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esotericworld · 5 years

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Holy shit, this is terrifying. An American citizen (who happens to be white) exposes the total abuse of power by the Depatment of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection. LOL at “customs”. The most doublespeak term I can think of after reading this.

Source: https://theintercept.com/2019/06/22/cbp-border-searches-journalists/

“...That was just the beginning. The real abuse of power was a warrantless search of my phone and laptop. This is the part that affects everyone, not just reporters and people who keep journals.

IN GENERAL, LAW enforcement agents have to get a warrant to search your electronic devices. That’s the gist of the 2014 Supreme Court case Riley v. California. But the Riley ruling only applies when the police arrest you. The Supreme Court has not yet decided whether the same protections apply to American citizens reentering the United States from abroad, and federal appeals courts have issued contradictory opinions. In the absence of a controlling legal authority, CBP goes by its own rules, namely CBP Directive No. 3340-049A, pursuant to which CBP can search any person’s device, at any time, for any reason, or for no reason at all. If you refuse to give up your password, CBP’s policy is to seize the device. The agency may use “external equipment” to crack the passcode, “not merely to gain access to the device, but to review, copy, and/or analyze its contents,” according to the directive. CBP can look for any kind of evidence, any kind of information, and can share what it finds with any other federal agency, so long as doing so is “consistent with applicable law and policy.”

Sophia Cope, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has sued CBP over its warrantless device searches, told me that the agency “has for sure said no” as to whether there is a right to counsel during secondary screening. “They’ve been pretty consistent. You don’t get a lawyer. A lot of people have tried to push back, particularly after the Muslim ban. People were like, ‘I have a green card, and you’re putting me back on a plane to Iran. I need a lawyer to come down to the airport.’”

CBP has been doing warrantless device searches since the advent of the modern smartphone, Cope said, but the practice has increased by some 300 percent since Trump took office. In late 2017, EFF teamed up w with the American Civil Liberties Union and filed a case alleging the unconstitutionality of the administration’s blitz of warrantless searches. Anecdotally, CBP appears to be targeting typical Trumpian scapegoats, including Muslims, Latinos, and journalists, but anyone reentering the United States can be subject to these searches. The 11 plaintiffs in the EFF and ACLU case are a computer programmer, a filmmaker, a graduate student, a nursing student, a limousine driver, a businessman, an engineer, a professor, an artist, and two journalists. All are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents who had experiences similar to mine.

“The secondary inspection environment is inherently coercive,” the complaint says. “Travelers are not free to exit those areas until officers permit them to leave.” Travelers are usually exhausted, sometimes ill, and may be under pressure to catch a connecting flight, anxious to get home to kids, or needed at work. Forcing travelers who are not suspected of any wrongdoing to cough up their passwords, on pain of having their devices seized, violates the Fourth Amendment right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures, the plaintiffs argue, and also infringes the First Amendment right to free expression and association by means of government intimidation and surveillance. “Regardless of whether you have embarrassing information on your device,” Cope said, “it’s about personal autonomy and living in a free society and not a police state.”

... I DIDN’T KNOW all of this when I was being held by CBP. When the officers told me they only wanted to check my devices for child pornography, links to terrorism, and so forth, I believed them. I was completely unprepared for the digital ransacking that came next.

After I gave him the password to my iPhone, Moncivias spent three hours reviewing hundreds of photos and videos and emails and calls and texts, including encrypted messages on WhatsApp, Signal, and Telegram. It was the digital equivalent of tossing someone’s house: opening cabinets, pulling out drawers, and overturning furniture in hopes of finding something — anything — illegal. He read my communications with friends, family, and loved ones. He went through my correspondence with colleagues, editors, and sources. He asked about the identities of people who have worked with me in war zones. He also went through my personal photos, which I resented. Consider everything on your phone right now. Nothing on mine was spared.

Pomeroy, meanwhile, searched my laptop. He browsed my emails and my internet history. He looked through financial spreadsheets and property records and business correspondence. He was able to see all the same photos and videos as Moncivias and then some, including photos I thought I had deleted.

At one point, Pomeroy was standing over my laptop on the desk. I couldn’t see the screen, and he had such a puzzled expression on his face that I stood up to see what he was looking at. “Get back,” he said, clapping a hand on his sidearm. “I don’t know if you’re going for my gun.”... I thought I heard him call for me to come over, so I did. “Stand back from my gun,” he said... Pomeroy pronounced words to the effect that he was subjectively forming a reasonable belief that I might grab his service weapon.

It was an implicit death threat and a rhetorical move on part of the police that will be familiar to people of color: I’ve got a gun on you, ergo, you’re a threat to me. Speaking of which, I’m certain this whole experience would have been worse had I been black or brown instead of white. And that is to say nothing of migrants and refugees, whose treatment at the hands of CBP on the U.S.-Mexico border is another matter altogether. But it does go to show that you can’t contain a culture of aggression to one part of an armed agency...

It was around 4 p.m. when Moncivias finally finished up and informed me, anticlimactically, that I was free to go. I couldn’t wait to get outside because the detention area was freezing. No wonder Spanish-speaking migrants call CBP detention la hielera — the icebox. I took my phone and laptop and silently packed up my luggage, which still lay disemboweled on the desk, underwear and all. Pomeroy was gone by this time. As I was walking out, I said to Moncivias and Villarreal, “It’s funny, of all the countries I’ve been to, the border guards have never treated me worse than here, in the one country I’m a citizen of, in the town where I was born.”

“Welcome back to the USA,” Moncivias said.

Update: June 24, 2019

After publication, The Intercept learned that a CBP supervisor was incorrect when he told a reporter that a U.S. citizen may be forbidden from entering the country for refusing to answer a CBP officer’s questions. The piece has been updated to clarify that CBP does not have the power to stop American citizens from entering the U.S.

Source: https://theintercept.com/2019/06/22/cbp-border-searches-journalists/

#united states #DHS #CBP #immigration #border patrol #freedom #privacy #government

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somuchbetterthanthat · 7 years

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What do you think the barricade boys would be like today. Like with everything going on.

I was thinking about this, and I thought “oh my god, I have zero idea, that’s why it’s so hard to really write les amis in modern AU” but, I can try to actually give the beginning of an answer (and I’m ready to hear everybody’s opinions on this, really, because I think, depending our own situations, we’re gonna imagine something different for all of them.). This turned extremely long.. sorry.

I think the easiest to pin down are Feuilly and Grantaire, to be honest.

Grantaire, would be That Guy who never went to vote to an election because “what’s the point? They’re all the same.” Or maybe, the first time he was able to vote was for a presidential, he voted someone, they didn’t pass (or they did and disappointed him) and he was disappointed and he went “whatever, voting is not as cool as I was told it would”. Grantaire won’t say he avoids the news because the bullshit around him actually affects him, and he totally won’t ever admit how much he loves being friends with people who ARE optimist and who sees humanity’s beauty and want to make things better. Grantaire is also the guy who is Totally in Favour of Women’s Rights, Especially the Sexual Liberation Part of It *wink wink*. He… probably had unfortunate sentences like “girls don’t like the nice guys, they just want assholes” (i mean he basically already say unfortunate things like that in canon). Irma probably said once to him “Dude, you are an asshole, and I don’t see women running to your feet, so shut the hell up.” In my opinion, he’s also a white man in his twenties, with all the blind prejudice it can bring. He’s bi, but not that comfortable with it.

Feuilly, and dear god will I fight anybody on this if I must, is a STUDENT. (Or was a student, depending on which age you give them). Feuilly still struggles with money, because he’d live in fucking Paris, but Feuilly would NOT struggle to study, because FRANCE’S UNIVERSITIES ARE CHEAP (in comparison to some other countries, I mean), and also there are different financial help for people like Feuilly who don’t have the financial means to pay everything from their pockets. It’s still highly probable Feuilly would work anyway, probably in retail or tutoring!, though. Feuilly would spend his time reading and Getting Angry or Passionate about everything that’s going on in the world, that won’t change in our modern world. It’s not about Poland anymore, but oh man Feuilly would rant hours on the situation of Syrians refugees. He probably sat in baffled, horrified silence after Trump’s election. He makes sure people know about what happens in countries the media aren’t interested in. In fact, I could see him write long articles on international problems.

To be honest, I really don’t know If I can do this for all of les amis (perhaps not as detailed). A lot of this is only my personal opinions on how they might be in modern France.

In a world where Law school isn’t the only available school for people who don’t want to graduate for School, what do Bossuet and Bahorel do? I can see them, of course, going to university, again and again, but? Would they really not get a diploma…? I mean, okay, poor Bossuet probably doesn’t because of Circumstances, but for Bahorel, I don’t know - he can still have gone to study Law in the first place, find it filled with Terrible Arrogant Competitive People, went “nope” and just. Tried a lot of other things, accidentally majored and got a diploma in at least two of them, and somehow ends up with the most diploma in the group???? Which is baffling because Bahorel would also clearly be a Stylist. He has a page and everything. People don’t get it. I dunno.

Concerning politics activity, Bahorel would still be the person who Knows Everybody In Paris, which means he goes from group to group - Bahorel probably knows the most radical leftist you can find in Paris, and he has tried to infiltrate an extreme-right meeting once or twice (but that ended up badly). Bahorel probably is the Main Messenger of l’ABC. He’s also probably very good at corrupting students and making them think “maybe being Far Left is actually quite cool”

Jehan probably is vegan? I have no idea what radical art movement is actually scandalizing the Good Society, but he’s probably part of that in some way (with Bahorel). Street art..? I truly have no idea here, so I won’t embarrass myself trying to say something. He still writes a lot of poems, he’s still very erudite, and he’s probably still very rich. He probably gives a lot of money to charity - for women, children, and animals, and he’s an active participant in at least one of them. He’s very big on the “nature doesn’t belong to human and we should be respectful of it” sustainable development movements.

… Of course les amis would probably all be for sustainable development cause they’re not idiots but. you know.

I can’t see Joly as anything else than a doctor, and I tend to think he’d go for caring for kids in particular. He’s good with them. To be honest, when it comes to politics, Joly and Bossuet are the hardest for me to pin down - I have zero doubt they’re as invested as the others, but I don’t think they’d have as much “clear” role if you know what I mean? Joly probably organizes things for the children at hospital, like having people come here to visit them and make them laugh (Bossuet would probably help with that, and, in fact, probably so would Grantaire), or making sure they can see That Movie that just got out, etc. Joly would also be highly invested in the cause of nurses, which are having a hard time in France right now. Bossuet, drawing from his own experiences, would probably help people in situation of poverty - homeless people, etc. Perhaps he’d help in Le Refuge, which is an association that helps lgbt kids in France who are homeless.

As for Joly, I can’t see Combeferre as anything else than a doctor, apart if he’s a teacher. Combeferre could totally be a teacher. however, Combeferre would probably be a family doctor, after trying a lot of different specialization. In fact, Combeferre probably went for medicine after trying a bunch of other things, and probably did at least two years of “prépa” (I have zero idea how to explain what it is. Two years of school that prepares you to a test that will allow you to enter prestigious schools all over france?) in like, physics or something because he used to plan to become a scientist. Combeferre is fascinated by technology and how it can help; probably works on making teleportation a thing during lost hours; has contacts all over the scientist words, and spends a lot of time with Jehan speaking about how we could actually already put into place green energy all over the world. Combeferre also tutors kids, he’s involved in feminist groups, and of all his friends, he is the most socialist while everybody else is pretty far into radical left.

Would Courfeyrac be a lawyer? Honestly, I could see it! There is something about Courfeyrac that feels right about this, choosing to defend the innocent and all, he’s a paladin isn’t he - of course he would be a real life lawyer, not a fictional one, and I don’t know exactly which branches of law exists for him in modern-france, but he would be for the one who comes closest to helping either children, group of people being wronged, etc. He probably also gives free lawyer advice for those who don’t even know perhaps they hAVE rights. Courfeyrac would deal with everything social media in the group, and he would still have an uncanny eye to notice people that might fit and belong in their group. He’s charming in a less intense way that Enjolras might be, which makes him an easy “first contact”.

As for Enjolras, well, duh, he’d be a printer. He’d be involved in particular with everything that touches the right of workers, what the EU means for France’s companies, and what generally speaking international market do for workers that might not have a chance to fight against the competitive prices of other countries. Chances are, the printshop would also have an editorial branch to it, too. Which brings me to my point-

I think les amis de l’ABC would have a newspaper of sort: they’d started with a blog, and somehow it turned into a very political, humanist newspaper, of which Enjolras would be the principal editor: all of les amis might write articles from times to times - Bahorel, Bossuet, Courfeyrac and Jehan are the one who find other authors to fill in. Grantaire probably writes the horoscope, and it is mocking and still very PoliticalTM, but the tone is humouristic and there are a lot of puns and les amis are much too weak for puns.

They would also have a branch dedicated to tutoring students of all ages, particularly in “difficult neighborhoods” (which would go hand in hand with Valjean’s center, which is a vague idea of mine that i like). That’s Combeferre and Feuilly’s responsibilities, though Joly chimes in when he can, as well as Courfeyrac and Enjolras.

They would, obviously, protest - that’s a French Given. They would be, as I said, very active on social media (Courfeyrac on youtube, please and thank you, videos of Enjolras speaking, etc.). A lot of their stance might be on visibility and education: which wouldn’t stop them from direct action when it needs to happen. Les amis de l’ABC would very much be far left, though I don’t think they would like the idea of two big parties anymore, because that’s a feeling that every french people feel nowadays, i think, or so it feels anyway.

And while I said “he” all the while in this post, because I put them all from canon to modern era, obviously not all of them would be “he”. Les amis de l’ABC would be boys, girls, trans, non-binary, they’d be white or black or brown-skinned, atheists, muslims, catholics, jewish people, etc. Les amis de l’ABC would be very diverse. Also, probably bigger than they were in canon-era - apparently there wasn’t that much of them because of political restrictions of the time-period, but nowadays they could be as much as they can freely, so, there’s that. Of course, that doesn’t change the idea that Enjolras, Courfeyrac, Combeferre, Feuilly, Bahorel, Jehan, Bossuet, Joly and Grantaire might be the “core” of their association/group.

I don’t… actually know if that answer your question at all? I hope so?

#this is a very hard question truly #les amis de l'abc #les amis #Les Misérables #my vague tentative to put les amis into a modern au

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beavertonfaalsam-blog · 7 years

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lit and comp final

Many people have been affected by the recent election. There are a lot of different opinions about our new president and his actions. In school we have talked about President Trump’s executive orders, including his ban on refugees, but not many other students know what it is really like to be someone who has to flee to a new country. As a muslim refugee, I personally know what this really means, and as a high school student in America, I feel my life is different than it was before November 8.

It was a long and difficult process to come to America from Iraq with my family. We came to America because it was becoming more and more dangerous to stay in Iraq. My uncle was working with the American Army as an interpreter for the newspaper and he moved to America with his family and some of my other uncles. In Iraq, a lot of powerful people did not like anything associated with America so they targeted everyone who was connected to America. Since my uncle had already moved, they went after my dad and my family instead. There are many examples of this, but the most significant happened one day when my dad was driving home from work. Another car drove up next to him, yelled threats at him, and pushed his car off the road. His car flipped over three times and they left him to die. He was badly injured, but luckily he was talking on the phone at the time so the person on the other end heard that something was wrong and came to find him. After that happened, we contacted the United Nations to start the process to flee to the US. From that time, it took two years of hard work before we actually arrived in the US. That entire time, my three sisters and I did not go to school because it was too dangerous. My family had to go through three interviews and had to talk about every detail of our lives from birth until the present. The big interview was with an American judge who was very angry and tried to intimidate us. He was especially hard on my dad and talked to him alone for over three hours to try to see his reaction when he was under pressure. He even asked my younger sisters, who were only five years old, to answer questions alone. We had to go through many medical checks and long meetings. Overall, this was a very long and complicated process, and it was a very scary time for my family. We finally got a call saying we had 15 days to pack one small bag each and leave our country.

I was shocked when I heard that President Trump wanted to ban people from seven countries, including my home country Iraq. After what my family had been through, I could not see how he thought this was an easy process that lets anyone in. I felt very scared and very targeted for where I was born and my religion. I also felt sad because this meant I cannot see my home country anymore and my family that is still there. My aunt was planning on visiting us here, but now she cannot come. My cousin is stuck in Egypt and he has a green card. Suddenly my future became unknown and scary. My family went through so much to get here, and now we feel threatened in the place where we are supposed to feel safe.

After the election and this news, I felt isolated because I am a muslim refugee from Iraq. Now when I go to school or go outside, I feel different than I did before Trump was president because of how the news portrays muslim people. When I am with my friends that wear the hijab, I feel this even more. At school, a group of students wrote a letter for muslim students that said that they were with us and did not want us to be scared. The school also gave us a special room to pray. These things were so nice and I felt that some people were fighting for me, but at the same time, I am still worried. At the end of the day, this does not affect them like it affects me. They do not have to be scared and they do not have to worry about traveling or being judged for their religion or background. I am worried about the future and how the current government will change my life and my family’s life.

My experience as a refugee allows me to see what is happening in America differently than other Americans. I hope that President Trump can re-evaluate his views on muslim people and refugees. America has a history of helping people in danger and giving them safety, and the country was built by people from all over the world. I feel scared for myself and my family, but I really have hope that something will change. I want the government and all Americans to stop seeing refugees as a threat and start seeing us as people who want the same things as all Americans - safety, education, and love.

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repwincoml4a0a5 · 7 years

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In Kansas City, A Mother Fears Her Children Could Be Next

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Mahnaz Shabbir was 12 when a teacher walked into her sixth-grade classroom and asked her to come to the front of the room and explain why her cousin wasn’t eating. Mortified, Shabbir told the class that her cousin, who had recently moved to the U.S. from India, was observing the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which requires fasting.

When her friends played “cowboys and Indians,” Shabbir, whose parents came from Hyderabad, India, was always made to play an Indian. This felt different: Her teacher had singled her out in front of her overwhelmingly white, Christian classmates.

That was 1971. But it was a humiliating lesson, and one that she carried with her for decades: Keep quiet about your religion.

So Shabbir did just that. She didn’t wear a headscarf in public. She talked about Islam only to people she could trust. She moved across the country: First to Wisconsin, then to the University of Missouri-Kansas City for business school and finally to the Kansas City suburbs, where she settled down with her husband.

Shabbir, who has kind eyes and a disarming smile, came to love the Midwest for everything the cities to the east were not. The people were nice. The spaces were vast. The stores were clean. She got a job doing strategic planning and business development at a hospital system. Her husband, an immigrant from Hyderabad like her parents, became a physician. They built a spacious home outside Kansas City, with wide windows, a winding staircase and a golden chandelier in the foyer. She had children of her own — four boys.

But after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the anti-Muslim whispers turned to shouts, and Shabbir couldn’t shake something inside her. Kids called her second-oldest child, a high school student named Syed, a “terrorist.” A man told her eldest child, Ali, that Muslims should be locked up. When the man asked for Ali’s name, he said it was Al.

Shabbir spoke to the principal and counselors at Syed’s school. She started to attend talks to help combat stereotypes about Muslims. Then she went again, and again, and again. Women’s groups, churches and the NAACP asked her to help dispel myths about Islam.

She published a column in the Kansas City Star. “[T]here has been so much negative information about Muslims and Islam, I knew I couldn’t be silent,” she wrote. “I had to speak out and let others know the truth. Thank God, for people who want to know the truth.”

In 2003, she quit her job at the hospital and started a consulting firm focused on combating Islamophobia. She led diversity trainings at middle schools. She became the chair of an independent citizen advisory board that investigated racial profiling by police. She worked on human relations at the school district and at interfaith groups dedicated to improving understanding between religions.

One time, a veteran told her he would help protect local mosques. A mother told Shabbir that her child, after attending one of her local “Meet a Muslim” programs, pushed back against one of his peers at school who said Muslims were “the problem.”

In 2006, her husband returned from his pilgrimage to Mecca. He appeared exhausted. Within a day, he died, leaving Shabbir to care for their four children alone. Four years later, Shabbir made her own pilgrimage to Mecca. She wore a headscarf. Afterward, she decided not to take it off.

“Oh, isn’t it much better than [just after] 9/11?” people ask her now.

“No, actually,’” she tells them. “It’s worse.”

The attacks on her children haven’t stopped. Someone pushed down her youngest child, who is in high school, and told him he blended into the rug. People called her second-youngest, Abbas, a monkey and a sand nigger. Abbas got into the first fight of his life when someone told him the same thing another person had told his brother Syed: that their late father was a terrorist.

Today, Islamophobia is more than a sentiment in Kansas. It’s the law. In 2012, Gov. Sam Brownback (R) signed a bill to ban state courts and agencies from using Islamic law to make decisions.

It’s also a political cudgel: Last July, Shabbir opened her mailbox to find a postcard from U.S. Rep. Kevin Yoder (R-Kan.), who represents her district. On the front of it was an Arab man with a large gun against the backdrop of a smoldering city. “Terrorism,” it warned, “can strike any time, anywhere.”

In 2015, the most recent year with available data, hate crimes in the U.S. jumped by 7 percent, according to FBI data. In Kansas, they jumped 35 percent, mostly due to an increase in religiously motivated attacks.

Then, one day last month, a man entered Austins Bar & Grill in Olathe, Kansas, minutes from Shabbir’s home.

At the bar, the man noticed Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani, two 32-year-old Indian men who worked at Garmin, a technology company that makes GPS-enabled gadgets. He asked them if they were in the country illegally. He asked them what type of visas they had. He told them to get out of his country.

Some people say the bar kicked the man out. But he returned with a gun. He shot Madasani, Kuchibhotla and Ian Grillot, a 24-year-old who tried to stop him. Then he fled. Adam Purinton, 51, of Olathe, has been charged in the shooting.

Madasani and Grillot survived the attack. Kuchibhotla did not.

He was 32 — roughly the same age as Shabbir’s oldest children. He was from Hyderabad, where her parents and late husband were born.

“It could have been any one of our boys,” she said. “It could happen while we’re here. Right now. Right at this moment it could happen.”

Shabbir wanted President Donald Trump to speak out. But for days, he said nothing.

That Sunday, four days after the attack, the India Association of Kansas City organized a vigil for Kuchibhotla in Olathe. Hundreds attended. Shabbir stood up and recited a Muslim prayer. “Namaste. As-salaam alaikum. Peace be unto you,” she said.

At the vigil, Shabbir spotted Congressman Yoder. She walked up to him and looked him in the eye. There is a Pandora’s box of hate that has been opened, she told him. It’s the duty of elected officials to do what they can to close it.

The next morning, back in Washington, D.C., Yoder asked for a moment of silence on the House floor and shared what he said he had learned at the vigil.

“Last night, our community sent the strong message that love will overcome hate,” he said. “Thousands of concerned citizens in my district came together to support one another and our growing and vibrant Indian community in this time of great tragedy.

“We show the world that our diverse political and religious views are what make our community and our country great. Mr. Speaker, in addition to this moment of silence, let us renew our commitment to treating each other with respect and embracing civility in our public discourse.”

The next day, Yoder asked Trump to condemn the attack at Austins Bar & Grill. A few hours later, he did.

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repwinpril9y0a1 · 7 years