90 Miles From Tyranny

Thursday, September 10, 2020

Why Has Amazon Just Appointed The Former Director of The NSA To Its Board? “Nothing nefarious about that at all”

Amazon has appointed former NSA head General Keith Alexander to its board of directors, prompting privacy advocates to suggest the move could be connected to Alexander’s previous experience in overseeing mass surveillance operations.

“We’re thrilled to elect a new member to our Board of Directors this month. Welcome, General Keith Alexander!” Amazon announced in a tweet:

Alexander served as NSA director from 2005 until he retired in March 2014. He oversaw the agency’s monolithic program, encompassing illegal mass spying on Americans, which officials lied about.

Under Alexander, the NSA deployed the PRISM tool to sweep up vast amounts of data from Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Facebook to name a few.

Edward Snowden, who exposed the NSA activity, had some choice words about Amazon’s appointment:

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Please Leave Silently Into The Night......

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It could be literally anything from the serene to the horrific,

from the beautiful to the repugnant,

from the mysterious to the familiar.

If you decide to open it, you could be disappointed,

you could be inspired, you could be appalled.

This is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended.

You have been warned.

When You Hear ANTIFA (Anti Freakin America) Is In Town

Girls With Guns

University of Rhode Island Professor Erik Loomis appeared to defend the murder of Aaron "Jay" Danielson, the member of the right-wing group Patriot Prayer, during recent social unrest in Portland, Oregon.

In 2012, Loomis came under scrutiny after he called for NRA executive Wayne LaPierre's "head on a stick" following the shooting massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut. Just weeks later, in January 2013, Loomis said, “I know the central mission of the Republican Party is to have a membership made up entirely of old rural white people."

"He killed a fascist. I see nothing wrong with it"

Now, Loomis is once again under fire after publishing a blog post titled "Why was Michael Reinoehl killed?" Reinoehl is the man suspected of fatally shooting Danielson. Reinoehl was killed as federal authorities tried to arrest him.

“Michael Reinoehl is the guy who killed the fascist in Portland last week. He admitted it and said he was scared the cops would kill him. Well, now the cops have killed him," Loomis wrote in the September 4 blog post.

“I am extremely anti-conspiracy theory. But it’s not a conspiracy theory at this point in time to wonder if the cops simply murdered him. The police is [sic] shot through with fascists from stem to stern. They were openly working with the fascists in Portland, as they were in Kenosha which led to dead protestors," Loomis continued.

In the comment section of the blog post, one reader challenged Loomis by writing, "Erik, he shot and killed a guy," referring to Reinoehl.

Loomis responded by saying, “He killed a fascist. I see nothing wrong with it, at least from a moral perspective.” He further added that “tactically, that’s a different story. But you could say the same thing about John Brown.”

Loomis furthered compared Reinoehl to Brown who in the 1800s used violence as a means of fighting slavery.

One reader then asked, “What’s so great about assassinating a rando fascist? And in the absence of a sound affirmative justification, it should be easy to envision the drawbacks.”

Loomis was quick to reply with, “What’s so great about assassinating random slaveholders, said liberals to John Brown.”

In a separate comment, Loomis wrote, "the problem with violence is that it usually, though not always, is a bad idea. That I agree with."

Loomis said in another comment, "Yes, sometimes violence is necessary, say to avoid greater physical harm, i.e. self-defense, or to defeat a literal army of fascists who are trying to kill people. But, ideologically, I think the idea that violence is good if it's against our political enemies is a core part of fascism, and so the ideological opposition to that idea should be its opposite - that violence as a general rule is bad, unless the specific context of that situation requires a violent response."

Loomis made headlines Tuesday for another comment he made on Twitter. In response to MSNBC host Chris Hayes tweeting, "Trump is objectively pro-Covid," Loomis tweeted "yeah, I mean, once Republicans figured out COVID was going to affect people of color and the poor disproportionately, they stopped caring about doing anything about it."

Former Campus Reform Campus Correspondent and Young Americans for Freedom New Guard editor Kara Zupkus quote tweeted Loomis. He then doubled down, calling Zupkus a "fascist" and disparaging YAF, a conservative student group.

"Also, thanks for the reminder to teach my students this semester just how horribly disgusting the Young Americans for Fascism is and has been since its beginnings in the cesspool of...

The Mostly Peaceful Car Ride Through Dallas...

Newspeak offers us new ways to see historical events.
Embrace this comrades, or else.

Radical Leftists Protecting Radical Leftists...

New Oscars Standard: Best Picture Contenders Must Be Inclusive To Compete

And the Oscar goes to … inclusion.

In the latest step in its ongoing effort to boost diversity both within its own ranks and across the film industry, on Tuesday the film academy announced new representation standards for films to be eligible to compete for best picture.

Developed over the past few months by a special task force as part of the organization’s Academy Aperture 2025 initiative, the standards encompass both representation onscreen — in the types of stories being told and the actors involved — as well as behind the scenes in the makeup of the crew and in the inclusivity of the companies involved.

To be eligible for best picture, a film must meet at least two standards across four categories: “Onscreen Representation, Themes and Narratives,” “Creative Leadership and Project Team,” “Industry Access and Opportunities” and “Audience Development.”