I received a call from Lynne Stewart's husband, Ralph Poynter, that the warden at FMC Carswell prison in Fort Worth Texas has recommended immediate compassionate release for government frame-up victim and renown attorney for the damned, Lynne Stewart.

Stewart was sentenced to ten years in prison on charges of conspiracy to aid and abet terrorism because she issued a press release on behalf of her client the "blind" sheik, Omar Abdel Rachman.

At this writing, many thousands have signed an online petition to the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons demanding a compassionate release for imprisoned people's lawyer Lynne Stewart. Stewart was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2009 for allegedly aiding a terrorist—this "aid" consisting of releasing a public statement by her client!

Three ominous events in the news last week show just how sharply fundamental rights are under attack:

Bradley Manning: Torture and Persecution of Whistleblowers

Bradley Manning, a 25-year-old U.S. Army private and intelligence analyst, was arrested in May 2010 in Iraq, accused of leaking classified documents that were published by WikiLeaks, and held for nine months under conditions amounting to torture. One of those leaked documents is a video showing U.S. troops in an Apache helicopter firing on and killing civilians in the streets in Iraq.

In all three of these government assassinations of U.S. citizens, there were no charges, no evidence, no trial, no right to counsel or to confront the evidence against them. In fact, the whole process—from placing their names on a hit list to killing them—was done in secret.

Raymond Lotta wrote:

I am inviting you to view and take part in a webcast next Sunday, February 10, at 4:00 pm (EST). I will be speaking on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and the Obama administration’s ratcheting up of repression and the need to keep to high standards and principles in waging this struggle.

Below you will find today's critical communication from longtime Lynne Stewart supporter, Betty Davis. The information concerns Lynne's health and her legal status.

As you will read below Lynne's breast cancer has returned. Lynne was successfully treated, we had hoped, two years ago and given a clean bill of health, as much as such diagnoses can be counted on. But a single spot was found on one lung a few months ago. Now another has appeared on the other lung and others in her upper back, all associated with her original breast cancer.

Next Monday, January 21, over 3,000 law enforcement officers and some 13,000 military troops will descend on the Washington Mall. The occasion is not a coup but the presidential inauguration, which will prompt the kind of militarized police mobilization that is a hallmark of National Special Security Events (NSSEs).

To this day, many people identify mid-2008 as the time they realized what type of politician Barack Obama actually is. Six months before, when seeking the Democratic nomination, then-Sen. Obama unambiguously vowed that he would filibuster "any bill" that retroactively immunized the telecom industry for having participated in the illegal Bush NSA warrantless eavesdropping program.

by Kevin Gosztola

The administration of President Barack Obama has gone much farther in defending and expanding indefinite detention powers than the administrations of President George W. Bush ever attempted. With the Feinstein Amendment in the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), such powers are set to be further expanded, according to Bruce Afran, a lawyer who has helped a group of individuals bring a lawsuit against a provision of the 2012 NDAA that granted the United States military the authority to indefinitely detain US citizens without charge or trial.

Gregory Koger faces months in Cook County jail for “unauthorized use of an iPhone.” He attempted to videotape a peaceful statement by Sunsara Taylor opposing the censorship of her talk prior to a public event at the Ethical Humanist Society of Chicago (EHSC) on Nov. 1, 2009.