Tuesday, September 9, 2003

• Protest Planned Against Ashcroft’s NYC Visit as Part of Nationwide Tour to Defend Patriot Act

  
  
  

  Attorney General John Ashcroft attends a closed meeting with law enforcement officials to defend the Patriot Act against mounting claims that it undermines civil liberties. We host a debate between the New York Civil Liberties Union and the Federation for American Immigration Reform.

• Jailed African American Webmaster Sherman Austin Moved Into Isolation After Receiving White Supremacist Death Threats

  
  
  

  Austin began a yearlong prison term last week. Federal officials charged that he had illegally distributed information about how to build Molotov cocktails on his website. We speak with his mother Jennifer Martin.

• Conscientious Objector Sentenced to Six Months in Jail

  
  
  

  21 year-old U.S. Marine reservist Stephen Funk was found guilty of unauthorized absence for refusing to report to his unit during the Iraq war. We speak with his lawyer Stephen Collier.

• "Guarding the Oil Underworld in Iraq" – U.S. Hires Private Security Firm in Iraq; WTO Protesters Head to Cancun

  
  
  

  We go to Cancun, Mexico to hear from Pratap Chatterjee of CorpWatch.org on a private security firm recently contracted by the U.S. to train 6,500 Iraqis to guard oil pipelines in Iraq and to discuss the upcoming WTO ministerial meeting.

• Supreme Court Appears Split On Overturning New Campaign Finance Law

  
  
  

  In a special summer session, the nation’s high court heard arguments on the constitutionality of the law regulating soft money donations from corporations and labor unions. Democracy hosts a debate between Common Cause and the Cato Institute.