On the anniversary of the Citizens United decision, Vermont politicians are moving to deny corporations the rights that humans enjoy. A year ago today, the Supreme Court issued its bizarre Citizens United decision, allowing unlimited corporate spending in elections as a form of “free speech” for the corporate “person.” Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the dissent, had the task of recalling the majority to planet earth and basic common sense.

"Corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires," wrote Stevens. "Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their 'personhood' often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of 'We the People' by whom and for whom our Constitution was established."

Fortunately, movements are afoot to reverse a century of accumulated powers and protections granted to corporations by wacky judicial decisions.

[Google Translate:] Copied the entire hard disk in the hunt for two users. Police took a copy of your entire hard disk, and is thus about political bloggers in all these countries. - Given the information that is on balance this is a potential scandal, "said Torgeir Waterhouse of the ICT-Norway , the IT industry association. Waterhouse believes this is a frightening example of how the police do not take the risk that sensitive information about your people can go astray, seriously.

You can compare this with the police to confiscate the contents of two safe deposit boxes, and end up with them for safety's sake take the seizure of all bank boxes in the bank, "said Waterhouse.

On the website of Autistici have also published a statement about the Norwegian raid on the server:

"When such things happen in China or Iran are those who care about privacy to the streets to protest against the" regimes "as the spying on citizens. But when it happens right in front of them they become confused, perhaps because the media blows up the petty scandals that happen in this country are insignificant."

ISPs are threatening to cripple websites that don't pay them first. Barry Collins fears a disastrous end to net neutrality. You flip open your laptop, click on the BBC iPlayer bookmark and press Play on the latest episode of QI. But instead of that tedious, plinky-plonky theme tune droning out of your laptop’s speakers, you’re left staring at the whirring, circular icon as the video buffers and buffers and buffers...That’s odd. Not only have you got a new 40Mbits/sec fibre broadband connection, but you were watching a Full HD video on Sky Player just moments ago. There’s nothing wrong with your connection; it must be iPlayer. So you head to Twitter to find out if anyone else is having problems streaming Stephen Fry et al. The message that appears on your screen leaves you looking more startled than Bill Bailey. “This service isn’t supported on your broadband service. Click here to visit our social-networking partner, Facebook.” The free, unrestricted internet as we know it is under threat.

A reporter tagged in a Facebook image that mocked the Palestinian president said Saturday he faces trial for insulting a public figure, raising concerns about freedom of speech in the Western-backed Palestinian Authority. Mamdouh Hamamreh, who works for the pro-Hamas Al-Quds TV, said security forces detained him in September, just hours after the image appeared on his Facebook feed. The picture showed President Mahmoud Abbas — a Hamas rival — standing next to an actor who plays a villain on a popular Syrian soap opera, the reporter said. Hamamreh said he was held for more than 50 days in a Palestinian lockup after the picture appeared on his feed. He said he had nothing to do with the image. He was released in November and says a hearing has been set for next month. "I censor myself now," Hamamreh said. "I'm careful of what I say."

An Israeli inquiry has found the country's navy acted legally in a deadly raid on a flotilla of aid ships trying to reach Gaza last May. The raid, in which nine Turkish activists were killed, attracted widespread international condemnation. Correspondents say the report will probably correctly be dismissed by Israel's critics as biased.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has released new documents revealing widespread abuse of detainees in US-run prisons in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay.

New documents obtained by the ACLU show "unjustified homicide" of detainees and concerns about the condition of confinement in American prisons, CNN reported on Saturday. Thousands of documents detailing the deaths of 190 detainees were released by the ACLU on Friday. The US military has provided the documents under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the rights group. The documents reveal how four Iraqi detainees were executed by a group of US soldiers and then pushed into a Baghdad canal in 2007.

One of the investigating documents says a wounded detainee was killed by an unnamed sergeant, who walked into the room where the detainee was lying wounded and “assaulted him … then shot him twice thus killing him.” The soldier then asked the other troopers present at the scene to lie about the incident. In another case, it is revealed that a soldier "committed the offense of murder when he shot and killed an unarmed Afghan male." But, according to the ACLU, the individual was found not guilty of murder by general court-martial. No senior officials have been held accountable for the violations.

Undercover police officers routinely adopted a tactic of "promiscuity" with the blessing of senior commanders, according to a former agent who worked in a secretive unit of the Metropolitan police for four years. The former undercover policeman claims that sexual relationships with activists were sanctioned for both men and women officers infiltrating anarchist, leftwing and environmental groups. Sex was a tool to help officers blend in, the officer claimed, and was widely used as a technique to glean intelligence. His comments contradict claims last week from the Association of Chief Police Officers that operatives were absolutely forbidden to sleep with activists.

Israel's High Court has approved the continued use of a secret interrogation center for the incarceration of Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners. The notorious Facility 1391 is reportedly located on a secret army intelligence base, and its existence was first revealed in 2003, Ha'aretz reported on Saturday. It is common knowledge that the facility, dubbed by critics as "Israel's Guantanamo Bay," held prominent Lebanese inmates, and later Palestinian detainees during the massive 2002 incursion into major West Bank cities in the wake of the Second Intifada. Information relayed to the High Court indicates that 271 detainees were held for relatively short periods at the facility between 1993 and 2004. Among the inmates were Sheikh Abdul Karim Obeid and Mustafa Dirani, who were kidnapped in Lebanon and held at the prison for long periods. There were many allegations that inmates, such as Dirani, were tortured and even sexually abused at the center, which has reportedly not been used since 2006.

Right wing pundits have often said that Palestinians, when in talks with Israel, never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. The more time that I spend in the West Bank and watch the behavior of the Israeli army towards Palestinians, the more I feel that the statement should be said about the army. The weekly demonstration in Bil’in last Friday is a perfect example.

The demonstration was much smaller than the previous weeks. However, there was a television crew from Israeli Channel 2 present. We were told that they had another crew embedded with the army for a story about the demonstration which would air on a weekend news show. As we marched to the barrier, I was eager to see how the army would handle the demonstration with the presence of such important Israeli media. Would they not fire any tear gas? Would they arrest people?

We arrived at the barrier and the chanting began. The demonstration was in honor of Jonathan Pollak and a number of demonstrators formed a peace sign each holding a photo of Pollak. Twenty minutes into the demonstration there was no tear gas. Soldiers threw a couple of sound bombs and had resorted to spraying demonstrators with the ’skunk,’ a horrible petrochemical that smells like shit and stays on your skin for weeks, but there was no tear gas. I told one of the Channel 2 people that it was unusual that the army had restrained on the gas and the reason was most likely the crew’s presence.

IT'S the ultimate experience for Star Wars fans - staring forlornly off into the distance as twin suns sink into the horizon. Yet it's not just a figment of George Lucas's imagination - twin suns are real. And here's the big news - they could be coming to Earth. Yes, any day now we see a second sun light up the sky, if only for a matter of weeks. The infamous red super-giant star in Orion’s nebula - Betelgeuse - is predicted to go gangbusters and the impending super-nova may reach Earth before 2012, and when it does, all of our wildest Star Wars dreams will come true. The second biggest star in the universe is losing mass, a typical indication that a gravitation collapse is occurring. When that happens, we'll get our second sun, according to Dr Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland.

“This old star is running out of fuel in its centre”, Dr Carter said. “This fuel keeps Betelgeuse shining and supported. When this fuel runs out the star will literally collapse in upon itself and it will do so very quickly.”

When this happens a giant explosion will occur, tens of millions of times brighter than the sun. The bad news is, it could also happen in a million years. But who's counting? The important thing is, one day, night will become day for several weeks on Earth.