Outraged by the shenanigans that led to the "stolen" elections of 2000 and 2004, the Raging Grannies teamed up with the Open Voting Consortium in lobbying against proprietary voting machines. On August 6th, the Grannies helped demonstrate a new, easy to use voting machine that uses open source software at LinuxWorld in San Francisco, the largest single gathering of the open source community.

Open source voting technology has workings that are entirely transparent to auditors and can also be voter-verified, unlike some of the electronic voting machines recently decertified by the state of California due to security problems.

Photos: 1 | 2 | Black Box Voting | Bay Area Raging Grannies

The RNC Welcoming Committee created a "Swarm, Seize, Stay" strategy which involves dividing St. Paul, Minnesota into sectors to facilitate coordination of blockades and other creative resistance to the RNC. Northern California radicals have banded together as "Unconventional Action (UA) in the Bay" and collectively chosen to adopt SECTOR 4 in downtown St. Paul. Sector 4 is one of seven sectors that surround the Xcel Center, home of the 2008 Republican National Convention. Organizers from coast to coast representing a variety of different communities are adopting other sectors.

UA in the Bay recently announced a Barricade Building Contest with categories that include Biggest-Baddest, Best Use of Found Materials, Best Use of Vehicle(s), Best Strategic Location, Most Creative, and Most Difficult to Remove. In addition, three street intersections in Sector 4 have been named as convergence points for the morning of September 1st before demonstrations are expected to become mobile.

A pre-RNC UA in the Bay meeting will be held in St. Paul on August 30th.

Read More · St. Paul Maps: 1 / 2
NoRNC.org · DNCdisruption08.org · UnconventionalAction.org

RNC: UA in the Bay show at Albany Bulb cancelled by police | UA in the Bay Benefit Show in Albany | UA in the Bay Benefit Show in SF | CRASH THE RNC: Sector 4 Barricade Building Contest | Tactics and Prognosis for Successful RNC Protest | UA in the Bay Final Organizing Meeting | More mapage of St. Paul area | Coldsnap Legal Collective to provide legal services related to 2008 RNC | UA in the Bay RideShare | Indymedia at the RNC: Callout and Update from TC-IMC | CRASH THE RNC: a call to action for activists and radicals of all stripes | St. Paul to provide stage for RNC protesters near Xcel Center | Trans/Queer/Womyn Housing @ RNC | Santa Cruz RNC Strategy Session, Aug. 2nd | UA in the Bay to Join the Resistance Against the RNC in St. Paul | UA in the Bay to Join the Resistance Against the RNC in St. Paul | RNC Strategy: Swarm, Seize, Stay / Sectors / Three-Tier Strategy / St. Paul Principles | Spokescouncil Against the Conventions (RNC/DNC), July 27th | RNC Welcoming Committee July Update | RNC/DNC Consulta for Bay Area Radicals | Be Prepared for Police Violence at the RNC Protest | Shut Down the Republication National Convention | RNC Welcomming Committee Comes to The East Bay | Unconventional Action: Call for Endorsements of RNC Strategy
DNC: DNC disruption logistics | DNC Protest, Split, and the Principled Stand of Cynthia McKinney | Fresno DNC Disruption meeting | We're Expecting You in Denver August 24-28 | Colorado "Fusion Center" to Step Up Intelligence Gathering During DNC | Anarchists Offer to Call Off All Protest Plans | Results of the July 20th Consulta in Denver | Indymedia Access for the DNC in Denver | SDS Call to Action: Disrupt the DNC! | Humboldt Against the DNC | ACLU Sues Denver for Security Equipment Details Ahead of DNC
More: Who's Paying for the Conventions? Corporate Sponsors | Thinking Beyond The Conventions: What Comes Next? | Regional organizing against the 2008 political conventions grows

On July 7th through 9th, the G-8 countries held their annual meeting high above Lake Toyoaka in Hokkaido Japan at an exclusive spa resort. This is part of the usual pattern of the annual G-8 meetings to hold them in the most remote areas possible. Hokkaido, a land of beautiful lakes and volcanos is the most rural and least populated of the four major islands that make up Japan. The Japanese government spent $250 million in security measures and deployed 22,000 national police to Hokkaido and another 20,000 were on reserve in Tokyo.

All the G-8 countries; Germany, France, Russia, Italy, England, Japan and of course the U.S. make up less then 35% per cent of the world's population but control the great majority of the wealth. The emerging economies of Brazil, China, India, were not included, but they along with Mexico and South Africa got to have meetings on the side. (The little G-5)

The one agreement that was reached at the summit was that the G-8 countries would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by the year 2050, 42 years from now. Fidel Castro commented in his reflections of July 15, that this "is about the time that hell freezes over".

Photos & Report | Resistance and Repression in Japan continue: Inside the Anti-G8 | G8: Summits and summits

Previous Indybay Coverage of the G8 Summit And Protests

On July 10th, Bush has signed into law the FISA Amendment Act. The law allows the government to spy on emails, phone calls, web surfing, and other communications without warrants. The law also includes immunity to telecommunication companies who participated in an illegal spying by the government. An older version past by the House was threatened to be veto by President Bush for not including this immunity.

The ACLU has issued a statement calling the law unconstitutional, while others have pointed that this law is an assault on fundamental rights such as the first and fourth amendments.

According to Mark Klein a person who worked for AT&T for 22 years, the government built secrets rooms in communication companies across the U.S. and have been monitoring countless citizens in all forms of internet communications.

Numerous democrats have voted for the bill, among them Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama. Obama voted for the bill, although he had promised to oppose the bill if it guaranteed immunity to the telecommunication companies. Obama has justified this by stating that the government should have the ability to defend the American people from terror attacks and that the newer version of the FISA bill allows a secret court, not the president, the right to decide who can be spied on.

In 2004, according to the government’s own figures, all of the 1,758 wiretap warrants submitted to the FISA secret court were granted.

New Wiretapping Law: A Big Leap in Big Brotherization of Society | Obama joins Senate vote to legitimize Bush's domestic spying operation | Today—U.S. Senate Votes Whether to Shoot Down 1st and 4th Amendments l SF AT&T Whistleblower And CWA Member Urges Against Immunity for Telecoms in Bush Spy Program l Compare Provisions in “Hitler’s Laws” with FISA AMENDMENTS ACT OF 2008 l EFF Speaks Out Against Telecom Immunity Deal l Senators Dodd and Feingold Criticize Bond's False FISA "Compromise" l Spying Telecoms Receive Billions in Government Contracts l Interview on the Wiretapping Bill & the Unprecedented Expansion of Presidential Powers l AT&T Works in More Places, Like NSA Headquarters l The FISA Amendment Law is signed into Law l HR 6304 Sets New Referendum

Glen Chase, a Professor of Systems Management, has released a report identifying the California Department of Food & Agriculture (CDFA) Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM) eradication program as a fraud. "CDFA claims the moth is an emergency and pretends that they can eradicate it in order to steal $100's of millions from taxpayer emergency funds, set aside for real emergencies."

"CDFA's fraudulent goal of eradication is based on a fake emergency, which was confirmed invalid by The Monterey and Santa Cruz County Superior Courts when both ruled that the CDFA violated California's Environmental Law by claiming an emergency exemption and spraying pesticides on populated areas." Both courts also found that no damage from this moth had occurred, contrary to CDFA's claim.

After the court rulings and after 31 cities passed resolutions to stop the spray of pesticides from this program, the CDFA gave up the aerial spray of synthetic pheromone based pesticides directly on cities. CDFA claimed it was the only method to eradicate the moth within the window of opportunity of only months that existed for eradication.

Now the CDFA reports they will instead use an untested sterile moth release program that won't be fully operational for three years, in 2011. "How the window of opportunity to eradicate the moth magically jumped from just months to years is a story that the CDFA is still working on." Read More and Download the Report

In a July 14th, New York Times Op Ed, Barack Obama says:

"As I’ve said many times, we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 — two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces."

In other words, he does not plan to get all of the troops out of Iraq and he will only get most of the troops out in two years. And what does he explain he will do with these troops? Redeploy them. Redeployed where? His rhetoric has been clear: Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran.

Obama goes on to call for a surge in Afghanistan as well as war in Pakistan:

"Ending the war [in Iraq] is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan [...] As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters [...]" Read More

see also: Obama outlines policy of endless war

The 4th Annual Old Time American Flag Burn took place on July 3rd at the Far West Fire Ring on Seabright Beach in Santa Cruz. This BYOF (Bring Your Own Flag) event is a ritual celebration of the First Amendment to the Constitution which protects freedom of speech, including the burning of the United States flag. Instead of flag desecration, this is flag consecration.

Two years ago congress attempted to amend the constitution to ban flag desecration and it failed by one vote. Since then congress has continued to attempt to generate a bill that would pass muster, but support has decreased. Justice William Joseph Brennan, Jr. noted that the "Principal function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute; it may indeed best serve its high purpose when it induces condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger." Organizers say their "intention is not to anger folks, but to create a safe place for our community to exercise this seldom used freedom. Read More

American Flag Consecration a Success!!

previous years: 2005 | 2006

A group of San Francisco residents called The Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco are gathering signatures for an initiative to be put on the November ballot. The Initiative will ask to rename Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W Bush Sewage Plant.

The group has managed to collect 8,500 signatures so far (15,000 are needed for an initiative). The initiative is going to read: Should The City And County of San Francisco Rename The Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W Bush Sewage Plant?

Some San Francisco residents strongly object to the resolution. One commentator on Indybay writes "sewage plants are a vital necessity to our survival, and fertilizer is necessary for plant growth upon which our food depends". The commentator goes on to say that we should "respect the labor that makes possible the work of the sewage plants" and passage of the resolution "honors Bush" and thus should be opposed.

Photos | Video | The Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco

In October 2007 the United States, the European Community, Switzerland and Japan simultaneously announced that they would negotiate a new intellectual property enforcement treaty, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA. Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand and Mexico have joined the negotiations. Although the proposed treaty's title might suggest that the agreement deals only with counterfeit physical goods (such as medicines), what little information has been made available publicly by negotiating governments about the content of the treaty makes it clear that it will have a far broader scope, and in particular, will deal with tools targeting "Internet distribution and information technology." To date, disturbingly little information has been released about the actual content of the agreement. However, despite that, it is clearly on a fast track; treaty proponents want it tabled at the G8 summit in July, and completed by the end of 2008.

Skidmark Bob of Free Radio Santa Cruz interviewed media analyst John Anderson about ACTA and H.R. 4279, the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property (PRO IP) Act of 2007. The PRO IP Act proposes to make substantial changes to federal copyright law, including the appointment of a copyright Czar. Read More and Listen to Audio

see also: Audio Collage on Sharing Music in the Digital Age

Armed with bazookas, instruments and colorful posters, residents of Santa Cruz will show their support on Tuesday, June 10th at 3:30pm in favor of a pending city resolution requesting that all US military aid to Colombia be re-directed to domestic drug prevention and rehabilitation programs, which have been shown to be more effective in the “war on drugs.” Bert Muhly of Tres Americas will speak on the issue, as well as Sandra Alvarez, long time Colombia activist and Ph.D candidate at the University of California Santa Cruz.

“The US has put almost five billion dollars into the Colombian military, and the army has committed massacres and collaborated with death squads and drug traffickers with almost total impunity,” said national campaign organizer Liza Smith of the Fellowship of Reconciliation’s Latin America program. “It’s time US communities stand up for how they want their tax dollars spent.”

Military spending in Colombia was supposed to cut cocaine production in half by 2005. Instead, retail prices for the drug have dropped and purity has increased, according to the Office on National Drug Control Policy. Meanwhile, a recent study showed that killings of civilians by the Colombian army has increased since the U.S. overhauled military training of its forces. Read More

California held an election on June 3rd. Proposition 98 failed to pass and Proposition 99 passed. In the CA Assembly, Nancy Skinner beat Kriss Worthington and in the State Senate Mark Leno beat Carole Migden.
Leno Victory Marks New Era in San Francisco Politics | State Election Results | San Francisco Election Results | Alameda County Election Results

Propositions 98 and 99 were aimed at changing the government’s power to take private property. Proposition 98 would have abolished rent control and other renter protections. Proposition 99 will block the government from taking single family homes or condominiums to transfer to other private parties, but will allow eminent domain for public uses and will not ban rent control.

Prop 98 loses, Prop 99 wins | Tenants Speakout Against Realtors For Supporting Prop 98 | Protect rent control, print out a No on 98 sign | San Francisco Tenants Rally Against Prop 98, Then Vote Against It | Prop 98 can provoke a city-wide rent strike | Four days to Save Rent Control | Oakland, Berkeley renters oppose Proposition 98 | No on Prop 98 Update | RHANAC's Steve Edrington Accusses Renters of Being Entrenched Tenants | Prop 98 Continues To Lose In The Polls | Expose the Landlords' Scheme | Non Profit Housing Developers May Be Selling Out The Poor | Prop 98 would eliminate rent control and tenant protections | How To Defeat Prop 98 | Progressive Politicos Preach to the Choir | Housing California Conference Will Have Prop 98 Discussion | Housing California Conference To Have Bush/McCain Supporter As Speaker On Prop 98 & 99 | Save Rent Control & Tenant Protections Update | Prop 98 Trailing Badly; Californians Support Rent Control

In San Francisco, Proposition G passed and Proposition F failed to pass. Propositions F & G focused on development by Lennar Corp in Bay View Hunters Point. Proposition F would have required that half of all Lennar's housing be available to people making less than the median area income, which is $75,000 for a family of four. Prop. G is the deal Newsom and Lennar were pushing; it will give the financially troubled developer the right to build 10,000 new housing units, office and retail space, and a new football stadium, along with 300 new acres of parks, in one of the city's most economically depressed areas.

Optimism in the Face of Defeat in the Bayview | Election fraud probably committed for Prop G | Election Fraud Watch in SF on Prop G-2d 49er Stadium Swindle | The people are for Proposition F and that is what really matters | Say Yes to F | Big Labor Sells Out | The Labor Council of San Francisco has helped Propostion F is a big way | Bayview Residents: the Hidden Treasure | Hold out for Hunters Point

Chris Daly's Blog | San Francisco Tenants Union | NoProp98.org | PropositionF.com | SF Bay Guardian Endorsements