Mr. Robot: Cyberpunk Triumph

Well, my number-one television guilty pleasure this summer was "Mr. Robot" on the USA Network - though it was so good, easily the best new show on TV this summer, indeed of the year, maybe even the past year or two, that there's nothing whatsoever to feel guilty about watching it.  It was just a pleasure, rare, keenly intelligent, and provocative.  I saw most of it in the past few weeks, and the finale tonight.

Hackers have appeared in all kinds of TV series, most of them obvious, a few like CBS's CSI-Cyber not half-bad, but Mr. Robot is something else, in a class all its own.  Impossibly suave and gritty at the same time, as lyrical as Rectify - the other out-of-left-field masterpiece to come along in the past few years - but hipper, with words like louche in  it, and with a heart and soul and slap-in-your face realism and cynicism that's not to be believed, but is plausible all the same, you disbelieve Mr. Robot at your peril.

Cyberpunk has attained impressive heights in writing - Sterling, Gibson, Varley - but not so much on the screen.   Mr. Robot takes its place right up there with its story - its only competition screenwise being Bladerunner, an utterly different kind of tale.

There are elements not only of Occupy Wall Street and V for Vendetta but Fight Club in Mr. Robot, but I won't say which ones or what, because I don't want to spoil your surprise and fun if you haven't yet seen it.  But unlike Fight Club and its progeny, in which the narrative is completely situated in the minds of the characters, in Mr. Robot we have a ratification or support of this in the very digital age we in fact inhabit, in which the difference between the fantasies on screens and realities in first-hand tangible experiences in hand have never been less.

Like many series, the next-to-last episode, and the one before that, packed more of a punch than the finale.  But that doesn't matter, because the story is continuing, the series will be back next year, which makes tonight's finale not a finale at all, but a bridge, and a short one at that.

I'll be here next year with more.

#SFWApro

Three Cheers for Anonymous!

I'm very pleased that Anonymous has declared cyberwar on ISIS, Al Qaeda, and whatever groups and people were behind the murderous terrorists attacks in Paris last week.   As Anonymous indicates in the above video, the group has always been a fervent and uncompromising champion of freedom of expression - when it was trampled by American police in contravention of our First Amendment during Occupy Wall Street being a prime example.   But with the killing of cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo, the defense of free expression has taken on a new urgency.  Governments have their hands more than full with the attempt to bring those murderers to justice and insure to whatever extent possible that they won't continue.  The cyberwar part of this is crucial, and the good guys - we, who believe in absolute freedom of speech and press - need all the help we can get.  Three cheers for Anonymous for stepping up.  Its joining this fight is necessary and welcome.


My thoughts last week on the Charlie Hebdo attack, as told to Fios 1 News

Further Thoughts on Charlie Hebdo: Where We Go From Here

Usually, governments have been the worst opponents of journalists, satirists, and those who not only believe but daily practice freedom of expression.   In the case of totalitarian governments in the 20th century and dictatorships throughout the ages, those in power often imprisoned and killed those who dared to criticize them in print or any medium. Democracies have been a little better, but even Turkey recently arrested and imprisoned a journalist.  The United States has been known to do the same - certainly numerous journalists were arrested here during Occupy Wall Street, in blatant violation of our First Amendment.

Recently, corporations have engaged in a kind of self-censorship, which has been destructive of the public's right to know.  Sony's initial pulling of The Interview out of movie theaters is a recent regrettable example. And even last night, in the reporting of the Charlie Hebdo attack, progressive stalwarts such as MSNBC refused to show some of the Charlie Hebdo cartoons deemed so offensive by the murderers in Paris.   But not showing those cartoons is an offense to those who died, and everyone who believes in freedom of expression.

The world changed yesterday.  Journalists have long been in danger on the front lines of war reporting.  Now they are in danger in their very offices.   Now more than ever, governments and corporations need to give those brave guardians of our democracy their maximum support.



my comments yesterday about the Charlie Hebdo attack

world response last month to Turkish media crackdowns



Sony media hack fiasco

Obama Weak in Protecting Citizens and Journalists in Ferguson

Obama's words an hour ago about what has been going on in Ferguson, Missouri were better than nothing, but a little late and, typically, a little weak.

The situation in Ferguson could not be more clearcut:  Under the First Amendment, people have the right to peaceably assemble to protest, which means not being teargassed, and not have police who look like an invading force in Iraq point all kinds of military weapons at you.   Under the First Amendment, reporters have the right - the obligation - to convey what is happening before them to the American people, and not be arrested as happened to two reporters (one of whom works for the Washington Post - African-American, perhaps not coincidentally).   When citizens and journalists are threatened and arrested by local police, it is the duty of the President to send in the National Guard to protect the people and physically restrain the police when necessary.

All of this, of course, in addition to the apparent murder of Michael Brown requiring justice.

It's unfortunately not surprising that Obama has done so little to protect the people in Ferguson.   He said little or nothing when the out of control cop pepper sprayed an innocent student in California during the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.   He said nothing against Michael Bloomberg's consistent use of New York police to trample on the rights of citizens, journalists, and citizen journalists during Occupy Wall Street.   As I described at length in New New Media, it's a good thing that courageous people recorded some of this police misconduct on their phones.

MSNBC did a great job last night in providing live, ongoing coverage of the events in Ferguson.  Not so much the New York Times, which put the Ferguson story below the fold in today's edition, with Iraq on top (fair enough, maybe), accompanied by stories about the Bloomberg era at Rikers, poverty in America, and college sports (totally ridiculous!).   Perhaps if the arrested reporter had been working for the New York Times, the events in Ferguson would have received better coverage from the newspaper of record.

This is not the first time in American history that the Federal government has been required to step in when the local authorities have been violating the law to the peril of its citizens.   Eisenhower did it in the 1950s, and Kennedy in the 1960s, to protect citizens who were being blocked by local authorities from attending their schools.   In both cases, the National Guard was sent in to literally push the local authorities aside.

As Obama concludes his second term, he might want to think about this.   At this point, regarding the protection of the constitutional rights of American citizens, he not only has been no JFK, he's been no Eisenhower.   But there's still time for Obama to do the right thing.   I urge him to do so - as Representative John Lewis and others in the legislative branch have requested - before further damage is done to the American people.

Making First Amendment Violators Pay

Good news today for the First Amendment  in New York City: the city has agreed to pay out $583,000 to fourteen people whose constitutional rights to peaceably assemble, guaranteed under the First Amendment to our Constitution, were trampled by police officers who arrested them on trumped up charges during the Occupy Wall Street protests at the end of 2011.

That's important and welcome news indeed.  But I'm wondering: what will happen to the NYPD cops who made the illegal arrests?   What will happen to the supervisors, to then Police Commissioner Kelly, and then Mayor Bloomberg?

The answer: nothing.  And that's why these violations of the First Amendment continue.   Violating the Constitution should be a pretty serious crime - after all, it's the Supreme Law of the Land.  And yet, pepper-spraying officers in California, officers in New York who claim demonstrators are blocking when traffic when they are not, continue to act if they're illiterate or other can't understand what the right to peaceably assemble means.

Fortunately, in our age of omni-present video, it's more difficult than it was in the past for police to get away with these crimes.   Tim Pool's video, for example, got Alexander Arbuckle acquitted a few years ago, when he was arrested on bogus charges in New York City during an OWS demonstration. Video also played a role in the city's decision to compensate the 14 people wrongfully arrested with almost $600,000, after the DA wisely decided not to prosecute the nonsense charges.

But what can be done to stop this police and Mayoral abuse in the future?   Putting the culprits behind bars, including the former Mayor, would be a good way to start.

Black Sails 1.4: The Masts of Wall Street

If you think of most of the action dramas on cable television these days - whether taking place in the present, like Banshee and Strike Back, or in the past like Da Vinci's Demons and Vikings - the story moves along pretty quickly, sometimes at blinding speed (in the case of Strike Back), with every episode whipping the narrative forward around sharp and dangerous curves.   In contrast, Black Sails is dangerous, all right, but it's story almost seems to stand still at times.   And that's a change of pace for television that I very much like.

In episode 1.4, much of the action centers around a ship in the sand, and the pirates' attempt to make it more suitable to their needs.   The ship stands there, like a majestic skeleton to a nearly forgotten past, except in Black Sails it's very much happening.   The ship, of course, as would be any massive sailing ship, is an emblem and enabling technology to the life and pursuits of the pirates.   In a world before planes, the sailing ship was the only way to move across great distances.   But in Black Sails, this distance is as much political and economic as physical.

Richard Guthrie provides us with some important back story, including the way Flint and Miranda got together and its social context, but also his take and opposition to Flint's vision of a utopian pirate island untrodden by the monarchies of the day.  We already knew that Flint and Miranda are cultured people, and that money is the lubricant of this whole on-the-margin society, but in 1.4 we get a taste of the economic sophistication of many of the major players.   The pirate leaders and their colleagues, male and female, are in many ways more akin to The Wolf of Wall Street than any show now or ever on television, and that makes Black Sails worthy of note as well.  Or, looked at in other way, we could say that the pirates represent the 99% in the Occupy Wall Street of that day.   The ship in the sand stands at the fulcrum of those two forces.

Any way you look at it, Black Sails is as much a feast for the intellect as it is for the eyes, and a pleasure to see on television.

See also Black Sails: Literate and Raunchy Piracy ... Black Sails 1.3: John Milton and Marcus Aurelius

#SFWApro

The Good Wife 5.9: Reddit, Crowd-Sourcing, and the First Amendment on Trial

The Good Wife has been having a fabulous year - not only because of Alicia leaving Lockhart Gardner now LG and all the emotional dynamite that set loose - but because of its fearless, irrelevant tackling of of major new new media aka social media issues.   The fictional mega search engine Chumhum is the center piece of most of this, but the egregiously nonfictitious NSA also figured in a major episode, and this past Sunday Reddit got its turn in the barrel.

Not Reddit by name, but the pejoratively named Scabbit is the bad guy in an important suit that LG and Florrick-Agos are locking horns over in court.   In our reality, Reddit is the self-proclaimed "front page of the Internet," which it to some extent is.  It works in the same way the almost late, lamented Digg used to work:  users can posts links to anything on the web, in appropriate categories (subreddits).   Other uses can then vote the links up or down, and comment on them.  The links with the greatest number of votes make the front pages - the master front page of Reddit, and the front pages of  the subreddits.

Also in our reality, Reddit came in for its fair share of criticism earlier this year with its well-meaning attempt to identify the Boston bombers.   Pictures were posted on Reddit, and readers were encouraged to identify the presumed bomber.  Unfortunately, this crowd-sourcing produced a wrong ID, showing that democracy has its limits in the apprehension of criminals.

On Sunday night, a Florrick-Agos client is the victim of a similar problem.  He's wrongly accused of a bombing at a food festival, and his pictures continue to be posted on Scabbit even after he's legally cleared.  As these postings begin to ruin his life, Lockhart and Gardner defend Scabbit against Florrick and Agos's attempt to get the court to insist that Scabbit not allow any more of these damaging postings on its site.   Scabbit's reply is that they'll take down any postings after they occur, but committing not to allow any postings beforehand would constitute "prior restraint," or a violation of the First Amendment.

It's valuable to see this issue treated on television.  I'm an absolutist regarding the First Amendment when it comes to the government getting in the way of any speech or publication or peaceable demonstration - meaning, I think FCC fines for "objectionable" broadcasting and NYC Mayor Bloomberg's interference with the press during Occupy Wall Street are equally unconstitutional - but the First Amendment should protect neither traditional nor social media from libel and slander suits, when they act irresponsibly in publishing defamatory information.   Crowd-sourcing, in other words, has its limits, and we need to work a little harder to decide what they are and promote them.

See also The Good Wife 5.1: Capital Punishment and Politicians' Daughters ... The Good Wife 5.5: The Villain in this Story

And see also The Good Wife 4.1 Meets Occupy Wall Street ...  The Good Wife 4.2: Reunited ... The Good Wife 4.3: "Template-Based Link Analysis Algorithm" ... The Good Wife 4.5 Meets The Sopranos ... The Good Wife 4.20: Anonymous ... The Good Wife Season 4 Finale: Good Twist!

And see also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ...  Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10  ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits  ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express ... The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

And see also  The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars 

#SFWApro

The Newsroom 2.2: The Power of Video

The power of video was in evidence in The Newsroom 2.2 tonight - including what can happen in its absence.

At an Occupy Wall Street protest, the NYPD - who in reality and on this show demonstrate a blissful and vexing disregard of the First Amendment - Neil is arrested for doing his job, i.e., reporting on the event.   Fortunately, he live streamed his unconstitutional arrest, so even though the marauding NY cops took and likely broke his phone, the video of his outrageous arrest survived.   Will is able to use it to get Neil released.   Journalists arrested by constitutionally illiterate cops weren't quite so lucky in our reality.  But Tim Pool's video did get the case against OWS reporter Alexander Arbuckle thrown out of court last year. (I was pleased to have Tim Pool guest lecture in my class at Fordham University a few months earlier.)

Video, of course, can also incriminate, and it lands Maggie in increasing hot water - that is, a video of her, recorded by a bystander and put on YouTube, when she was in effect proclaiming her love for Jim. Determined to get the video off of YouTube, Maggie (with Sloan insisting on accompanying her) track down the video poster via Foursquare.   The poster is not prone to remove the video - it's getting lots of hits and is connected to her blog, after all - but Sloan tries to buy the poster's compliance by offering to tweet a pointer to the poster's blog to Sloan's nearly half a million followers on Twitter.  The poster agrees, takes the tweet - only to write a blog post about the whole event, anyway, which of course garners even more to attention to the video, which she hasn't removed, and her blog.  A savvy and amusing lesson about the labyrinthine power of social - or what I can "new new" - media, and the wheelers-and-dealers who try to use these media for their often conflicting purposes.

But the final lesson about video in this episode, about the impact of no video, is not amusing at all. Troy Davis is executed for killing  a police officer in Georgia.   He proclaimed his innocence until the end.   If only a video existed of what really happened to the cop.   Just as justice would have been better served if a video existed of what George Zimmerman did to Trayvon Martin.   We don't yet live in such a world, but we're slowly getting there.

See also The Newsroom Season 2 Debuts on Occupy Wall Street and More ... and (about Trayvon Martin) If Only There Was a Video Recording

And see also The Newsroom and McLuhan ... The Newsroom and The Hour ...The Newsroom Season 1 Finale: The Lost Voice Mail



#SFWApro

If Only There Was a Video Recording ...

As I lament the killing of Trayvon Martin, and the acquittal of his killer in Florida a few days ago, I can't help thinking: if only there was a video recording of the crucial events of that evening.

One thing which everyone agrees upon is no one other than George Zimmerman now can know with 100% certainty what happened that night.   In the absence of eyewitnesses, and, even worse, a video of the events, we are forced to rely on our ever fallible logic and emotions.

Eyewitnesses of course can be mistaken or can lie.  A video can on its own do neither, but can certainly be spliced or pointed in directions which distort the truth.  Still and all, it provides a record of events in general more reliable than eye-witness testimony.

Video recordings have already righted serious wrongs in our society.  A video recording in 1991 brought Rodney King's beaters - Los Angeles police officers - to trial.  And although they were acquitted of assault in state court, two of the officers were found guilty in Federal court of violating King's civil rights, and were imprisoned.  Video recordings brought the cop who killed Oscar Grant in 2009 in San Francisco to at least some justice.  In New York City last year, Alexander Arbuckle was acquitted of bogus charges brought against him by the NYPD during an Occupy Wall Street event.   Fortunately for Arbuckle and the truth, Tim Pool had recorded the event and what preceded it on his smartphone.

Opportunities for video recording are increasing.  Not only does every smart phone come with video recording capability, but developments like Google Glass will make them even easier and less intrusive to use.   We can not go back in time and see what happened to Trayvon Martin.   We can and should fight racism on every level, but we can never rid the world entirely of bad people.   In the difficult course of attempting to bring them to justice, we need all the technological help we can get.

The Newsroom Season 2 Debuts on Occupy Wall Street and More

The Newsroom was back on the air for its second season last night, with a good show that got Neal at the beginnings of Occupy Wall Street in August 2011 New York, and the team into much more.

Actually, the much more entails what may be a departure for the series, at least insofar as what we saw in the first season last year.  "Genoa" is some kind of project so secret and so powerful that it could "bring down a President" and change the world.   We get little more than a whisper about it in the opening episode.  It could conceivably be a fabrication of the source who brings it to "News Night" - but likely not - or it could be something that turns out to be related to, I don't know, the real NSA leaks.  Or it could be something in between - that is, a true story told by the source, but with no connection to our reality.

One could wonder why, with so many overtly tectonic news developments happening at this time, The Newsroom not only dabbles with the fictional, but makes it an apparent centerpiece of this season. The answer, of course, is that this is fictional television, and as such is entitled to choose what parts of its story are based on real events, and how real those events may be.

But I do especially enjoy the second take The Newsroom gives us on events that we lived though in the real news, which is why I think Neal on Occupy Wall Street was the high point of last night's episode. The inability of the conventional media to understand and thus report accurately about Occupy Wall Street - something which I critiqued them about in my own appearances on television at the time - was well presented by the Occupy Wall Street non-leader whom Neal got to interview.   But we all know that News Night is not quite conventional media, which is why its story - the show that we watch - is so riveting.   I'm therefore much looking forward to seeing how this OWS thread develops.

Meanwhile, it was also good to see at least one personal relationship moving in the right direction - to wit, Don breaking up with Maggie, after he sees her YouTube video in which her lack of feelings for Don are clear.   It will be good to see Jim back from New Hampshire and closer to Maggie.

And the election of 2012 indeed looms large - in the October 2012 "present" of this season, and its August 2011 extended flashbacks - which provides yet another inducement to look forward to The Newsroom.  I'm especially fond of revisiting elections with happy endings.

See also The Newsroom and McLuhan ... The Newsroom and The Hour ... The Newsroom Season 1 Finale: The Lost Voice Mail



#SFWApro

Why the US Dept of Justice's Grabbing of Associated Press Phone Records is so Egregrious

The proper relationship of the government and the press in a country such as ours that is governed by the First Amendment should be just this: the government should answer or not answer any questions put to it by the press.   Period.

Answering questions deceptively or incorrectly is morally wrong, even reprehensible - at its worst, propaganda, for want of a better name - but is not illegal.  But doing anything to interfere with the press, anything that could be reasonably construed as attempting to intimidate the press, is a straight-up violation of the First Amendment, and its injunction against the government "abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press".   A press subject to government investigation for doing its job - reporting, being the press - cannot possibly do its job free of abridgment.

President Obama needs to do more than say he agrees with the above.  He needs to root out the people in the Justice Department who abridged the First Amendment rights of the Associated Press.  These abridgers need to be publicly denounced and fired.

Once again, in the attempt to safeguard our freedom, our freedom has in fact been abridged by our own government.  As I've said many times over the years, the First Amendment is ever subject to equal-opportunity despoilers - meaning, trampling by government officials, of both parties.   In the local governmental response to Occupy Wall Street in 2011, First Amendment rights of journalists and OWS participants were roundly violated by Democratic and well as Republican officials.

Press Secretary Jay Carney gave an eloquent statement of President Obama's devotion to the First Amendment at a press conference today.  Obama now needs to follow through with actions.

The Good Wife 4.2: Reunited

The Good Wife treatment of Occupy Wall Street continued in episode 4.2, with the story of an innocent protester tasered to death by a cop out to make his "mark".  In addition to the strong courtroom drama - with Will back in court arguing the case of the victim - the story provides an important reminder of what cops can do and have done when they're set unconstitutionally loose against protesters and people.

Meanwhile, the court also has Will grappling with a new rule that allows jurors to ask questions of witnesses when they're on the stand.  This makes for some humorous and decisive moments in courtroom but, even it hadn't, I like this rule.  It empowers the everyday people who are the bedrock of our judicial system and democracy.

An important continuing story is also introduced tonight, in the person of Maddie Hayward, played by ER's Maura Tierney.   Her character on ER overlapped briefly but significantly with Julianna Margulies' Carol on the same show, and it would have been great to see the two together on The Good Wife in any case.  But their new story seems especially scintillating and complex, spanning business, politics, and, of course, the personal.

Maddie goes out of her way to help Alicia - including giving an unasked-for contribution to Peter's campaign.  But her guardian angel behavior may have a price - she wants to have a drink with Alicia.  When Alicia demurs, Maddie says she just wants to be friends, and Alicia agrees to have a drink the next evening.

We don't see that. The episode ends before that.  But one thing is sure: it's not just friendship that Maddie wants.  Maybe sex is indeed her motive.  But I'm thinking Maddie wants Alicia to run for some office.






See also The Good Wife 4.1 Meets Occupy Wall Street

And see also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ...  Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10  ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits  ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express ... The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

And see also  The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars

The Good Wife 4.1 Meets Occupy Wall Street

The Good Wife was back on CBS for its fourth season last night, with a bunch of good punchy stuff including Kalinda's husband, but Zach stole the show with his deft use of viral video.

The defining incident began with Alicia, Zach, and Grace driving back from a college visit through a neighboring county in Illinois.  They're pulled over by a cop on a bogus charge.  He gets agitated when he realizes that Zach has been using his smartphone to record the cop's illegal activities - much like NYPD pushing around people with cameras during the NYPD's unconstitutional restrictions on demonstrators and press last year - and, indeed, much like what happened in NYC, Zach is arrested.

Alicia and Peter do their best to get Zach out of this, including getting the officer to apologize, but law enforcement in the neighboring county refuses to be pushed around.  Fortunately, Zach has the savvy to put up a video of the cop and his actions - Zach discovers that the cop had several other innocent victims - and when the video goes viral, charges against Zach are dropped, and the cop is told to apologize.

Not exactly the same as happened in New York City in reality, but close enough.  Citizen photographer Alexander Arbuckle was arrested in NYC on New Year's Day 2012 for "blocking traffic" during an OWS demonstration.  Fortunately, citizen video journalist Tim Pool recorded the whole sad NYPD spectacle, and when this video evidence was offered in court, Arbuckle was acquitted. A victory for the First Amendment and what I "new new media" - aka social media.   Every since Rodney King, a video camera has the victim of police misconduct's best friend.

There was not much political content in Zach's story, but it hits the same point nonetheless. It is gratifying and satisfying indeed to know that we now live in a world in which police cannot just get away with anything they please because there are no witness other than the victims of police misbehavior.  Good for The Good Wife for bringing this point home in such an entertaining and impressive way.  It's a tonic and warning for NYPD and other police harassment of demonstrators and press that is still going on.





See also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ...  Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10  ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits  ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express ... The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

And see also  The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars

Audio, Video, and Justice for Trayvon Martin

With all the conflicting accounts of what happened on the night that George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, two things remain clear:

1. George Zimmerman had no business being anywhere near Trayvon Martin when the shooting occurred.  He was told to stop following Travyon by the police.

2. George Zimmerman was in pretty good shape, certainly not recently having been beaten to an inch of his life, when he got out of the car at the police station within an hour after the killing.

We know the first because of the police recording of Zimmerman's call.  We know the second because of the video taping of Zimmerman's arrival at the police station.

Neither the audio nor the video are crystal clear.   There are parts of the audio that are in dispute (the racial epithet that many hear Zimmerman utter).   But the police injunction to Zimmerman to not follow Trayvon, and Zimmerman's not being seriously injured when he arrived at the police station, are beyond dispute.

This is not the first time that video has changed the game, tipped the scales in favor of justice, for victims of violence.   LAPD officers would never have been brought to justice had their beating of Rodney King in 1991 not been videotaped by an alert citizen.   Police officers would not have been reprimanded had their pepper spraying of Occupy Wall Street demonstrators exercising their First Amendment rights not been captured on video.

Nothing can bring Trayvon back.  But the eyes and ears of the cosmos, in the form of recordings which bear witness to the circumstances of his killing, will be the foundation of the justice that he deserves.

The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

The coming attractions to The Good Wife 3.15 showed Will, in danger of disbarment, leaving the office with a baseball bat.  The relative good news, as we found out tonight, is that Will isn't going off to bash anyone.  He's going off to play baseball.

He'll have a little time on his hands, because he elected to take the six-month suspension from practicing law, rather than risking permanent disbarment.  It was the smart move, but I hate to see Will give in even an inch to the forces of sloth and evil that are always at work to bring him down.

The specific story for the night was good too - keyed perfectly into what is going on right now in Syria.  Although what happened to the brave freedom fighter in Homs, on a Skype or other vid connection with Kalinda, was predictable, it was nonetheless very moving.

No so the episode's treatment of Occupy Wall Street.  A judge gives an impassioned shout-out to OWS, but it's bundled in a lame comedic thread that just didn't work.  OWS is serious enough to warrant it's own serious treatment on this show.  Memo to writers: do it.

But there are some good stories brewing in Peter's office, as he directs Cary to shake things up, and I'm looking forward to the next episode, which will be on in ... March?   Well, maybe it give Will some time to get a little baseball in somewhere.


See also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ...  Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10  ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits  ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express

And see also  The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars

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The Plot to Save Socrates
"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Timcast on UStream Doing Great Covering NYPD Violation of First Amendment Tonight

In between the usual New Year's Eve celebrations, I've been watching Timcast and his live UStream coverage of Occupy Wall Street, and the New York City Police (NYPD) once again violating the protesters' First Amendment rights.

I'm going to continue to talk even more about this trampling of the First Amendment - one of my New Year's resolutions - but I wanted to take a moment to thank Tim, and say how inspiring it is to have his continuous coverage of Occupy Wall Street.

There was nothing about this on CNN, MSNBC, or Fox.  Nothing on the major broadcast networks.  CNN is especially irksome - they gave us Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin, who were funny enough, broadcasting from Times Square in New York City.   But there's nothing funny about the NYPD continuing its systematic flouting of the First Amendment, and the damage that does to our democracy, just a few blocks away..

But, as the mass media failed in their jobs tonight, Timcast soldiered on.  For no pay.  Motivated by the noble goal of getting world out to the world about what's been happening in New York City on this New Year's Eve and now Day.

I just saw on Timcast's live feed the NYPD block the sidewalk, then order protesters to stop blocking the sidewalk, then start arresting the group.  And Tim Pool - the Tim of Timcast -  covering this, was grabbed and pushed by police, and threatened with arrest.   Another outrageous abrogation of the First Amendment.

Tim just reported that a National Lawyers Guild observer was arrested by the NYPD, after he disobeyed their order to put his phone down!

All of this on 13th Street and Second Avenue in New York City.

You know what?  As long we have people like Tim,  democracy will never be defeated.  He just said he's "beat, hungry, and carrying this 40-pound bag".  That would be the bag with his video equipment.  It's also the bag of our freedom and future.

Most of my 2011 commentary on Occupy Wall Street is here.

-Paul Levinson, PhD
Professor of Communication and Media Studies
Fordham University

More Lies from Mayor "I Have an Army" Bloomberg about OWS and the Press

According to Mayor Michael "I Have an Army"  Bloomberg, talking on radio this morning about the criticism he's received about preventing the press from covering his eviction of Occupy Wall Street protesters from Zuccotti Park, “We didn’t keep anybody from reporting, they just had to stand to the side while the police did their job."

And how, exactly, is a reporter supposed to do her or his job when the police prevent this reporter from seeing what other police are doing?

And why, if Bloomberg and the police "didn't keep anybody from reporting," did Bloomberg after the Zuccotti Park eviction order the NYPD - his "army" - to keep their hands off reporters covering these events?

The answer, as the New York Times reported, is that a "coalition" of media representatives pressured Bloomberg into saying the right thing.

He also complimented his army aka police for doing "a great job" in their evictions at Zuccotti.   Is that why the coalition of media people complained?   Is preventing reporters from doing their jobs, roughing them up in some cases, not to mention the unconstitutional eviction of the Park itself, a "great job"?  Is Bloomberg already reneging on his order to police to leave reporters alone?  Didn't take long.

Fortunately, cellphones in the hands of uncredentialed, every day people have shown America and the world the truth - people put in the hospital (one, a former Marine, in critical condition), tear-gassed, shoved up against a wall (an elderly woman) - all by police, who are supposed to protect not assualt law-abiding people.

I'll give Bloomberg this - so far, none of the worst offenses by police have happened in New York City.  But pointing to a worse evil does not justify one not quite as bad, and Bloomberg by his talk and actions is well on the way to making New York, a city I was born in, lived all my life, and love, into a totalitarian town.

-Paul Levinson, PhD, Professor of Communication & Media Studies, Fordham University

my interview of NY Night News about Bloomberg, OWS, the press


Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 1

A Progressive Libertarian in the Occupy Wall Street Age

It's been 3 and 1/2 years since I posted I Am a Progressive Libertarian, which received some 60+ comments, most in 2009 and 2010, most by people who argued that I wasn't really a libertarian, which I maintained I really was.  The gist of my position is we need (a) less or no government in regulation of communication, technology, etc., and strict enforcement of Constitutional provisions of government's capacity to wage war, collect data on citizens, etc., (b) more government involvement in providing health care (I see protection from microbial parasites or disease as akin to protection from human invaders), and (c) payment for necessary government by taxing the super-rich (as a goal, no taxes from any person or business earning less than $1,000,000 per year, greatly increased taxes for all people and corporations earning more than that per year). 

How does that position play in our Occupy Wall Street age?

1. The resurgence of direct democracy that is the mainspring of Occupy Wall Street is a straight-up staple of any libertarian philosophy.   Direct democracy intrinsically reduces government by replacing representatives of the people (in Congress, in state houses, and in city halls) with the people themselves as decision-makers.   See Occupy Wall Street, Direct Democracy, Social Media for more.  The failure of Congress to reach an agreement on budgetary issues this year is further evidence of the decline of representative democracy.  Referenda to recall or remove elected government officials, calls for a Constitutional Convention, and General Assemblies at Occupy sites are expressions of this new direct democracy.  Note that The Tea Party, which often presents itself as a conservative libertarian movement, is explicitly focused on electing representatives, meaning that, unlike Occupy Wall Street, The Tea Party is not pursuing direct democracy (though both movements arise from a common refusal to accept business-as-usual from current officials and representatives in government).

2.  Police brutality against protesters in Occupy Wall Street sites across America is precisely the kind of government trampling of communication - and abrogation of First Amendment rights to peaceably assembly - that the progressive libertarian seeks to prevent, restrain, punish, and stop.   Similarly, the obstruction of the press from covering the Occupy Wall Street eviction in New York by Mayor Michael "I Have an Army" Bloomberg is an outright violation of the freedom of press provision of the First Amendment.   The failure of President Obama to condemn all of these violations in the U.S., and of Governor Jerry Brown to do the same in California, is yet another example of the exhaustion of representative democracy in our digital/street age.

3.  The 99% vs. 1% focus of Occupy Wall Street is exactly what I have in mind with the goal of no taxes for any person or business earning under a million dollars per year, and sharp increases in taxes for all earnings above one million dollars per year.   Bank of America's decision to rescind its plan to charge $5 a month for use of debit cards is a small but first explicit victory of the 99% over the 1%.

In sum, the progressive libertarian approach is not a call for yet another political party.  It is, rather, a philosophy, a perspective, which I see as consonant with Occupy Wall Street and hope will ring a bell with those seeking less government in our political  lives and more government responsiveness to our human needs, financed by the super-wealthy.   As a citizen, I intend to continue to shine an uncompromising light on the government's escalating violation of our First Amendment rights.

See also I Am a Progressive Libertarian and The Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 1

-Paul Levinson, PhD
Professor of Communication and Media Studies
Fordham University

Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 1

I offer ongoing commentary about Occupy Wall Street, September 27 through November 23, 2011.  The commentary first appeared in 15 blog posts - dates, titles, and links to the text of the blog posts are listed below.  Main themes include Occupy Wall Street as a resurgence of direct democracy, police violation of the First Amendment in their violence against protesters and the press, failure of the Obama administration to protect the rights of Occupy citizens attacked by munipalities, and much more.  The audio podcast is about 55 minutes in length.  It is intended as both analysis and eyewitness to one of the most important revolutions in human history.  Further chronicles will appear here in subsequent months.


audio podcast: Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 1

1. Sept 27, 2011 NYC Police Disgrace Themselves in Brutal Treatment of Wall Street Protesters
2. Oct 6, 2011 Advice to President Obama: Join Occupy Wall Street
3. Oct 16, 2011 Occupy Wall Street, Direct Democracy, Social Media: A Thumbnail History of Media and Politics Since Ancient Athens
4. Oct 21, 2011 Obama Should Call in National Guard to Restrain NYPD in Occupy Wall Street
5. Oct 26, 2011 No Expiration Date on First Amendment
6. Oct 29, 2011 Into the Mind of a Conservative Bully
7. Nov 2, 2011 Bank of America Bends to Will of the People
8. Nov 10, 2011 Open Letter to Governor Jerry Brown
9. Nov 13, 2011 Lame CBS Broadcasts Only First Hour of Republican Foreign Policy Debate
10. Nov 15, 2011 Mayor Bloomberg's Poor Understanding of the First Amendment
11. Nov 16, 2011 Violation of First Amendment to Cover Up Violation of First Amendment
12. Nov 20, 2011 What OWS Has Shown Us about Bloomberg, Jerry Brown, Obama
13. Nov 20, 2011 Jay Carney (and Obama) Have It All Wrong about Police and OWS
14. Nov 20, 2011 Failure of Budget Super-Committee Shows Further Decay of Representative Democracy
15. Nov 23, 2011 First Amendment Trampling Bloomberg Caves: NYPD Ordered to Let Press Do Its Job

My television interviews about OWS ... with Chuck Scarborough on NY Nightly News ... on FOX 5 NY ...

Relevant movie ... Tiffany Shlain's Connected moive

Blog posts since the audio podcast  (to appear in Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 2) -

  16.  Nov 25, 2011: Cairo and New York: A Tale of Two Related Cities
  17.  Nov 26, 2011: LA Woman Could Be Charged with 'Battery" for Pepper Spray - How About 
         UC-Davis Cops?
  18.  Nov 27, 2011: The Pike Pepper Spray Meme:  Pros and Cons
  19.  Dec 3, 2011:  A Progressive Libertarian in the Occupy Wall Street Age
  20.  Dec 9, 2011: More Lies from Mayor "I Have an Army" Bloomberg about OWS and the Press


transcript vidcast of OWS Chron 1 - thanks to Claude Almansi

The Pike Pepper Spray Meme: Pros and Cons

As the Huffington Post noted last week, John Pike's pepper spraying of UC Davis students has become a massive meme of Internet ridicule.   Jeanne Moos's CNN piece yesterday had some truly funny examples, my favorite probably being Pike as the cause of John Boehner's tears.

But I admit to having mixed emotions about this meme.  On the one hand, Pike's act of casual depravity - pepper spraying non-violent students like "he was watering a garden," as Sharon Osbourne aptly put it  - is deserving of all the cleansing ridicule the creative among us can bestow upon it.  Humor is a good way of diffusing cultural pain, of sublimating the fury we feel at Pike's nonchalant cruelty, as per Freud.

On the other hand, maybe we don't want our anger sublimated all that much.   Pike assaulted those students, plain and simple.  He committed a crime that warrants not only conviction and punishment - as in jail - but maximum publicity in its raw form, to serve as a warning and reminder to other police officers to control themselves when they are attempting to control groups of people.  All of that is no laughing matter.

Still, there is a healing quality in humor, in laughing at Pike's vent from hell aimed at everything from Mount Rushmore to the Beatles to Bambi.  My other favorite is Pike showing up in prehistoric cave art - Pike as the demon of authoritarian violence which has beset our species from the beginning - and here's a shout-out to James McGrath's contribution (James' comment on my blog post here yesterday got me thinking about this).



Occupy Wall Street Chronicles, Part 1