AMPB REPORT #77

AMPB REPORT #77
a publication by the association of micro-power broadcasters
Dear Readers,
The latest news is mixed, very mixed. On a sad note, San Francisco Liberation Radio suffered a defeat in federal court challenging the confiscation of their equipment (see story later in this edition). On the bright side, Rod Moses, owner of Radio Goldfield in Pahrump, Nevada was able to get a temporary permit to operate his low power station. The law firm of Leventhal, Senter and Lerman, which represents many big-time broadcasters, has challenged this stationÕs existence on the grounds that Moses was cited for broadcasting illegally after february 26, 1999, and that makes him ineligible for a LPFM license. Never mind that this provision of the ÒRadio Broadcast Preservation ActÓ was already thrown out of court as unconstitutional. It might be argued that the entire existence of the FCC and their ÒauthorityÓ might also be considered unconstitutional. Whatever... In any case, we salute Rod Moses and his stamina and hope he stays on the air forever. It should also be noted that one of the dirty little secrets about big-time radio biz is that just about everybody in the industry has violated a FCC regulation at one time or another, so letÕs just cut the crap here. This whole thing is about money and the big time guys donÕt want to share any of it with the little broadcasters. ThatÕs why class D stations (remember them?) got outlawed in the first place. So if you want to get a breath of fresh air, check out the Anarchist Book Fair in San Francisco on March 24th, then hop on over to the Long Haul Info Shop in Berkeley for a screening of ÒPirate Radio USAÓ. ItÕs a great documentary about the whole micro-power radio thing and the screening is a benefit for Berkeley Liberation Radio 104.1 FM. They could really use your help, so come on by. The address is 3124 Shattuck Ave. in Berkeley and it starts at 6:30 PM,
-Paul Griffin (for the AMPB)
STATION ALERT
SFLR Loses One in Court
Federal agents acted legally in raiding the Castro neighborhood office of San Francisco Liberation Radio in 2003 and seizing equipment that was used to run the unlicensed, low-power "pirate" FM station, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Liberation Radio was not entitled to advance notice or a hearing before the raid by federal marshals and Federal Communications Commission representatives. The station had been denied a federal license and accused the agency of a politically motivated crackdown on so-called micro-broadcasters. Liberation Radio, which had broadcast music and "radical progressive'' politics on 93.7 FM for 10 years, was driven off the airwaves by the raid and now operates over the Internet. "Neither broadcasters nor listeners have a First Amendment right to engage in or listen to unlicensed broadcasts,'' the three-judge panel said in Wednesday's ruling, rejecting the station's argument that seizure of broadcast equipment without a hearing violates free expression.
The court also said advance notice might have allowed owners to move, hide or destroy equipment that was legally subject to forfeiture. Liberation Radio will probably ask the full appeals court to order a new hearing before a larger panel, said Katherine Alfieri, a lawyer for the station. She said the station might not have been able to save its equipment if it had been given a hearing before the seizure, but it was hoping to establish rights for anyone facing government interference with communication.
BOYCOTT MONSTER CABLE
Fighting the MonsterCity supports boycott of company that outsourced 120 jobsBy Chris Albon
› news@sfbg.com">news@sfbg.com On Valentine's Day, Yi Jun Huang, a smiling 65-year-old Chinese immigrant, walked into the Apple store near Union Square and handed the manager a large chocolate heart and a pink valentine as about 40 laid-off Monster Cable workers and their supporters rallied outside. It was one of several appeals to electronics stores to honor a boycott and stop carrying Monster products. Huang had worked in a Monster Cable factory producing high-end audio cables for 16 years and was fired last October with more than 120 mostly Chinese immigrant workers when the company decided to outsource their jobs. "The production manager openly told us that production was moving to Mexico," Huang said. Now, despite a boycott launched by the Chinese Progressive Association (CPA), a slew of protests by the workers, and a resolution passed Feb. 13 by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors urging the company to address worker concerns, Monster Cable still refuses to budge. "A multibillion-dollar company should not springboard off their workers for the sake of profit and then kick them to the curb," said Shirley Lorence, an organizer with Rise Up, a caucus within the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union. "That's wrong." The recently laid-off workers have an average tenure of eight years, with many having around 15 to 20 years, according to the CPA. Many workers are in their 40s and 50s. With these layoffs, Monster Cable broke from its previous policy of providing four weeks' severance pay plus one week for every year of service, and it did not offer job placement, retraining, or community support for any of the workers. The Board of Supervisors resolution asks Monster Cable, which spent $6 million buying the naming rights to the city-owned Candlestick Park, to give $2 million for a Worker and Community Transition Fund and its workers a more generous severance package. "We saw no evidence that times are tough," Huang said. "We know their sales are up to a billion dollars annually. We're the ones who work there, and there have been no signs that things are slowing down."
Leith FM sets course to capture pirate ship
ADAM MORRIS
IT was the pirate radio station which gave big breaks to DJs such as Tony Blackburn and Johnnie Walker. And now the last vessel from which the legendary Radio Caroline broadcast could soon be based at Leith Docks. Under ambitious proposals by community radio station Leith FM, the Ross Revenge would be moved from its temporary home on the Thames to the Leith shoreline, at a cost of around £50,000. If successful, it is hoped the project would not only provide the station with magnificent studios, but deliver a tourism boost for Leith. "We've seen the difference the Britannia has made to the area, which is astounding," said Leith FM chairman and presenter Stewart Lochhead. "But I think it's very mainstream too, and if we were to get the Radio Caroline boat, not only would it do Leith FM good, but it would give the area a bit more of a bohemian edge, bringing a different kind of tourist to the area." Not only does the Leith FM presenter - known for his part as one half of the popular Grumpy Old Men show - want to move the studios on to the ship, but he thinks a centre in honour of Radio Caroline could be established to boost visitor numbers. He is working closely with John Ritchie, who runs Newtongrange community radio station, Black Diamond Radio, on the proposal and the pair intend to make an approach soon. Leith FM was recently awarded a five-year licence and should be live to coincide with the Leith Festival at the end of May. "John and I remember the days of Radio Caroline in the 60s and thiswould be a great move for the station," he continued. "Our current offices are a touch cramped and to broadcast from the Radio Caroline ship would be something very special. "We had a lunch last Thursday where we discussed it and agreed we should try and pursue funding for it. "It's a shame for something like this to be lying unused in the Thames, it's got such a fantastic history. There's also a ship in the Orkney area which we may look at, although the Ross Revenge would be the main one because of the heritage, the history and the stories." Although public access is currently forbidden, the two studios on board the vessel are in good shape. The vessel, which would have to be towed, is maintained and owned by the Radio Caroline Support Group. The group has previously stated its intent to move the boat to a permanent quayside location in the UK. Radio Caroline itself broadcasts online and digitally from on-land studios in Maidstone and proprietor Peter Moore said while his ideal solution would be to keep the boat in the south of England, if a good enough offer came along he would have to listen. "It's an expensive business moving such a vessel all the way to Edinburgh, and I've not been approached by anyone from Leith FM about this as of yet," he said. "But everything has its price and of course I'm keen to keep the Radio Caroline brand alive." Leith Links councillor Marjorie Thomas said the idea to bring the former Grimsby trawler to Leith was an exciting one. "I think it's an excellent idea, and perhaps a place on the shore would be ideal. "Lots of young people come down to Leith to socialise and I think this would be the kind of thing they would visit."
NASA - What Are They Hiding From US?
By W.C. MooreÊ
Having just returned from the 16th Annual International UFO Congress Convention, I can tell you beyond a reasonable doubt that whatÕs being hidden from us is quite over-whelming and NASA is only one among the culprits.ÊÊ But since NASAÕs moniker has oft been clarified as: Never A Straight Answer, I figure thatÕs a good place to start. ÊThe general public is largely unaware that NASA has for many years, at least since the beginnings of the space shuttle missions, maintained satellite links which have distributed camera feeds from the shuttles and more recently the International Space Station, to transponders which can be picked up by just about any scientific institution thatÕs technically equipped and interested.ÊÊÊ Truth be told, literally anybody who coughs up enough dough for the right type of receiver can also join in on the fun.ÊÊ Quite a few people from the private sector have done just that, and in the process have stumbled across some rather astonishing footage of anomalous phenomena (uh, UFOÕs to be perfectly clear).ÊIn the late 80Õs a former Canadian television station manager, named Martin Stubbs, had his eng tech crew set up one of their unused satellite dishes to receive this signal which he recorded 24 hours a day for the duration of the specific shuttle missions. At home, evenings while having dinner, he would fast forward through these stacks of tapes and hit the brakes when he saw anything that looked a tad peculiar.ÊÊÊ After editing hundreds of hours of these NASA down-linked images, he along with UFO Magazine, UK,Ê put out a 90 minute video called, ÒNASAÕs Secret Transmissions - The Smoking GunÓ.ÊÊ ÊÊWhat was captured that was so visually arresting was scores of spherical objects that buzzed around the shuttles like bees around a hive, albeit much more slowly.ÊÊ The full motion images might best be described as what youÕd expect to see if you were looking at a drop of pond water through a microscope.ÊÊ These were analogous to microscopic paramecium and amoeba in the way they moved squiggly fashion, but their size, which was able to be approximated by referencing the shuttle itself and known camera lens focal lengths, was determined to be 3Ú4 of a mile to 3 miles across!ÊBut that material, going back 7 to 8 years ago is now old stuff.ÊÊÊ The newer imagings, recorded the same way through NASAÕs own cameras, which should be acknowledged as quite a respectable authenticating medium, show similar bright objects that hover in very close proximity to the space station itself.ÊÊ One distinct and noteworthy object was clearly rectangular in shape, like a HersheyÕs candy bar, only white-silverish in color.ÊThis particular film, ÒNASA - What are they hiding from us?Ó, which ran in the film festival competition at the convention, showed numerous instances of this phenomena from an assortment of angles.ÊÊ Although NASA has flatly denied that the images suggest anything life-like from out of this world, one of the astronaut spacewalkers did step forward to talk about having witnessed something very unusual.ÊÊÊ Heide Piper was a crew member of STS-115 which returned to earth on September 22nd, 2006.ÊÊ It had previously been acknowledged that the shuttleÕs return had been delayed for a day because of what NASA referred to as a mysterious object near the Space Station.Ê NASA had initially referred to the phenomena which caused so much concern, particularly among the Russian scientists, as possibly some part of the Atlantis shuttle itself which had come loose and went floating in space.ÊÊÊ Then they said it was a plastic bag, then trash, and finally when theyÕd run out of anything else to call it, they simply referred to it as a mysterious object. ÊWhile standing at the podium during the welcome home ceremony with cameras rolling, space-walker Heide Piper started out by talking about something very peculiar.ÊÊ ÒIt was something that, something that youÕve never seen before.ÊÊ And when I finally got to go out the door that was something very different too.ÓÊÊÊÊÊ But just after having opened up with this acknowledgement and appearing to be ready to offer more descriptive details of the phenomena, her voice began to break as she suddenly became very shaky on her feet and literally fell into the arms of NASA personnel who lowered her to the floor.ÊÊÊ ÊNASA claimed that it was brought on by time spent in weightlessness and the adjustment back to EarthÕs gravity.ÊÊÊÊ The suggestion from others, not directly associated with NASA was that she was so traumatized by witnessing this bizarre space phenomena that she suffered an attack of post traumatic stress syndrome.ÊÊ But there is another explanation as to why it might be that an apparently physically fit and experienced astronaut would collapse upon merely recounting a visual sighting that was unusual.Ê ÊÊIt has been long acknowledged within Dr. Stephen GreerÕs Disclosure Project material that the black ops government does indeed have Ôoff-the-shelf technologyÕ that can remotely trigger strokes or even heart attacks if ÔtheyÕ feel the need for suppression of unwelcome revelations is urgent enough.Ê Although it is clearly conspiratorial in nature, it is also possible that NASA felt it had to stop her from the releasing of revelations that it considered top secret .ÊEven if you are fairly attentive to the daily news headlines, you most likely would have heard no more than just information about the female astronaut who fainted during a press appearance.ÊÊ Her actual words spoken and certainly this footage of her fainting were censored from the mainstream media.Ê Should you be interested, this presentation from March 3rd, 2007, by Jaime Maussan and Santiago Yturria Garza is accessible at the UFO Congress website:Ê ufocongress.com.ÊW.C. Moore is a commercial radio broadcast veteran of stations KFRC and K-101 in San Francisco, as well as a past co-programmer of San Francisco Liberation Radio.ÊÊ His website is: CareerinRadio.com and he can be reached at: gotowc@aol.com.
AMPB record chart for the week ending 3/17/07
# TITLE - ARTIST - LABEL
1 IN THE GRIP OF OFFICIAL TREASON - JELLO BIAFRA - ALT. TENTACLES
2 (SELF TITLED) - MOONDOG - HONEST JON'S
3 ONE WORLD, MANY CULTURES - VARIOUS - PUTUMAYO
4 REBIRTH OF A NATION - PUBLIC ENEMY - GUERILLA FUNK
5 THE OUTSIDER - DJ SHADOW - UNIVERSAL
6 GRAVEYARD SHIFT - SCOTT H. BIRAM - BLOODSHOT
7 THE ROUGH GUIDE TO LATIN-ARABIA - WORLD MUSIC NET
8 SOUKSONIK - JEF STOTT - SIX DEGREES
9 THE HEALING - STRANGE FRUIT PROJECT - OM
10 M'BEMBA - SALIF KEITA - DECCA
11 YELL FIRE - MICHAEL FRANTI & SPEARHEAD - ANTI
12 STRICTLY THE BEST VOL.36 - VARIOUS ARTISTS - VP
13 RHYTHM OF THE RIVER - VARIOUS ARTISTS - RIVERBOAT
14 PUTUMAYO PRESENTS A NEW GROOVE - PUTUMAYO
15 AGAIN AND AGAIN - DESTANI WOLF - BRAVE WOLF
16 DIVA LA GRANDE - CANDYE KANE - RUF
17 FREEDOMÕS ROAD - JOHN MELLENCAMP - J. MELLENCAMP
18 COLORBLIND - ROBERT RANDOLPH & THE FAMILY BAND - WARNER
19 ANGEL VOICES - LIBERA - EMI
20 THINK GLOBAL BELLYDANCE - WORLD MUSIC NET
21 DJ SNOWBOYÕS AFRO-CUBAN KALEIDOSCOPE - EMUSIKA
22 DON'T TELL COLUMBUS - GRAHAM PARKER - BLOODSHOT
23 WAR, JOURNALISM... - ROBERT FISK - ALT. TENTACLES
24 MY NAME IS BUDDY - RY COODER - NONESUCH
25 FOOT FETISH - WOODLEG ODD - WOODLEG MUSIC
26 POLO CLUB - GREENSKEEPERS - OM
27 THE ROAD TO ESCONDIDO - JJ CALE / ERIC CLAPTON - REPRISE
28 WOMEN OF THE WORLD ACOUSTIC - PUTUMAYO
29 THE ROUGH GUIDE TO SALSA DURA NYC - WORLD MUSIC NET
30 SURYAGHATI EP1 - ZAMAN 8 & HAFEZ MODIR - SIX DEGREES
31 CRUCIAL REGGAE FROM OUTSIDE JAMAICA VOL.2 - SKANK
32 SUPER POP VENEZUELA - LOS AMIGOS INVISIBLES - GOZADERA
33 STEEL GUITAR HEART ATTACK - JON RAUHAUSE - BLOODSHOT
34 THE IN SOUND FROM WAY OUT! - BEASTIE BOYS - CAPITOL
35 THE ROUGH GUIDE TO WORLD MUSIC AFRICA & MIDDLE EAST - WMN
36 TONGUE BATH - XTATIKA - TZADIK
37 PUTUMAYO PRESENTS GYPSY GROOVE - PUTUMAYO
38 LIVE AT THE FILLMORE EAST - NEIL YOUNG - REPRISE
39 THE ROUGH GUIDE TO THE BLUES - WORLD MUSIC NET
40 MY TIME - HUTCHY - RUFF CUT
CAPTAIN FREDÕS WORLD CRUISE #71
this show is downloadable from radio4all.net or radio.indymedia.org
HELLO BONJOUR-MICHAEL FRANTI
RABBIT HOP-MOONDOG
AH GHANILEK-REINES DE SABA
BULA BULA-MABULU
DO YOUR KNOW-MR. VEGAS
LIGHTEN UP-BEASTIE BOYS
110TH AND 5TH AVE-TITO PUENTE
SHARA SAIDI-GAMAL GOMA
THESE BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WALKINÕ-CANDYE KANE
SONO ONE DROP-JEF STOTT
TWISTED SENSE OF GOD-FINE ARTS MILITIA
BROKEN LEVEE BLUES-DJ SHADOW
JIM CROW-JOHN MELLENCAMP
ICE PICK-ALBERT COLLINS
SMINBE-TAMA
THE LOST SONG-THE CAT EMPIRE
18 WHEELER FEVER-SCOTT H. BIRAM
IÕM AFRAID OF AMERICANS-DAVID BOWIE (REMIXED)
HOLIDAY IN GUANTANAMO-JELLO BIAFRA
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