Greenpeace takes ‘corporate spies’ to federal court

[cory777]

Source: Raw Story

The American branch of an international environmental group is suing two chemical companies, their PR firms, and the private investigators they hired allegedly for spying and racketteering.

“The message of this lawsuit is: when companies engage in espionage, they will be discovered and exposed. These unacceptable and underhanded tactics interfered with valuable work we were undertaking to protect public health and expose environmental crimes,” Phil Radford, executive director of Greenpeace USA, said in an advisory.

Greenpeace USA's federal lawsuit filed Monday alleges that Dow Chemical and Sasol hired a private spy firm Beckett Brown International (BBI) through public relations firms Dezenhall Resources and Ketchum to spy on the environmental group.

"Plaintiffs allege that between 1998 and 2000, Defendants conspired to and did surveil, infiltrate, and steal confidential information from Greenpeace with the intention of preempting, blunting, or thwarting its environmental campaigns," the lawsuit said.

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/greenpeace-sues-corporate-spies-dow-sasol-pr-firms/

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Uncensored Activist News http://activistnews.blogspot.com/

[ooglymoogly]

1. Fat chance, that.

A democracy it is not.

Honest judiciary and legal system it is certainly no more.

Might as well ask honest judgment form a bench of kangaroos.

[Larkspur]

2. Is Greenpeace incorporated?

If so, then the ruling would be about corporations, not activist groups, so this court case could be a catch-22 for the corporatist judges.

[TomCADem]

3. Applying The Logic Of Some On DU, Greenpeace's Suit Of Critics Of Greenpeace Is Censorship

For example, defenders of President Obama are often derided on this board as fanboys, some DUers proudly proclaim that they will sit out the 2012 election, and articles critical of Democrats often get bumped and stay bumped far longer than articles critical of Republicans.

I hope Greenpeace wins, but these types of corporate funded infiltrate, divide, conquer and attack tactics are becoming increasingly common.

Heck, look at Latinos for Reform, which attacked Democrats from the "left" for failing to aggresively push immigration reform. Liberal right? Except, that the group was funded and formed by Republicans.

[ProudDad]

5. You wrote

"articles critical of Democrats often get bumped and stay bumped far longer than articles critical of Republicans."

Probably because the republicans are full of crap so -- no mystery there...

And being critical of the democrats who were catapulted in office on the biggest wave since Lyndon Johnson and did about the same job with the mandate is basically speaking truth to power...

:shrug:

[TomCADem]

6. "republicans are full of crap so -- no mystery there" - More like they get a free pass

A Republican can say the most racist, extrimist things, and the mainstream media and much of DU essentially writes it off as harmless Republicans-Being-Republicans. No big deal.

Conversely, on the right, when a Democrat says anything mildy progressive, the right goes crazy and attacks the Democrat as a socialist, facist, godless, homosexual, etc.

Look at Fox News. Did it simply ignore Alan Grayson? No. It put a target on him, and he lost in the election.

Yet, the left does not do this. Or, maybe the left has bought into this narrative that it is no big deal when Republicans say something crazy. Thus, when Jim DeMint proposes banning gays from teaching at public school, it hardly gets noticed on DU when I post an article reporting this. But, when Obama simply pushes for a gradual process of reviewing and repealing DADT, he gets attacked for not simply ignoring the current law.

Personally, I think we ignore Republicans at our peril.

[ProudDad]

7. I guess it's because you will find a consensus here

that nearly everything a republican says is bat-crap crazy shit so there's no reason to argue with one another about it...

We say, right -- the scorpion is acting just like a scorpion...

But when one points out the latest outbreak of pimples on the Obama Administration's nose or the latest evil done by the National Security State or the Empire and gets right-wing talking points back on an allegedly Progressive board -- having to respond bumps the thread up to the top again.

As for DADT, if he were as serious about ending it as Truman was about ending segregation, he could order the services to NOT enforce it with the stroke of a pen...

Defending that kind of crazy making crap we get from "democrats" gets threads bumped up in the list...

[cstanleytech]

8. I agree with you especially about

people who support Obama being derided for it on this forum by people who are disappointed that he didnt wave his magic wand and grant their wishes instantly.
They seem to forget the fact that hes the president of the entire united states and is supposed to be for "all" the people not just one party and with one agenda and just toss out the fact that that type of thinking is part of what got us in the mess with President Bush.
Now if people want the president to succeed they need to work for it, start small and make changes that will last like for example push for major campaign finance reform that the SCOTUS cant flush down the toilet, that would actually be a good thing and its something the republicans would have a hard time explaining their opposition on.
Same thing for reducing the military spending by atleast half of what it currently is by next year, after all we are spending something like 3 or 4 times what china and russia combined spend and that just makes no sense to me.

[ProudDad]

4. K&R and

wishing for success...

[fasttense]

9. Now, back to the topic.

Why would these corporations need to hire additional spies to infiltrate Greenpeace? Were the CIA and FBI too busy at the moment? Or are corporations just dropping the pretense of having to convince politicians to use our national spy rings to do their dirty work?

I suspect that the CEOs wanted full control of the spying operations, so they simply hired some goons. When corporations drop the pretense, it means we have moved further along on the American path of fascism.

I seriously doubt the courts will take any action against these corporations after all our justice system has been captured by corporations too.

[Steerpike]

10. hmmmmm...

i'm impressed...can't wait to see how this turns out...i wish them luck also!