MEDIA ROOTS — Independent journalists have a passion to get information out to individuals who might not otherwise receive it and most often require supplementary sources of income to survive.  Here at Media Roots, life’s no different.

My second line of work is operating a pedicab, a three-wheeler that helps shuttle tourists to various monuments, memorials, and museums in the nation’s capital.  Pedicabs have been in operation here for over five years and boast a perfect safety record and a near-perfect customer satisfaction record.  And while 38 police departments now claim jurisdiction within the District, only the U.S. Park Police find issue with the hard-working and generally light-hearted independents operating on the National Mall.

Most pedicabbers have other lines of work, like indy journalists, and are typically rather articulate and rational.  The majority have never had previous issue with the law and are not looking to create any unnecessary trouble for law enforcement.  But after only a few hours at the third-most popular tourist attraction in the United States, anyone can witness how the aggressors wear an official costume, while the pacifists cruise around accepting gratuities.

While peddling on Sunday, March 25, I found myself pulling up to the Smithsonian Natural History Museum at approximately 3:00 pm.  Another pedicab appeared to have been abandoned in front of the museum.  And nearby was a Park Police cruiser.  In order to prevent the missing operator from having to pay the $195 to recover the cab from the impound lot, I briefly attempted to cart the empty cab back to our shop downtown.

Almost immediately, Officer Blake of the U.S. Park Police, the same officer whom had issued me a previous citation just weeks before (only to be dismissed by DC adjudication services), appeared and ordered me to not take the human-powered vehicle.  I immediately complied and moved approximately 20 feet from the scene.  Blake would follow me and continued to instruct me I couldn’t stop where I had – in front of a parked tour bus.

“Where would you like me to go?” I asked.

“Off the Mall,” he would reply with an unlawful attempt to exile me from over 300 acres of public property.

Unsure how to respond, I steered my pedicab to what appeared to be a legal parking spot a motor vehicle had just vacated.  Again, the officer was hot on my trail.

“Give me your ID. You’re getting a ticket.”  I complied with no hesitation.  In order to maintain a level of accountability, I also pulled out my video camera to capture the scene.

“Put your camera away,” he continued.

“I don’t have to put my camera away.”  After all, I am the organizer for DC CopBlock and quite familiar with the First Amendment.

“Put your hands behind your back.”

I had officially been placed under arrest, despite the fact that two other pedicabbers were seemingly ignored by officer Blake.  I was in utter disbelief that not only was I getting arrested again (the first arrest in November, also a charge for resisting arrest, was eventually dismissed by federal prosecutors), but I was now getting arrested for a Constitutionally-protected act.

As the handcuffs were aggressively placed on my already-sore wrists, I became dizzy and uncertain about the officers’ intentions.  They screamed orders at me, even though I was not talking back nor were there any loud noises nearby.  A tourist and his son a few feet away were visibly traumatized by the incident with the younger crying and his father yelling at the police for their blatant display of excessive force.

“Stop resisting,” Officer Hiatt continued to yell at me, even though he was close enough to kiss me.

“I’m not resisting,” I calmly replied, uncertain what else to say.

The officer then slammed me down to the gravel.  Because I was already cuffed, I couldn’t break my fall and ended up landing face-first.  The fall knocked me out for a minute and the trauma to my shoulder is still present to this day.  But the emotional damage of a tyrannical police force, operating without regard to the law or morality might take years to recover from.

Oskar Mosco is a regular contributor for Media Roots

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TBD — Two Park Police officers bend down to look at another groaning black-haired pedicab operator, his face against the grass and lying on his stomach on the National Mall. They talk into their radio. On the street is a little green pedicab, abandoned. One officer fastens handcuffs on the young man, a manager at National Pedicabs.

This pedicab operator calls himself Oskar Mosco and is the same one who was arrested last fall and formed the D.C. Pedicab Operators’ Association to advocate for operators amid the evolving regulations and allegations of harassment that have come up in the last year.  He was last arrested in November, but the case was dismissed earlier this year.  The National Park Service controls the pedicab territory of the National Mall, and Park Police enforce the rules.  Yet the NPS is still developing its formal pedicab regulations, which will apparently mirror those the District Department of Transportation released last year.  The Park Police note that D.C. traffic regulations apply, however, and regularly write tickets to the region’s pedicabbers.

Mosco attempts to ask what orders he disobeyed.

“We are no longer discussing this,” the Park Police officer tells him. “You are under arrest.”

The two officers pull Mosco to his feet and escort him to a police car, in which a second pedicab operator sits, as Mosco shouts that he was arrested for videotaping the police. “You should not get arrested for videotaping a police officer!” Mosco yelled to onlookers in front of the Natural History Museum. “This is a free country, not a police state!”

Pedicabs are a human-powered transportation option that fill a unique demand in an increasingly petroleum-dependent society. They have proven to be safe and fun in areas that demand a variety of transportation options. The very survival of America’s emerging pedicab industry depend on a population that is informed, and concerned, with the what else can be possible. Those interested in following the development of American pedicab culture can follow the page Everything Pedicab.

Read more about Two D.C. pedicab operators were arrested on the National Mall.

© 2012 TBD

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Photo provided by Daniel Blackwell. 

MEDIA ROOTS- John Dau is one of Sudan’s Lost Boys, a group of more than 20,000 boys who escaped the genocide during the Sudanese Civil War, where 2.5 million Southern Sudanese were killed and millions of others were displaced. John gives Media Roots a moving account of his escape, his life growing up in the refugee camps, his experience coming to America for the first time and his work with the John Dau Foundation, where he established the first comprehensive & sustainable community medical clinic in his home village of Duk Payuel.

 Interview with John Dau conducted, produced and edited by Abby Martin 

Trailer for National Geographic’s award winning documentary called ‘God Grew Tired of Us’, based on John Dau’s story. Check out more about the film at http://www.godgrewtiredofus.com/

Learn more about the John Dau Foundation and how to help at http://johndaufoundation.org/

MEDIA ROOTS- Media Roots interviews Darfur refugee and human rights activist Adeeb Yousif from the Darfur Reconciliation and Development Organization (DRDO) about his organization, his work documenting human rights abuses, his experience being targeted by the Sudanese government and what he thinks could bring peace to the region.

For more information about the Darfur Reconciliation and Development Organization visit http://www.drdoafrica.org

Photo by flickr user UN Photo

GLOBAL RESEARCH– Watching the international media on the web and TV change gears Friday, as information started to fasten to the fact that the worst terrorist act in Scandinavia since the 3rd Reich was perpetrated by a right-wing Christian zealot, was fascinating. This, rather than what Pam Geller, Steve Emerson, Daniel Pipes, Dennis Prager, David Horowitz, CNN, Fox News and many others were touting for hours as most likely an act of Muslim Jihad in a country that is way, way too liberal.

I was keyed into paying attention to how this meme might have to morph fairly early in the afternoon, by an item carried by Michael Rivero at What Really Happened, about the major event at the youth camp the day before the massacre:

During the second day of Labour Youth League summer camp at Utøya got the Labour Party’s young hopefuls visit by Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store.

Together with the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation correspondent Sidsel Wold and Norwegian People’s Aid Kirsten Belck-Olsen, discussed the Foreign Minister of the deadlock between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

As foreign minister arrived Utøya he was met with a demand from the AUF that Norway must recognize a Palestinian state.

– The Palestinians must have their own state, the occupation must end, the wall must be demolished and it must happen now, said the Foreign Minister to cheers from the audience. [automatically translated from Norwegian by Google translate]

That was an event held Thursday at the summer camp for the children of Norwegian liberals.

As the story developed Friday, almost every news outlet was quick to provide experts on Muslim terrorism and how that might have a growing negative impact on Norway and Europe.  On Anderson Cooper, Friday afternoon, as he had his experts on Jihadism on camera, he was being told by another person – a CNN reporter – that the shooter, possibly the bomber, was a blond Norwegian.  Cooper seemed to be taken aback, turning back to his Jihad experts, who were dismissive of the new information.

The bombing-shootings took up enormous bandwidth in our media machine until it came out that the alleged perpetrator has more in common with Sarah Palin and Alan Dershowitz than with Rachel Corrie or Furkan Do?an, both of whom have been labelled terrorists by Dershowitz.

As the end-of-the-week-in-midsummer stupor overtakes the media on a hot Friday evening in the USA, will they get around to trying to find out what set Anders Behring off?

The bombing had to be pre-planned, probably for some time.  Was the pro-Palestinian event Thursday at the camp where over 70 were killed published on the web, facebook, twitter or somewhere else?  Most likely.  That may be what pushed this guy’s last button.

And just who created the group that fictitiously took credit for the massacres early Friday?

The ‘Helpers of Global Jihad’ group, of which al-Nasser is a member, made the claims in an email circular issued to various sources. The group does not appear to have any past history.

It is thought that the bombings are a belated response to Norwegian newspapers and magazines republishing cartoons of Mohammed originally published by Jyllands-Posten of Denmark.

I’m not about to go all conspiracy theory on this story.  I am bothered, though, that the media was extremely rapid to ramp up the radical Islam run amok meme, yet so unready to deal with what is increasingly appearing to be possible – that the Christian gunman was impelled to kill liberals he may have felt were too sympathetic to Palestinians.

Update – Saturday, 12:30 p.m. PDT:

This diary questions what pushed Breivik over the edge.  Phoenix Woman’s diary this morning, He’s Not a Terrorist – He’s a Freedom Fighter! touches upon some of the more pathetic errors in the media on Friday, as accurate information on the shooter-bomber became available.  David Dayen’s front page fdl diary, takes this subject further – Norway Terror Reveals Disturbing Assumptions About Muslims.

Glenn Greenwald devoted his Saturday column to yesterday’s pathetic media coverage.  His second update links to an Electronic Intifada article that shows how the false meme developed soon after the bomb went off in downtown Oslo.  Essentially, it appears one dubious “expert” pushed the global media “over the edge”:

The source is Will McCants, adjunct faculty at Johns Hopkins University. On his website he describes himself as formerly “Senior Adviser for Countering Violent Extremism at the U.S. Department of State, program manager of the Minerva Initiative at the Department of Defense, and fellow at West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center.” This morning, he posted “Alleged Claim for Oslo Attacks” on his blog Jihadica:

This was posted by Abu Sulayman al-Nasir to the Arabic jihadi forum, Shmukh, around 10:30am EST (thread 118187). Shmukh is the main forum for Arabic-speaking jihadis who support al-Qaeda. Since the thread is now inaccessible (either locked or taken down), I am posting it here. I don’t have time at the moment to translate the whole thing but I translated the most important bits on twitter.

The Shmukh web site is not accessible to just anyone, so he is the primary source for this claim. McCants stated from the beginning that the claim had been removed or hidden, and on Twitter he even cast doubt on whether it was a claim of responsibility at all.

snip – EI posted screenshots of several tweets by McCants, then this:

McCants later reported that the claim of responsibility was retracted by the author “Abu Sulayman al-Nasir.” Furthermore, according to McCants, the moderator of this forum declared that speculation about the attack would be prohibited because the contents of the forum were appearing in mainstream media. It does seem more than a little bit odd that genuine “jihadis” would post on a closed forum that a former US official and “counterterrorism expert” openly writes about infiltrating.

EI is highly critical about how easily McCants’ dubious information was spread:

The media also failed. They reported on the claims McCants disseminated because his position and perceived expertise gave these claims credibility. Would The New York Times have required multiple sources and independent confirmation of the existence of the posting and its contents if it had not come from someone with McCants’ supposedly solid credentials?

For hours after McCants posted the update that the claim of responsibility was retracted, BBC, the New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post were still promoting information originally sourced from him. The news was carried around the world and became the main story line in much of the initial coverage.

The threshold for a terrorism expert must be very low. This whole rush to disseminate a false, unverifiable and flimsily sourced claim strikes me as a case of an elite fanboy wanting to be the first to pass on leaked gadget specs.

Read more about The Norway Terrorist Attack: “News Without Facts”

Written by Edward Teller

© 2011 Global Research 

Photo by Flickr user toplix

SALON– For much of the day yesterday, the featured headline on The New York Times online front page strongly suggested that Muslims were responsible for the attacks on Oslo; that led to definitive statements on the BBC and elsewhere that Muslims were the culprits.  The Washington Post‘s Jennifer Rubin wrote a whole column based on the assertion that Muslims were responsible, one that, as James Fallows notes, remains at the Post with no corrections or updates.  The morning statement issued by President Obama — “It’s a reminder that the entire international community holds a stake in preventing this kind of terror from occurring” and “we have to work cooperatively together both on intelligence and in terms of prevention of these kinds of horrible attacks” — appeared to assume, though (to its credit) did not overtly state, that the perpetrator was an international terrorist group. 

But now it turns out that the alleged perpetrator wasn’t from an international Muslim extremist group at all, but was rather a right-wing Norwegian nationalist with a history of anti-Muslim commentary and an affection for Muslim-hating blogs such as Pam Geller’s Atlas Shrugged, Daniel Pipes, and Robert Spencer’s Jihad Watch.  Despite that, The New York Times is still working hard to pin some form of blame, even ultimate blame, on Muslim radicals (h/t sysprog):

Terrorism specialists said that even if the authorities ultimately ruled out Islamic terrorism as the cause of Friday’s assaults, other kinds of groups or individuals were mimicking Al Qaeda’s brutality and multiple attacks.

“If it does turn out to be someone with more political motivations, it shows these groups are learning from what they see from Al Qaeda,” said Brian Fishman, a counterterrorism researcher at the New America Foundation in Washington.

Al Qaeda is always to blame, even when it isn’t, even when it’s allegedly the work of a Nordic, Muslim-hating, right-wing European nationalist.  Of course, before Al Qaeda, nobody ever thought to detonate bombs in government buildings or go on indiscriminate, politically motivated shooting rampages.  The NYT speculates that amonium nitrate fertilizer may have been used to make the bomb because the suspect, Anders Behring Breivik, owned a farming-related business and thus could have access to that material; of course nobody would have ever thought of using that substance to make a massive bomb had it not been for Al Qaeda.  So all this proves once again what a menacing threat radical Islam is.

Read full article on Greenwald: The Meaninglessness of “Terrorism”.

Written by Glenn Greenwald

© Salon 2011