TASK DEFINITION: Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.
PROBLEM: Torturing Muslims is an 'awesome' way to get things done. On December 9, the Senate Select Committee released a partial report of the horrifying, illegal torture tactics used by the CIA during the Bush administration . Some question the timing . I think the timing is perfect . We are now in a position to recall what past black activists, from Martin Luther King to Angela Davis to Muhammad Ali, knew when they spoke against the immoral actions of their nation in Vietnam . The protesters in Ferguson got a sneak peek, or a reminder, of this lesson in August, when Palestinians, who had experience with being shot at with US-made weaponry, advised US protesters on how to treat the searing pain of tear gas bombs (pour Coca-Cola directly over the eyes) . But recently, because of the quick succession of the failures to indict the killers of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, and then the release of the torture report, we are at a moment in which the link between our domestic terrorism and our international terrorism is being drawn for the rest of us . Immediately after the release of the report, many in the media did their best to claim that the release of this report was part of some wider conspiracy to demoralise Americans . The best example of this would be Fox News' Andrea Tantaros , who, in the middle of a conversation about the report, began shouting that "The United States of America is awesome, we are awesome." She seemed positively indignant that the Obama administration was attempting to "have this discussion to show us how we're not awesome" . For those unfamiliar with the slang of US hipsters and teenagers, we generally use the "awesome/not awesome" binary to evaluate things like pizza, beer, or surfboards - not the moral character of a nation-state . But , if we are to adopt her method of expression , Tantaros seems to be forgetting that she is able to be on television in part because one or two generations ago, a few people declared that women not being able to participate in news media was not very "awesome" . She also forgets that a couple generations before that, her Greek last name would have prevented her from being considered"white" , and she thus would not have been allowed in front of a camera . Whether Tantaros accepts it or not, the history of equality in the US has been one of people deciding that things were not yet awesome, and taking it upon themselves to make them more awesome . But we should note that Tantaros was primarily angry at being forced to have a public conversation, and at being embarrassed that the world was seeing us have a discussion about our behaviour . "This makes us look bad," she pleaded . "And all this does is have our enemies laughing at us." Not only is torture illegal , but by US' own standards, it is ineffective . The CIA knew this . The 1992 US Army Field Manual on Interrogation explicitly advises that "the use of force is a poor technique, as it yields unreliable results", and can "induce the source to say whatever he thinks the interrogator wants to hear" . This ended up being true - we now know that one prisoner told the CIA that he was trying to recruit black Muslims in the US to attack gas stations . He later admitted that he made up the story,"because he thought that's what interrogators wanted to hear" . This year has also shown us that ineptitude can also happen at home, with our domestic police forces . The Ferguson Police Department has utterly failed to de-escalate tensions at every possible opportunity . We now know the officer that killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice was not fit to hold a pistol, much less a badge . In fact ,  a report by the Justice Department has shown that Cleveland police officers routinely use unjustified force in arrests, and fire their weapons "carelessly" , putting both innocent bystanders and themselves in danger . If the timing of the one-two punch of public revelations of anti-black racism and criminal torture do not convince us , then we can at least recognise a pattern in the people that are desperate to deny both . The torture report is available to anyone to view online, provided they are willing to wade through pages and pages of gruesome accounts . There is an account of putting a prisoner in a diaper, shackling him to the ceiling, and leaving him for days . One prisoner died of hypothermia after being chained, nearly naked, to a concrete floor . Many were sexually assaulted . Despite this, Republican Congressman Peter King attempted to wave these facts away, declaring that no harmful torture occurred . Instead ,  he brushed it off as merely a few"people made to stand in awkward positions" . This is the same Peter King who said that Eric Garner did not die because of a chokehold, but because he was overweight . It is also the same Peter King that implied that Garner, in his final moments, was lying about not being able to breathe . If Tantaros' reaction to the defiling of the "awesomeness" of the US seems childish , Peter King's reaction is worse . It is the rhetorical equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears, and shouting "nyah, nyah, I can't hear you" - as your brother drowns beside you . And , as if we needed any clearer indication on how racism and callousness regarding the torture of non-whites were connected , we were given a clear reminder last week , when Facebook released a 23 second commercial about a feature of its service, and cast a Sikh man as the spokesperson . The video was immediately bombarded with angry comments calling the man an "ISIL terrorist", a "raghead", and a "sand nigger" . One commenter blasted Facebook itself, asking"Why do you have a Muslim on this pic?" When another user replied that he was a Sikh, the commenter responded:"Same thing." We might chalk this up to ignorance : Our education system is focused on white European and US history . Most Americans don't know the difference between a friendly Sikh man and a scary Muslim terrorist . Actually, most Americans couldn't tell you the difference between a fatwah and a plate of chapati . But we should be more precise here - it's not that we don't know , it's that we don't want to know . But then again , separating "good" brown people from "bad" ones isn't the point, and wouldn't make a difference . For too many of us, anyone brown and bearded is automatically al-Qaeda, and deserves to be tortured and killed . Our understanding of humanity does not apply to anyone that can be mistaken for Muslim or Arab , and we excuse ourselves for this moral exception by constantly reminding ourselves that our country was attacked in 2001 . It's not that we can't know that we are terrorising black people . It's not that we can't know that the people we tortured in those prisons were people . We could, if we wanted to . But we don't want to . The events of the past few months have shown us that we are not up against a few crooked cops, a group of rogue rednecks, or a wacky news station . We are up against an empire of immorality that, in its fear, would rather shoot and waterboard the world, than to learn about it . If there is a true "enemy" , it is that Empire . It has been hiding in plain sight , and this year, it has revealed itself- in the mirror . As Tantaros says, it laughs at us . What we choose to do about that is up to us .

SOLUTION: On December 9, the Senate Select Committee released a partial report of the horrifying, illegal torture tactics used by the CIA during the Bush administration

PROBLEM: Privatising Mexico's oil industry spells disaster. Considering Mexico's history and the present political context, it's no surprise that the majority of the Mexican population nowadays is either deeply suspicious of President Pena Nieto or just opposed to the current fast-track drive to privatise oil and pass it into the hands of foreign oligopolies . At present, Mexico suffers from an extremely weak state where the vast majority of crimes go unaddressed because of a judicial vacuum . More than 22,000 forced disappearances have occurred since 2007 and more than 70,000 people have been killed since 2006 . Almost every week we hear about more mass graves discovered . Most recently, a massacre of students in Iguala shook the nation . Mexico also suffers from the third largest illicit economy in the world, according to the Global Financial Integrity Report . Clearly, organised crime is openly challenging and fragmenting the state . In the face of these facts even President Nieto has admitted in public speeches that Mexico's legal system is in shambles . International experience and basic common sense indicate that a country must possess a minimum standard of the rule of law in order to be able to foster social benefits for most of its population when privatising state assets . Without functional regulatory and judicial controls, it is technically and politically not feasible for any oil-funded social development fund to effectively spread wealth to future generations through new public education programmes, a modernised public health, adequate environmental standards and a much-improved physical infrastructure . Absolutely nothing today indicates that Mexico can implement privatisation of the oil infrastructure at even the most basic standards of security, transparency, effectiveness and efficiency . Yet ,  a Mexican paradox occurs . While insecurity still runs at record highs , foreign money keeps pouring in . What's going on? Since the beginning of the still unfinished democratic transition and since the economic opening to international trade of the early 1990s, Mexico managed to attract billions of dollars per year in foreign direct investment . Yet ,  most of this money has been channelled into politically managed non-competitive sectors in the hands of Mexican "state courtesans" disguised as private entrepreneurs who over the last 25 years created vast oligopolies out of the privatisation of state assets . The privatisation process in Mexico has largely been conducted through dubious procedures orchestrated by corrupt federal governments . All this happened in the midst of a Mexican economy lacking technological innovation with low productivity and where more than half of what is produced and consumed is exchanged within informal/illicit markets . Nevertheless ,  these so-called private oligopolies within the mining, banking and telecommunications industries operate in a crony capitalistic fashion by attracting foreign investors to politically protected markets in which governments (through bribes and subsidies) ensure rates of return two to five times above the international average . How can, for example, German or US oligopolies presently investing in Mexico fail to fall in love with such a "generous" corrupt system? The forthcoming Mexican oil privatisation falls comfortably within this "legally corrupt" economic framework . Yet ,  harsh social realities have a way of trumping politics most of the time . Mexican writer and journalist Ana Lilia Perez published in 2012 a book titled"The Black Cartel" in which she provides a description of massive organised crime infiltration within the top managerial echelons of the state-run oil company, PEMEX . The nature of the organised crime infiltration covers technical and political appointees at PEMEX . Moreover ,  with thorough documentation, Ms Perez provides a detailed account of how and where a large portion of the oil extracted and distributed by PEMEX is currently stolen through illegal operations . These have been linked to Mexican politicians and US and Mexican private companies selling illegal Mexican oil to the markets in Canada, Mexico and the US, with the complicity of the Mexican armed forces supposedly responsible for protecting the PEMEX infrastructure . The current illegal oil trafficking comes with high-level political corruption, intense armed conflict causing thousands of deaths per month and frequent acts of terrorism against the PEMEX infrastructure . One cannot expect this armed conflict scenario to just go away after privatisation . In this kind of context, any honest foreign investor bidding within a Mexican oil privatisation process should have his or her head checked or otherwise possess enough political clout within Mexico or the financial capacity to bribe with millions of dollars the government ladder and pay for a vast praetorian guard of security personnel to manage the armed chaos ahead . In comparison , dealing with other oil producing countries with problematic states, such as Nigeria, would seem like a walk in the park . Shareholders of oil companies can only expect low economic returns and chaos from investing in the Mexican oil sector , unless , prior to any private investment drive, an international judicial cooperation effort starts dismantling the vast organised crime networks within the Mexican oil business and beyond . This international judicial cooperation must entail the actual implementation of a serious anti-corruption programme within the Mexican state with much broader conflict of interest and traffic of influence statutes, all monitored by reputable international civil society organisations . Furthermore ,  the failure of the Mexican state needs to be corrected with the installation of autonomous investigative units for economic crimes within each Mexican region and the creation of witness protection programmes for cases of political corruption linked to organised crime . These reforms will be good for Mexican society in general and also good for the pockets of Mexican and foreign oil investors .

SOLUTION: Clearly, organised crime is openly challenging and fragmenting the state Almost every week we hear about more mass graves discovered

PROBLEM: The rise of Poland's urban movement. Poland's recent local elections went according to the usual script: The ruling coalition of the Civic Platform and Polish People's Party retained their control over major cities . But there was one political surprise in the final results . The urban movement, which ran for the first time in elections as a nationwide coalition of city activists, won the mayor's seat in Gorzow Wielkopolski, in western Poland, and a number of city council seats in big cities like Warsaw, Poznan and Torun . Although a newcomer to the electoral race, the urban movement dictated the direction of most election campaigns . Their demands ended up in the electoral programmes of mainstream political parties , which scrambled to attract grassroot activists on their lists to capture the youth leftist vote . So what is this new political force and can it permanently transform Polish local and state politics? In late 2007, a group of residents of the Rataje district in Poznan, in western Poland, organised to defend their right to have a say in the planning of their neighbourhood . The mayor of Poznan and the city council, had proposed to transform the derelict post-industrial zone of the neighbourhood into a new residential and commercial area . Local residents, on the other hand, insisted on building a park and a recreational area . They mobilised the community, organised protests, wrote petitions and publicised the issue in the media . The negative publicity made the situation uncomfortable enough for local officials to concede to public pressure and withdraw their commercial development proposal . This was the first sign that a new social force was emerging with the potential to affect urban policies in Poland through civic engagement . Grassroot activities began to surface in other Polish cities around that time . Activists from Sopot in northern Poland started calling for participatory budgeting following the model of the Brazilian city of Porto Alegre . In Lodz, in central Poland, an informal group of active citizens organised themselves around the issue of cleanliness of public spaces . Gradually, these groups merged into a movement calling for citizen participation in the transformation of the post-industrial area of the city, just like in Poznan . Lodz used to be an important industrial centre up until 1989 when its textile industry collapsed and many industrial buildings lay abandoned and derelict . In Warsaw, urban activists organised demonstrations for the preservation of green areas in the centre of the Polish capital; against hikes in public transport fees,;and against privatisation of municipal buildings . In the last few years, groups like Right to the City, Inhabitants' Forum, and the Housing Movement have emerged in almost every Polish town bringing together individuals of various ages, social, and cultural backgrounds . These groups were involved in a variety of campaigns to reassert residents' rights to their neighbourhoods and towns: from writing petitions, to organising protests, pickets and demonstrations, to occupying vacant buildings, setting up squats and blocking evictions . Their political appetite grew with time . In 2010, Poznan activists formed:"We, the Inhabitants of Poznan," social electoral committee to contest local elections . They received almost 10 percent of the votes , but with an electoral law favouring big political parties, they failed to get a seat on the council . This electoral experience facilitated the launching, in 2011, of an informal coalition - the Urban Movements Congress - comprising urban activist groups from all over Poland . The congress was tasked with formulating a programme to provide a common foundation around which urban activists would build their campaigns in local communities . The programme was focused on three main pillars: policies to stem and reverse the growth of socioeconomic inequalities and exclusion; sustainable environment-conscious urban development in the interest of all residents; and promotion of direct democracy practices such as social consultations, participatory budgeting and referendums . After the founding of the congress, the urban movements grew in strength and impact . On the national level, the congress managed to pressure the Ministry of Regional Development to include some of its policies in its 2012 National Urban Policy (NUP) programme . On the local level, urban activists managed to reap a number of victories . In 2011, after much "harassment" from activists, the mayor of Sopot agreed to implement participatory budgeting in the city . Residents now can decide on how to spend 5 million zlotys (about $1.6m) or one percent of the municipal budget . Other mayors soon followed suit . In Lodz, residents decide on how to spend 40 million zlotys ($13m) . The mayor of Lodz also invited local activists to advise the city council's Revitalisation Bureau on specific policies for the socioeconomic development of the city . The reason why Lodz became more accepting of the urban movement's demands was because its previous mayor was removed in a popular referendum in January 2010 . The mayors of Czestochowa, Olsztyn, Elblag, Bytom and Ostroda were also removed in the same manner for introducing policies regarding privatisation and commercial development which went against the will of their electorates . The same fate threatened the mayor of Warsaw , but the low turnout at the referendum saved her . After surviving in her post, she quickly implemented some of the urban movement's demands . But the most spectacular achievement of the Polish urban movement in recent months was putting Krakow's candidacy to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games to a referendum . After it was announced in November 2013 that local authorities had decided to put forward Krakow's candidacy for the Olympics, activists launched a campaign called Krakow Against Games , which aimed to inform people of the negative consequences of hosting big sporting event . City authorities caved in under popular pressure and put the decision to a referendum, with the condition that it has at least a 30 percent turnout . Knowing that the 2010 EU elections had only a 26 percent turnout , they combined the referendum with the 2014 EU elections . To the displeasure of local authorities, some 36 percent of Krakow's citizens voted and 70 percent of those said no to the games . Victory of the Krakow Against Games campaign showed that referendums can be an important tool in bringing local policies in line with residents' will and that urban activists have considerable social support . The Krakow victory gave impetus to the formation by of nationwide coalition of 12 sociopolitical entities affiliated with the Urban Movements Congress to contest the 2014 local elections . The results of the election demonstrated that the movement can translate its grassroot support into electoral victories . With the 2015 parliamentary and presidential elections approaching, the coalition is hopeful that it will have an even larger political impact in the coming year . The urban movement has a long way to go in order to occupy a permanent place on Poland's political map , but its public presence, successful campaigns and increasing social support show that there is a definite shift in Polish people's sociopolitical attitudes . There is clearly growing support for sustainable and environment-conscious development which aims to level out inequalities and exclusion and usher in effective practices of direct democracy .

SOLUTION:
In Warsaw, urban activists organised demonstrations for the preservation of green areas in the centre of the Polish capital; against hikes in public transport fees,;and against privatisation of municipal buildings In the last few years, groups like Right to the City, Inhabitants' Forum, and the Housing Movement have emerged in almost every Polish town bringing together individuals of various ages, social, and cultural backgrounds