The Art of #OWS

Posters came from Occuprint. Occuprint showcases posters from the worldwide Occupy movement, all of which are part of the creative commons, and available to be downloaded for noncommercial use. We ask that artists are given attribution for their work.

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Luc Besson’s Aung San Suu Kyi Biopic ‘The Lady’ Out Now In UK

I have GOT to see this movie.

Michelle Yeoh Interview

‘The Lady’ is Luc Besson’s biopic about pro-democracy icon and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, starring Michelle Yeoh as Aung. Aung San Suu Kyi became an icon for democratic freedom after she spent 15 of the last 21 years under house arrest in Burma after leading the National League for Democracy in an election victory over the ruling military junta in 1990.

‘The Lady’ is the extraordinary story of Aung San Suu Kyi. It is a story of devotion and human understanding set against a backdrop of political turmoil that continues today. ‘The Lady’ was written over a period of three years by Rebecca Frayn. Interviews with key figures in Aung San Suu Kyi‟s entourage enabled her to reconstruct for the first time the true story of Burma‟s national heroine. ‘The Lady’ is out now in the UK.

How much did you know about Aung Suu before you embarked on this movie?

Michelle Yeoh: Coming from Malaysia we all know who Aung Suu is, but unfortunately because she’s been in and out of house arrest since 1988, we’ve really forgotten exactly the reasons why, who and what was truly involved. In the last three years, the news that came out was when the Americans swam into her compound and her house arrest was extended for another 18 months, and then news about her resurfaced. But by then, Rebecca Frayn had already finished the script and approached me when she finished her first draft of the script, and I knew this was not just a role of a lifetime, but an incredible story that really needed to be told. Fortunately Luc Besson came to my rescue (laughs), because I always believe that no matter how good a script is, if you don’t have a director who’s totally committed and dedicated to it, you won’t have a story that will come to life for the audience. That was very important to me, I lived and breathed her for the last four years. Everyday day, every night. I learned Burmese,. I slept with her, I woke up with her. Because it was necessary not just to mimic and give you a two-dimensional concept and feel for what she represented, of who she was, but to allow you to come into her world. A world so full of love and passion. I was submerged in it, I still think very much so.

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American Stonehenge

The Georgia Guidestones may be the most enigmatic monument in the US: huge slabs of granite, inscribed with directions for rebuilding civilization after the apocalypse. Only one man knows who created them - and he's not talking.

The Georga Guidestones are located in Elbert County, Georgia, approximately 90 miles (145 kilometers) east of Atlanta, and 9 miles (15 kilometers) north of the center of Elberton. The monument is situated on a rise a short distance to the east of Georgia Highway 77 (Hartwell Highway), and is visible from that road. Small signs beside the highway indicate the turnoff for the Guidestones, which is identified by a street sign as "Guidestones Rd."

The Georgia Guidestones are a huge granite monument located on a hilltop in Elbert County, Georgia, USA. It is sometimes referred to as the "American Stonehenge," a title that has been applied at times to a number of other structures, including Mystery Hill.

A message comprised of ten guides or commandments is inscribed on the monument in eight modern languages, and a shorter message is inscribed at the top of the structure in four ancient scripts.

The monument is almost twenty feet tall, and made from six granite slabs that weigh more than 100 tons. One slab stands in the center, with four arranged around it.

A capstone lies on top of the five slabs, which are astronomically aligned.

An additional stone tablet, which is set in the ground a short distance to the west of the monument, provides some clarifying notes on the history and purpose of the Guidestones.

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The top 10 most censored Natural News stories of 2011

Ah, 2011 was a wonderful year for censored news, wasn't it? We learned a lot this year about the FDA, the CDC, evil corporations and fruit cereal that contain no fruit. The problem is, the mainstream media never bothered to report any of it. Or if they did touch the stories, they distorted them to fit their own corporate agendas.

Here are the top ten most censored Natural News stories we covered this year: Link

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A Christmas Message From America's Rich

It seems America’s bankers are tired of all the abuse. They’ve decided to speak out.

True, they’re doing it from behind the ropeline, in front of friendly crowds at industry conferences and country clubs, meaning they don’t have to look the rest of America in the eye when they call us all imbeciles and complain that they shouldn’t have to apologize for being so successful.

But while they haven’t yet deigned to talk to protesting America face to face, they are willing to scribble out some complaints on notes and send them downstairs on silver trays. Courtesy of a remarkable story by Max Abelson at Bloomberg, we now get to hear some of those choice comments.

Home Depot co-founder Bernard Marcus, for instance, is not worried about OWS:

“Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” Marcus said. “Are you kidding me?”

Former New York gurbernatorial candidate Tom Golisano, the billionaire owner of the billing firm Paychex, offered his wisdom while his half-his-age tennis champion girlfriend hung on his arm:

“If I hear a politician use the term ‘paying your fair share’ one more time, I’m going to vomit,” said Golisano, who turned 70 last month, celebrating the birthday with girlfriend Monica Seles, the former tennis star who won nine Grand Slam singles titles.

Then there’s Leon Cooperman, the former chief of Goldman Sachs’s money-management unit, who said he was urged to speak out by his fellow golfers. His message was a version of Wall Street’s increasingly popular If-you-people-want-a-job, then-you’ll-shut-the-fuck-up rhetorical line:

Cooperman, 68, said in an interview that he can’t walk through the dining room of St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida, without being thanked for speaking up. At least four people expressed their gratitude on Dec. 5 while he was eating an egg-white omelet, he said.

“You’ll get more out of me,” the billionaire said, “if you treat me with respect.”

Finally, there is this from Blackstone CEO Steven Schwartzman:

Asked if he were willing to pay more taxes in a Nov. 30 interview with Bloomberg Television, Blackstone Group LP CEO Stephen Schwarzman spoke about lower-income U.S. families who pay no income tax.

“You have to have skin in the game,” said Schwarzman, 64. “I’m not saying how much people should do. But we should all be part of the system.”

There are obviously a great many things that one could say about this remarkable collection of quotes. One could even, if one wanted, simply savor them alone, without commentary, like lumps of fresh caviar, or raw oysters.

But out of Abelson’s collection of doleful woe-is-us complaints from the offended rich, the one that deserves the most attention is Schwarzman’s line about lower-income folks lacking “skin in the game.” This incredible statement gets right to the heart of why these people suck.

Why? It's not because Schwarzman is factually wrong about lower-income people having no “skin in the game,” ignoring the fact that everyone pays sales taxes, and most everyone pays payroll taxes, and of course there are property taxes for even the lowliest subprime mortgage holders, and so on.

It’s not even because Schwarzman probably himself pays close to zero in income tax – as a private equity chief, he doesn’t pay income tax but tax on carried interest, which carries a maximum 15% tax rate, half the rate of a New York City firefighter.

The real issue has to do with the context of Schwarzman’s quote. The Blackstone billionaire, remember, is one of the more uniquely abhorrent, self-congratulating jerks in the entire world – a man who famously symbolized the excesses of the crisis era when, just as the rest of America was heading into a recession, he threw himself a $5 million birthday party, featuring private performances by Rod Stewart and Patti Labelle, to celebrate an IPO that made him $677 million in a matter of days (within a year, incidentally, the investors who bought that stock would lose three-fourths of their investments).

So that IPO birthday boy is now standing up and insisting, with a straight face, that America’s problem is that compared to taxpaying billionaires like himself, poor people are not invested enough in our society’s future. Apparently, we’d all be in much better shape if the poor were as motivated as Steven Schwarzman is to make America a better place.

Not to take anything away from the excellent and ever enlightening Matt Taibbi, and if you can stomach more enlightenment from these greedy bastards, go here to read more.

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John Yoo Needs a Fair Trial

From the Universal Declaration of Human Rights put forth in 1948 by the UN and ratified as International Law:

Article 5.
No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 6.
Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

Article 7.
All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.

Article 8.
Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

Article 9.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10.
Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 11.
(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

Article 12.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 13.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 14.
(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.


Article 15.
(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

Article 18.
Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

Article 19.
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 20.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.

Article 30. (Final Artical)
Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

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John Yoo also clearly violated the Geneva Convention, which establishes the standards of International Law for the humanitarian treatment of the victims of war. The Geneva Convention is also ratified as International Law. The Geneva Convention states that there is no grey area between a prisoner of war and a civilian. Everyone accused of crimial actions must be treated as one of these two categories under International Law. John Yoo invented his famous Orwellian euphemism of an "enemy combatant," in order to create just such a fictitious grey area in order to get away with torture, and other human rights violations. This invention of Yoo is not possible under the Geneva Convention, nor is it possible in the Universal Declaration On Human Rights. These International Law Codes were set up precisely, in order to stop such heinous abuses, as was learned through the cruel experiences of war, especially that of the Second World War in which heavy abuses, often by the police, and security forces were to lead to some of the most barbarous scenes in human history.

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