Are NYPD using sexual assault to defend their Wall Street paymasters?

LET'S SUPPOSE that the blind Chinese dissident, Chen Guangcheng, remains spunky and rebellious once he's settled in at New York University, and decides some time during the summer to join an Occupy demonstration, along with his wife.



Here's what they might reasonably expect by way of treatment from the NYPD, if we are to believe – which I do – a report on new police strategies against protestors by David Graeber, anthropologist and creative force in the Occupy movement.

You can read the whole of Alexander Cockburn's article on how the NYPD are protecting their Wall Street paymasters,  here.  Imagine if the police acted in this way in Belarus- what the reaction from the neoliberal/neoconservative commentariat would be! Yet in the 'great' neoliberal/neocon media organs, there's very little, if any, coverage about how democratic protestors are being dealt with by the authorities in New York. I wonder why that is?

Also in The Week/The First Post, don't miss this great piece by our good friend David Lindsay on the House of Lords- and why if the second chamber is to be reformed, the main parties should be banned from it.