll for foreign troops rises. Taliban fighters launched attacks on a U.S. military base and some Afghan troops turned their weapons on U.S. and NATO allies. Judy Woodruff talks to Ret. Lt. Gen. John Nagl and Johns Hopkins University's Vali Nasr for more.
Syria's deputy oil minister announced his defection in an online video that emerged Thursday, making him the highest ranking civilian official to abandon the regime since the uprising against President Bashar Assad erupted a year ago.
Abdo Husameddine's announcement came one day after the top U.S. general said President Barack Obama has asked for a preliminary review of military options in Syria, as the conflict grows increasingly dire. The U.N. estimates 7,500 people have been killed.
"I do not want to end my life servicing the crimes of this regime," Husameddine said in a video posted on YouTube, adding that he was joining "the dignified people's revolution."
He appeared to address President Bashar Assad directly.
"You have inflicted on those you claim are your people a full year of sorrow and sadness, denied them the their basic rights to life and humanity and pushed the country to the edge of the abyss," said Husameddine, wearing a suit and tie and appearing to be reading from a paper.
It was not clear when or where the video was made. There was no comment from Damascus.
Husameddine identified himself as an "assistant" to the oil minister and a member of the ruling Baath Party and said he has served 33 years in various government positions. Cabinet ministers in Syria may have several assistants known as deputies.
The defection came as international condemnation on Assad mounts.
On Wednesday, the U.N. humanitarian chief, Valerie Amos, got the first independent outside look at the Baba Amr district of Homs following a deadly monthlong siege. The military took control of Baba Amr on March 1, but Amos was allowed in only Wednesday.
She said Thursday she was struck by the devastation she saw in the shattered neighborhood. She found it mostly empty after residents fled the fighting. Activists charge that Syrian forces conducted cleanup operations there, including executions and arrests.
"The devastation there is significant. That part of Homs is completely destroyed, and I am concerned to learn what happened to the people in that part of the city," she said in Damascus, a relatively peaceful stronghold of Assad's regime.
"I have been struck by the difference between what I have seen here in Damascus and what I saw yesterday in Baba Amr," she added.
But shortly after she spoke, Syrian security forces opened fire to disperse mourners in Mazzeh, an upscale neighborhood of Damascus. The crowd had gathered for the funeral of a soldier who was allegedly executed last month for refusing to obey orders to shoot at civilians in Homs.
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said scores of people were arrested as security forces attacked the crowd in Mazzeh. There was no word of casualties.
In Cairo, former U.N. chief Kofi Annan said his top priority as special envoy to Syria is to end the violence and deliver badly needed aid.
He warned against further militarization of the conflict and urged the opposition to come together with the government to find a political solution.
"I hope that no one is thinking very seriously of using force in this situation," Annan said. "I believe any further militarization would make the situation worse."
Addressing a news conference after talks with Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby, he said he would be making "realistic" proposals to resolve the conflict. He did not elaborate.
Annan, who has been appointed joint U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria, is scheduled to travel to Damascus on Saturday, where he will likely meet Assad.
Annan said his mission was to start a "political process" in Syria to resolve the conflict there, and his only priority was the welfare of the Syrian people. "They are a brave, ancient people and they deserve better," he said.
Although there are widespread concerns that military action in Syria would be difficult, Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday that Obama has ordered up a Pentagon review of options.
Dempsey said the options to be examined included enforcing a no-fly zone and humanitarian airlifts. Dempsey said the military would study the situation and report back on points like Syria's sophisticated air defenses and its extensive stockpile of chemical weapons. He said the assessment would include "mission, enemy, terrain, troops and time."
The committee chairman, U.S. Sen. John Kerry, said the time is not right for a U.S. move against Syria.
Kerry told CBS's "This Morning" Thursday that there are stark differences between Syria and Libya, where NATO airstrikes helped topple dictator Moammar Gadhafi last year. Kerry said Washington "can't just jump up some morning and say, 'Let's go and drop some bombs on Syrian tanks.'"
The uprising began with largely peaceful protests, but faced with a vicious regime crackdown, it has become increasingly militarized. The U.N. says more than 7,500 people have been killed in the yearlong violence. Activists put the death toll at more than 8,000.
Assad's power structure has suffered a steady stream of army defectors, who have joined a group of dissidents known as the Free Syrian Army, now numbering in the thousands, but civilian government officials have remained largely loyal.
That added significance to the defection of Husameddine, the deputy oil minister.
Among numerous military defections recently was that of Syrian Brig. Gen. Mostafa Ahmad al-Sheik, who fled to Turkey in January, becoming the highest ranking officer to bolt.
In late August, Adnan Bakkour, the attorney general of the central city of Hama, appeared in a a video announcing he had defected from the regime. Authorities reported he had been kidnapped and said he was being kept against his will by gunmen. He has not been heard from since.
In the YouTube video, Husameddine said he was defecting "knowing full well that this regime will burn my home, persecute my family and make up a lot of lies."
"I advise my colleagues … to abandon this sinking ship," he added.
JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): Next, a two-part look at Europe's debt crisis.
First, more protests in Greece against austerity measures in the country where the troubles began two years ago.
We have a report from James Mates of Independent Television News in Athens.
JAMES MATES: It is 20 years to the day since the Maastricht Treaty was signed to bring the continent every closer under the euro.
This afternoon, this was a German flag being burned in Athens. Before long, riot police were swinging batons and firing tear gas. Greeks believe they are being driven into poverty on orders from abroad. This is a country is seething with anger.
Inside the parliament, politicians seem to be on the verge of accepting Europe's demands for another round of cuts to wages, pensions and health care. It's designed to reduce Greece's massive debt. But as anyone in this crowd will tell you, they have been cutting for two years now, and the debts have simply got bigger.
EVA KAILI, socialist member of Parliament: I don't think they can take anymore. And I think it's the wrong recipe. That's why. They could take it if they knew that it was a way out. But from what it seems, it's not a way out. It leads us to deeper recession.
JAMES MATES: What the Greek government is having to do today is choose between two appalling options: to take the medicine that Europe has prescribed and with it years more of austerity and recession, no guarantee of success at the end of it; or to forget Europe's money, to go it alone, leave the euro, knowing that in the short term, at least, that would be even more painful. One or the other, they have to choose.
A storm swept through Athens this afternoon, driving many of the protesters home. It was also enough to rip the European flag from its pole, where it flies beneath the Acropolis. Many Greeks, though, are simply too angry to notice the symbolism.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Now Italy, another European country and a much larger economy under financial pressure.
On the eve of his visit to Washington and meetings with President Obama, Italy's premier talked today in Rome with our Margaret Warner.
MARGARET WARNER (Newshour): Amid protests in the streets and pressure from abroad, a new face came on to the Italian political scene three months ago.
Prime Minister Mario Monti's mission: try to rescue the country's stagnant economy and unwind its massive national debt.
MARIO MONTI, Italian prime minister (through translator): If we will be able to take advantage of this opportunity altogether to start a constructive dialogue on general goals and decisions, we will be able to redeem the country and to rebuild the confidence in its institutions. Thank you.
MARGARET WARNER: Italy had not fallen to the same depths as Greece, Portugal and Ireland, needing bailouts by the European Union, but the economy was stalled. The markets were hammering Italian debt. And Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was facing sex and corruption charges. He resigned after he lost his working majority in parliament over austerity measures the E.U. had demanded.
With that, the Italian president turned to Monti. The former professor served as an E.U. commissioner for nearly 10 years, but has never held elected office. Now he leads a government composed mostly of other technocrats. They must try to ensure that Italy can continue to borrow on international credit markets and keep paying off a national debt that equals 120 percent of its gross domestic product.
Among E.U. countries, only Greece has a larger debt load. Monti has pushed through budget and social welfare cuts. But he also has warned his European partners, especially Germany, that austerity must be accompanied by growth.
At the same time, his moves to modernize the Italian economy have run up against longtime traditions, such as the protective hold that guilds have over everything from taxicabs to lawyers. So far, his proposals have been endorsed by parliament, but more tests loom.
Congressional leaders on Friday indefinitely shelved two antipiracy bills that had rallied the Internet and rocked Capitol Hill, dealing a major defeat to the traditional media industry while emboldening a new breed of online political activists.
Using a medium that helped organize protests against the legislation, Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, announced via Twitter that the vote would be delayed. But he indicated that the issue, which had been scheduled for a vote Tuesday, had not died.
“There’s no reason that legitimate issues raised about PROTECT IP can’t be resolved,” he wrote, referring to the Senate bill by its shorthand name. “Counterfeiting & piracy cost 1000s of #jobs yearly. Americans rightfully expect to be fairly compensated 4 their work. I’m optimistic that we can reach compromise on PROTECT IP in coming week.”
In the House, Representative Lamar Smith, the Texas Republican who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called off plans to formally draft his version of the antipiracy bill next month.
After vowing two days ago to move forward, Mr. Smith said in a statement on Friday: “The committee remains committed to finding a solution to the problem of online piracy that protects American intellectual property and innovation.” But he added, “The House Judiciary Committee will postpone consideration of the legislation until there is wider agreement on a solution.”
Speaker John A. Boehner, talking with reporters Friday in Baltimore, where House Republicans held their annual retreat, called the bill “well meaning,” but said it needed “more consensus.”
Supporters of the shelved bills as well as opponents pushing an alternative backed by the Internet giants Google and Facebook said differences could be bridged. But privately, Congressional aides and lobbyists say the pressures of an election year make action this year unlikely. Lawmakers will not be eager to brave another firestorm incited by Google, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia and other popular Web sites.
Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon and a key opponent of the bills, said lawmakers had collected more than 14 million names — more than 10 million of them voters — who contacted them to protest the once-obscure legislation.
MARGARET WARNER (Newshour): It's their 17th meeting in two years, trying to tame an economic crisis that threatens to ensnare Europe in another recession.
Leaders of the 27 E.U. member states arrived in a Belgian capital nearly paralyzed by a general strike. The union-led protests targeted austerity measures in Belgium and elsewhere in Europe, like raising taxes and retirement ages and slashing government spending to reduce deficits and crushing debt.
But now, with unemployment rates rising and growth rates declining in many countries, E.U. leaders are reaching beyond the idea that austerity alone is the answer. Today's summit credo instead was jobs and growth.
British Prime Minister David Cameron instituted a cuts-only agenda at home, but the British economy has been reeling.
DAVID CAMERON, British prime minister: We need to get really serious about the growth agenda in Europe. That means completing the single market. It means signing trade deals with the fastest-growing parts of the world. And it means a serious effort at deregulation, particularly for small businesses, so they can create the jobs and the growth that we need.
MARGARET WARNER: Which may be easier said than done.
With large debt loads in many countries, the economic arsenals available to European nations are severely depleted. And many of the measures discussed today, like funding apprenticeships and training for unemployed youth, would do little to improve growth in the short term.
At the same time, austerity remained part of the picture. The leaders today signed off on a fiscal pact first outlined in December that would impose much stricter budget discipline and potential sanctions on those who sign up. Today, all 17 Eurozone countries did and eight of the 10 outside the common currency.
There was no action on the euro nation in most serious jeopardy, Greece. It remains in talks to restructure its private debt, a precondition to get the next installment of E.U. bailout funds. And doubts about the Greek effort to reform had some leaders echoing a mandate from another era of summits -- trust, but verify.
FREDRIK REINFELDT, Swedish prime minister: They're not delivering on their own promises when it comes to reforms. We're all in this together, but we need to ensure that we all do what we promise others.
MARGARET WARNER: What also wasn't agreed today was increasing the size of the European-backed bailout fund for countries that do get in trouble. But that is sure to be on the agenda at the next E.U. summit in March.
JONATHAN RUGMAN, Independent Television News: In the past few weeks, Russia's been roiled by the biggest street protests in 20 years.
For most of that time, this vast country has been run by Vladimir Putin, a former KGB spy who now stands accused of rigging last month's elections to stay in power even longer. Videos emerged of votes stuffed into boxes long before the polls even opened. This woman was filmed voting dozens of times, and officials have been caught on camera busily trying to change the election result.
Mr. Putin's hometown is St. Petersburg, where the mood is turning against him. "Give power to the people," they chanted last month. Others never had the chance to be heard. The 1917 revolution began here. So could this be the launch pad for Russia's version of the Arab Spring?
Channel 4 News has been given access to three groups in the vanguard of anti-Putin protest. These are the most notorious and secretive of St. Petersburg's revolutionaries. They're currently in hiding, and there's an international warrant out for their arrest.
Their name is Voina, which means war. On New Year's Eve, they set fire to a police transporter, claiming this was their gift for all political prisoners. They've turned over police cars in protest. The aim here, they say, is to create works of art which humiliate the authorities and inspire dissent.
Here, they soldered and screwed shut the doors of a restaurant owned by a Putin supporter. The three ringleaders live by stealing food and clothing. And they're constantly on the lookout for the police. They keep their home address secret. And it's so run-down that they have no piped hot water. Two of them were in prison for three months last year, until the British graffiti artist Banksy posted 80,000 pounds bail.
They're bring up a 2-year-old child here. And even he has to sleep in a cardboard box to keep warm. And Putin, they believe, will stay cozy in his position of absolute power, unless they escalate their protests.
JEFFREY BROWN (Newshour): They rallied in the rain today across from the White House to protest the ongoing detention of foreign terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Some of the more than 200 protesters wore orange jumpsuits and black hoods to mark 10 years since the first 20 prisoners arrived at Guantanamo. At its peak, the prison housed nearly 700 men. More than 500 were released or transferred to other countries during the Bush administration.
The facility currently holds 171 detainees, with 36 awaiting military tribunals on war crimes charges. Among them is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, expected to be arraigned at Guantanamo later this year. The Obama administration had wanted to try him in federal criminal court in New York City, but dropped the idea in the face of strong opposition.
Congress has since barred moving any of the detainees to the U.S. mainland for trial. That, in turn, has effectively prevented any attempt to close the prison once and for all.
In the meantime, there's a renewed focus on the broader question of how to handle terror suspects. A provision in the recently passed national defense authorization bill requires the military to take custody of foreign terror suspects linked to al-Qaida, unless the president specifically rules they should be held by civilian authorities.
It also allows indefinite military detention without the right to trial. But the interpretation of both provisions remains in dispute. The bill was debated in the House of Representatives last month.
REP. ALCEE HASTINGS, D-Fla.: Well, here we are today trying to return to an era of arbitrary justice, witch-hunts and fear-mongering. While this measure includes an exemption for United States citizens, it does not protect them from indefinite detention.
REP. MAC THORNBERRY, R-Texas: The provisions in this bill, Mr. Speaker, are a small step towards having this Congress back involved in making these detention -- detention decisions.
JEFFREY BROWN: White House officials initially warned that President Obama would veto the bill. Congress made modifications, and he ultimately signed it. But he added in a statement: "I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists."
The protesters at today's rally in Washington made clear the issue will not go away, and legal challenges to the new law remain possible.
"is it provided political imprimatur by Congress."
Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary:
1 a: a license to print or publish (as a book or paper) b: approval of that which is published under the circumstances that censorship of the press exists
More excerpts
VINCENT WARREN, Center for Constitutional Rights: We have in this country confused the war paradigm and the law enforcement paradigm.
And the NDA is the precise example of that. And my colleague is right that the Supreme Court has talked about...
JEFFREY BROWN: You mean it's codifying the war, the war approach?
VINCENT WARREN: It's codifying...
DAVID RIVKIN, former associate White House counsel: As one approach.
VINCENT WARREN: It's codifying the conflation of it, in my view, because the Supreme Court has spoken to that -- the issue in Hamdi.
But in the Padilla case, where you had someone that was captured in the United States and the Bush administration tried to push him into military custody, before the Supreme Court could rule on it, the Bush administration moved him out, because -- frankly, because I thought that they thought that they were going to lose.
So, in fact, the broader discussion really here is about to what extent should law enforcement actions and crimes be treated as crimes in the U.S., and to what extent should crimes of war and violations of the war -- of law of war be treated as military situations...
DAVID RIVKIN: Let's be -- let's be honest.
Do you not accept the notion, as many critics allege, that propels the exclusive use of the civilian justice paradigm? Would you support the trial of somebody, at least high-valued detainees, clearly individuals who are enemy combatants by revamped military commissions that operate in full accordance with the Constitution, with the highest standards of military justice? Or do you think that they're all a bunch of muggers and rapists and bank robbers, so be tried in the district courts?
VINCENT WARREN: No, I would support -- I would support military courts for people who have violated the law of war.
But what I don't support is a conflation of criminal activity and military activity by calling the U.S. a battlefield, and then anybody that is captured on the battlefield of the United States has the option of going to... ---- VINCENT WARREN:The question that really should be asked is, when have we ever seen a war that has no location, no geographical limit, and no time limit? That's the situation that we're in now.
The reality of the War on Terror, specifically against Muslim Terrorists, is that it will NEVER end. Historically, when has any religiously based movement been stopped by military action? The Roman Empire's actions did not stop the creation of the Christian Religion, did it.
The only thing that will end this is when peaceful Muslims world-wide stop Muslim extremists.
GWEN IFILL (Newshour): Now, an update on the turmoil in Syria, as that country's embattled president fights back.
We begin with a report from John Ray of Independent Television News in Cairo.
JOHN RAY: Three hundred days of violence and counting, a death toll passing 5,000 and mounting, and yet a confident president paraded before his nation and vowed that victory at any price is close.
BASHAR AL-ASSAD, president of Syria (through translator): This will not be possible unless we hit the murderous terrorists with an iron fist. There will be no compromise with terrorism and no mercy to those who use weapons to create discord and division.
JOHN RAY: The turmoil, he blamed on foreign conspirators, dark forces, including the Arab League.
BASHAR AL-ASSAD (through translator): Has the League succeeded to be independent? Has it ever succeeded to realize any of the people's dreams? Or has it in fact contributed directly to sowing the seeds of discord and division?
JOHN RAY: As he spoke, these pictures emerged of Assad supporters mobbing a convoy of Arab observers. Eleven were hurt, the timing perhaps no coincidence. It was condemned by Arab leaders in Cairo. But their peace mission is in deep trouble.
Assad's withering attack on the Arab League, exploiting its divisions and its indecisiveness, aims to kill off their attempts to resolve this crisis. And opposition activists who once thought the world would come to their rescue are losing hope.
RAMI JARRAH, opposition activist: And the only way I think to really solve this issue would be some sort of intervention. But we don't expect that anyone wants to intervene. So it's just too messy.
JOHN RAY: So, while the world remains reluctant to act, there's a president who believes he's winning.
THEODORE KATTOUF, former U.S. Ambassador to Syria: I think it's a little -- I think, to some extent, he might have thought: I can make some cosmetic reforms. I can lighten the image of the regime. I can open things up a bit.
But very much like in "The Godfather," where Michael Corleone may have in the beginning some idea that he can take the family in a different direction, take them out to Las Vegas, start legitimate businesses, he found out that the system only operates one way: with a strong, ruthless SOB at the top. And that would be him.
The Arab Spring has been greeted in Saudi Arabia by “a new wave of repression” that saw authorities arresting and imprisoning peaceful protesters demanding political reforms. Now, the Saudi crackdown may be reinforced by a draft anti-terror law that would effectively criminalize dissent as a “terrorist crime.”
In a new 61-page report, “Saudi Arabia: Repression in the Name of Security,” Amnesty International (AI) said authorities have “used security concerns to justify the arrest of hundreds of people who have been imprisoned after unfair trials.” The draft anti-terror law would further strip away rights from those accused of such offenses, Amnesty said.
“Peaceful protesters and supporters of political reform in the country have been targeted for arrest in an attempt to stamp out the kinds of call for reform that have echoed across the region,” said Philip Luther of AI.
“While the arguments used to justify this wide-ranging crackdown may be different, the abusive practices being employed by the Saudi Arabian government are worryingly similar to those which they have long used against people accused of terrorist offenses,” he said.
AI said that the government “continues to detain thousands of people, many of them without charge or trial, on terrorism-related grounds. Torture and other ill-treatment in detention remain rife.”
In April 2011, an Interior Ministry spokesperson said that around 5,000 people connected to the “deviant group,” meaning al-Qa’ida, had been questioned and referred for trials, Amnesty said.
Meanwhile, Saudi troops continue to serve in Bahrain on behalf of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), helping the rulers of the tiny oil-rich monarchy to put an end to many months of peaceful demonstrations seeking reform.
In a statement following AI’s release of the draft law, the Saudi government said it “absolutely has a responsibility to protect the public from violent attacks, but that has to be done within the boundaries of international law.” It said the new draft law is designed “to assist Saudi Security forces in tackling terrorist activity.”
But AI charges it would “allow the authorities to prosecute peaceful dissent as a terrorist crime.”
The organization says it has obtained copies of the Draft Penal Law for Terrorism Crimes and Financing of Terrorism. It says, “If passed it would pave the way for even the smallest acts of peaceful dissent to be branded terrorism and risk massive human rights violations.”
A Saudi Arabian government security committee reviewed the draft law in June but it is not known when or if it might be passed.
AI says that since February, when sporadic demonstrations began — in defiance of a permanent national ban on protests — the government carried out a crackdown that included the arrest of hundreds of mostly Shi’a Muslims in the restive eastern province.
Since March over 300 people who took part in peaceful protests in al-Qatif, al-Ahsa and Awwamiya have been detained.
Several thousand women demanding the end of military rule marched through downtown Cairo on Tuesday evening in an extraordinary expression of anger over images of soldiers beating, stripping and kicking female demonstrators in Tahrir Square.
“Drag me, strip me, my brothers’ blood will cover me!” they chanted. “Where is the field marshal?” they demanded of the top military officer, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi. “The girls of Egypt are here.”
Historians called the event the biggest women’s demonstration in modern Egyptian history, the most significant since a 1919 march against British colonialism inaugurated women’s activism here, and a rarity in the Arab world. It also added a new and unexpected wave of protesters opposing the ruling military council’s efforts to retain power and its tactics for suppressing public discontent.
The protest’s scale stunned even feminists here. In Egypt’s stiffly patriarchal culture, previous attempts to organize women’s events in Tahrir Square during this year’s protests almost always fizzled or, in one case in March, ended in the physical harassment of a small group of women by a larger crowd of men.
“It was amazing the number of women that came out from all over the place,” said Zeinab Abul-Magd, a historian who has studied women’s activism here. “I expected fewer than 300.”
The march abruptly pushed women to the center of Egyptian political life after they had been left out almost completely. Although women stood at the forefront of the initial revolt that ousted President Hosni Mubarak 10 months ago, few had prominent roles in the various revolutionary coalitions formed in the uprising’s aftermath. Almost no women have won seats in the early rounds of parliamentary elections. And the continuing demonstrations against military rule have often degenerated into battles in which young men and the security police hurl rocks at each other.
On the fifth day of clashes that have killed at least 14 people, many women in the march said they hoped their demonstration would undercut the military council’s efforts to portray demonstrators as little more than hooligans, vandals and arsonists. “This will show those who stay home that we are not thugs,” said Fadwa Khaled, 25, a computer engineer.
The women’s demand for a voice in political life appeared to run counter to the recent election victories of conservative Islamists. But the march was hardly dominated by secular liberals. It contained a broad spectrum of Egyptian women, including homemakers demonstrating for the first time and young mothers carrying babies, with a majority in traditional Muslim head scarves and a few in face-covering veils. And their chants mixed calls for women’s empowerment with others demanding more “gallantry” from Egyptian men.
Egypt’s military rulers came under fire from international human rights groups soon after they took power in February for performing invasive, pseudo-medical “virginity tests” on several women detained after a protest in March. But in Egypt’s conservative culture, few of the women subjected to that humiliation have come forward to criticize the generals publicly.
The spark for the march on Tuesday came over the weekend, when hundreds of military police officers in riot gear repeatedly stormed Tahrir Square, indiscriminately beating anyone they could catch. Videos showed more than one instance in which officers grabbed and stripped female demonstrators, tearing off their Muslim head scarves. And in the most infamous case caught on video, a half-dozen soldiers beat a supine woman with batons and ripped off her abaya to reveal a blue bra. Then one of them kicked her in the chest.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
*Anti-First Amendment policies that attempt to turn America into a theocracy by enshrining ANY religious belief as law.
* Any attempt to suppress human or Constitutional rights.
* Any law or policy that supports discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, race/color, gender, sexual orientation, or any law that does NOT support Equal Treatment under the law.
*Any law or policy that attempts to suppress Freedom of the Press or Free Speech.
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