Monday, July 1, 2013

United Airlines Security interrogates Board Member of Global Network Against Weapons in Space on his way home from Nordic Conference in Stockholm


REPORT FROM 'HIGH NORTH' SPACE CONFERENCE



I am writing this from the Frankfurt, Germany airport where I have a three-hour layover on the way back to Boston. I flew early this morning from Kiruna to Stockholm and then Frankfurt.

One of our new Global Network Advisory Board members, Luis-Gutierrez-Esparza (President of Latin-American Circle of International Studies) from Mexico was met with a big surprise after he left Kiruna. Early this morning our board convener Dave Webb from the UK received an email from Luis saying that prior to boarding his flight in Stockholm Luis was pulled aside by United Airlines security and interrogated for 45 minutes about our Global Network conference. He was asked who paid for his trip to Sweden, who organized the conference, how the conference was funded, and for a list of all conference participants. Luis did tell them how his own trip was funded (by sources inside Mexico) but he refused to give any names of anyone else involved in the event.

This unusual interrogation of Luis indicates just how closely the military industrial complex is watching the work of the Global Network. They do fear the spreading of knowledge and resistance to US-NATO efforts to use the “High North” of Sweden, Norway, and Finland for space radars, satellite downlink stations, and testing areas for drones and other high-tech weapons. This incident should give us all full confidence that we are on the right track and the determination to continue, and to expand, our efforts.

I want to offer some observations from my conference notes that I think were particularly interesting and important. They are not in any particular order but all equally valuable.


The event was attended by people from the following nations: Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Germany, England, Russia, US, Mexico and Japan.
  • The conference began with singing by a Sami (indigenous people from the High North) man. Sami are best known for their reindeer herding. He sang prayers to his mother, grandfather, his friend, and the wind.
  • Kiruna is a city of about 20,000 people in the High North and while we were there we never saw the sun set – it is the land of the midnight sun.
  • Kiruna is a mining town and has the largest underground iron ore mine in the world. Because they essentially mine underneath the city the ground just below is expected to eventually give way so the city is being moved away from the mine and the process will take the next 30 years to complete. The mining company, owned by the state, will pay for the moving of the city.
  • During WW II the Nazi’s never occupied Sweden but instead they took the iron ore from Kiruna to Germany to build their war machine.
  • Just outside of Kiruna is the Esrange Space Center where they download images from satellites in polar orbits. The information from the satellites is used for both civilian and military purposes.
  • Expanding mining operations and the growing space testing range are having negative impacts on the Sami people’s culture and ability to herd rein-deer.
  • One Sami woman speaker told us that we’ve all had our minds colonized by the western dominant culture and that we each have a responsibility to de-colonize our minds.
  • Norwegian journalist Bard Wormdal (author of The Satellite War) told us that Norway practices a “double standard” as they violate the Svalbard and Antarctic Treaties which strictly forbid military operations of any kind from happening at these north and south polar locations. In both cases Norway has downlink satellite stations at these two points and provide the US military with imagery that is used for war making. The Norwegian government still denies this even after the publishing of the book, which provides conclusive evidence of these treaty violations.
  • When the conference participants took a bus trip to the Esrange Space Center we got a briefing from a public relations team representing the Swedish Space Corporation. At first they told us that only civilian use satellite imagery are being downloaded at the center but after many knowledgeable persons in our group objected and offered the truth they reluctantly admitted that indeed satellite imagery is in fact provided for US and NATO military operations.
  • Russian conference participant Vladimir Kozin told us that when Obama recently spoke in Berlin about the need for cuts in nuclear weapons the Pentagon at the very same moment was releasing a new plan to upgrade existing US nuclear weapons based in Europe. The US is the only nuclear power that bases its nukes outside of its own country.
  • Kozin stated that the Russian government feels strongly that the US “missile defense” program (now being expanded with NATO to surround Russia) undercuts their strategic defense capability and makes hopes for nuclear disarmament virtually impossible.
  • In Obama’s Berlin speech he did not mention “one single word” about missile defense Kozin told the conference.
  • Kozin also reported that in recent times the US Navy has been sending nuclear submarines toward Russian submarine bases. (Imagine the outrage if the reverse was being done!)
  • The new European Union “Galileo” military/civilian satellite system (like the US GPS) will be used to explore for oil and natural gas drilling in the melting Arctic Ocean.
  • Activists from Finland showed the conference a map of the large drone testing area that has been established in their country. The 11,000 square kilometer test area is only 30 kilometers from the Russian border. In 2005 drones that were used in Afghanistan were tested at the range.
  • Finnish corporate controlled media, like in Sweden and Norway, are doing major anti-Russian propaganda that is pumping up conflict in the region.
  • We need to draft international anti-drone agreements at the NGO level and it was decided to begin that process right away.
  • It was also decided that the Global Network should pursue the idea of making a documentary video about the dangers of expanding “missile defense”.
  • Over and over during the conference links were made between climate change and expanding militarism. There was total agreement that we should all be demanding the conversion of the military industrial complex so that our resources can be used to deal with climate change.
  • We must turn the Arctic region into an International Nature Park in order to prevent the drilling for oil and natural gas and the militarization of the Arctic.
  • The development of robotic warfare technology may be the biggest military advancement since the making of the atomic bomb.
  • We must all talk more about how Techno-Fascism, and the worshipping of military technology, is a deep spiritual sickness.
  • A US military radar for “missile defense” is planned for deployment in the Kyoto prefecture in Japan. Resistance plans are now underway.
  • RAF Waddington in the UK is now piloting drones from that base. Protests were recently held there.
  • In Darmstadt, Germany US military downlink radars were removed some years ago but it was only recently learned that below the ground at that same location still exists a military war fighting computer center.
  • Following the recent disclosures about the NSA by the whistleblower Edward Snowden, the UK government told their media that they are not allowed to mention the NSA surveillance program and the Menwith Hill (US NSA spy base) in Yorkshire in the same breath.
  • There was a tentative decision made by the Global Network membership to hold our 22nd annual space organizing conference in 2014 near Vandenberg AFB in California.
  • It was also resolved to create a Nordic network to work on drone and space issues that would work to organize local actions during Keep Space for Peace Week - October 5-12.
  • The new documentary called The Ghosts of Jeju was shown to the conference and people loved the film about resistance to a Navy base on Jeju Island, South Korea that will port US warships as Obama's "pivot" into the Asia-Pacific further surrounds China. People cried, clapped with the music at the end, and asked for how to get the film. You can order it here
  • Everyone expressed their deep appreciation to all those in the Swedish peace movement for doing a wonderful job hosting our conference. Particular thanks go to Women for Peace and especially those in Kiruna who worked so hard to take such good care of us.
Bruce K. Gagnon
Coordinator
Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
PO Box 652
Brunswick, ME 04011
(207) 443-9502
globalnet@mindspring.com
www.space4peace.org
http://space4peace.blogspot.com/  (blog)

The Defamation of US-Professor Grover Furr author of "Krushev Lied" (2011)


Comments: (22)

The Defamation of Grover Furr

Category : News
- By Jack Smith IV, Staff Writer
A YouTube video of a Montclair professor at a public debate has sparked the attention of national and local news outlets, resulting in both public outcry and marked sensationalism.
In the video, the professor is addressed a question regarding genocides committed by communist regimes in the past hundred years, which grows into a shouting match between the professor and the questioner. “The United States has the lowest standard of living of all of the industrialized countries,” says the professor at the end of the video, “and they all have some form of Socialized healthcare, and you should have it too!”
The professor was Grover Furr, who has been with Montclair State for 43 years, and teaches classes like History of Journalism, World Literature and History of the English Language.
Outside of his capacities as an English professor, his research specialty has been the communist regimes of the 20th century, where he holds a number of controversial positions.
One popular contention is his claim that Stalin, who is historically recognized as a genocidal mass-murderer, never actually perpetrated any of the alleged atrocities. “I have yet to find one crime,” he shouts in the video, “one crime that Stalin committed!”
The video is hosted by ‘YAliberty,’ with a description that reads “Let’s make this video go viral.” It has 37,000+ views to date.
Young Americans for Liberty (YAL) is a national organization for politically libertarian students. A relatively new activist organization, it has grown rapidly in the past four years, expanding to 300 chapters representing 26,000 students across the nation, a testament to the burgeoning American libertarian movement.
After the publishing of the video on their official YouTube channel, Jeff Frazee, the executive director and founder of YAL and the former National Youth Coordinator for Ron Paul’s 2008 presidential campaign released a statement claiming Furr was teaching Stalinism to students. When Furr responded to YAL on this statement, Frazee, arguably one of the most important libertarian youth leaders in the country, personally responded with one sentence, “You are a sick man for denying the deaths of millions of innocent people and should be exposed for such.”
During the recent election season, YAL sponsored a series of debates held at seven universities, and it was at this debate that the video of Prof. Furr was taken. “During the first few days, I watched the video rise in popularity, from 7,000 views to 12,000 views to 25,000 views, and so on,” said Anthony Celi, Vice President of the local YAL chapter. “It was very exciting to see our event get national coverage. We worked long and hard to put that debate together.”
This coverage, however, was mostly due to the circulation it was receiving among a variety of conservative-leaning news sources and independent bloggers. The video had indeed gone viral, and with a very particular audience.
The Washington Examiner, a daily paper with a circulation of a few hundred thousand, ran the headline on its site “Your Tax Dollars At Work: prof says Stalin did not kill millions of people – that’s ‘the Big Lie.’” The video itself is called “‘Communist Denier’ teaches students.” The title’s implications, however, are that Grover Furr uses his platform as a professor to teach communism or Stalinism to his students, a possibly spurious allegation.
All of this media attention caught the eye of Arthur V. Belenduik, a lawyer from Washington D.C. Belenduik’s field is communications and he has been practicing law for decades. “If the FCC regulates it, it’s the kind of work I do.” Arthur Belenduik is also a first-generation Ukranian American.
“When Stalin was rolling his tanks into Eastern Europe, my parents were running for their lives,” he said. “My aunt spent five years in a concentration camp under Stalin. I’ve seen what he can do first hand.” It wasn’t long after the video went online that Belenduik was receiving emails from Ukranian friends about Prof. Furr. The prospect that someone making claims that Stalin never committed “one crime” was teaching at a public university was appalling to Belenduik.
Belenduik felt he needed to reach out, and contacted the office of the president, the College of Humanities and Social Sciences and the English department. The position of the school was that Prof. Furr was entitled to his first amendment rights, both in public forums and on his website hosted through Montclair’s servers.
“The first amendment is not an absolute right,” said Belenduik, speaking on the phone from his office in Washington. “It’s not an issue of teaching the controversial. We demand that students who come to college be taught things that are truthful.” Unsatisfied with the official response from the university, he reached out to the Montclarion. “I am asking that you take steps that will lead to the immediate termination of Grover Furr,” he wrote in an email to our editors.
The portrayal of Prof. Furr by these online news sources is endemic of a popular narrative in modern conservative politics: universities are liberal institutions, subsidized by your tax dollars, where young people go to be indoctrinated into left leaning ideologies. The Washington Examiner and other publications paint Prof. Furr as a typical example of just this. The alleged ethical infringement, however, hinges on whether or not Professor Furr brings his personal politics into the classroom, out of context of the coursework at hand.
Though initially excited by the circulation and publicity, the local leadership of YAL was clear that they didn’t support the outcry against Prof. Furr which called for his removal from his teaching position. “We invited the man to debate his position, and he did just that,” said Celi.  “The debate existed independently of his teaching.”
Ultimately, it’s Professor Furr’s behavior in class which informs the legitimacy of his professional performance. The College for Humanities and Social Sciences was reluctant to comment on whether or not there had been a history of formalized complaints against Prof. Furr, or whether administrators had sat in on or observed any classes.
“I can tell you this,” said Dr. Emily Isaacs, chair of the English department, “I have not received a complaint from an undergraduate student regarding any English class this semester.”
“None of these bloggers, or anyone saying these things, has ever been in one of my classes,” said Furr, who’s no stranger to the regular criticism he receives, mostly online, and none of whom have reached out to him for comment on the debate clip. “Have they ever sat in on one of my classes? Or spoken to my students? They certainly could have. And those are the only opinions that matter.”
“I’d heard that his political views had influenced his classes,” said one student who has taken Prof. Furr’s class in Middle English Literature. “But in my class, he never really made any references to communism or Stalinism or anything.” Most students have the same reaction.
Prof. Furr, though notorious for his political positions, can’t recall an incident where Prof. Furr brought those positions into an irrelevant classroom context.
Professor Furr keeps a website where all of his course materials are available for anyone to view, hosted on Montclair’s servers, as well as information on his political views, his publications and articles he authors or curates. “I’ve taken a look at the syllabus for his History of Journalism class, at least,” said an associate professor who teaches journalism here at Montclair, “and I couldn’t find anything that wasn’t really par-for-the-course.”
Though there is debate about his writings on the subject of communist regimes of the 20th century, they’ve never been a part of his assigned readings or materials for classes he’s taught, and Prof. Furr often has to defend himself from outright slander on the subject.
Ratemyprofessors.com, a site owned by MTV-U that hosts millions of ratings and comments, is a site where you can post reviews of your professors much like you would movies or restaraunts.  The site has pages of comments about Prof. Furr, many of which range from the misleading to the obviously fraudulent. Prof. Furr writes a letter nearly annually requesting the removal of dozens of these posts, going one by one through each review pointing out clear inaccuracies, such as comments on Furr’s performance teaching classes that don’t even exist.
“As I recall, in every case they removed the posts I identified,” said Furr. “[They’ve] handled this matter well.” Soon after they’re removed, the comments begin to stack up again, and are often taken as legitimate and used to levy criticism in right-wing blogs.
Public and private universities have historically been a safe haven for the exchange of controversial ideas, the institution itself representing the value of multi-disciplinary practices and views informs the growth of an informed member of society.
“Students attending Montclair State University are aware, intelligent and discerning,” said Suzanne Bronski, Montclair’s Director of Media Relations. “At the heart of the university experience is the valuable process of helping students to arrive at their own informed and considered opinions. As much as people may vehemently disagree with Professor Furr, we deeply believe that students are capable of separating out historical truth from personal political viewpoints.”
As for Furr himself, the defense against the defamation of his character marches onward. He thinks it’s time for another letter to Ratemyprofessors.com. “I’ll probably write to them again as soon as classes are over.”

"Drohnen-Programm ein groß angelegtes internationales Terrorprogramm" Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky, Ehrengast des Global Media Forums in Bonn, kritisiert im Kulturzeit-Interview  auf 3sat den US-Präsidenten scharf


Bei einer Umfrage des US-Magazins "Foreign Policy" wurde der Linguistikprofessor Noam Chomsky zum wichtigsten Intellektuellen imenglischsprachigen Raum gewählt. Gegenüber Kulturzeit kritisiert Chomsky am 19. Juni, als Ehrengast des Global Media Forums in Bonn:


"The Ghost of Jesu Island" - Film about Struggle against US Military Bases