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In reply to the discussion: What we have here ... [View all]Generic Other
(28,979 posts)144. I am reviewing my past views on these issues per your suggestion
When J. Edgar Hoover released the "dirt" on Martin Luther King, Jr. I screamed to high heaven about their tactics. Only in 1976 when the Senate investigated did the government acknowledge what COINTELPROs mission was: to "disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and neutralize" anyone the FBI suspected of being radicals.
According to political analyst Earl Ofari Hutchinson:
The FBI patterned COINTELPRO on the methods used by its counterintelligence division and internal security sections during the 1940s and '50s. The arsenal of dirty tactics they used included unauthorized wiretaps, agent provocateur, poison-pen letters, "black-bag jobs" (breaking and entering to obtain intelligence) and the compiling of secret dossiers.
Driven by a grotesque mix of personal racism and paranoia, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover kicked the program into high gear in the 1960s. The FBI recruited thousands of "ghetto informants," for their relentless campaign of harassment and intimidation against African American groups. The bureau even organized its targets into Orwellian categories agents gave such labels as "Rabble Rouser Index," "Agitator Index" and "Security Index."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/earl-ofari-hutchinson/the-fbi-walks-a-perilous-_b_3447225.html
Driven by a grotesque mix of personal racism and paranoia, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover kicked the program into high gear in the 1960s. The FBI recruited thousands of "ghetto informants," for their relentless campaign of harassment and intimidation against African American groups. The bureau even organized its targets into Orwellian categories agents gave such labels as "Rabble Rouser Index," "Agitator Index" and "Security Index."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/earl-ofari-hutchinson/the-fbi-walks-a-perilous-_b_3447225.html
And it never ceased. The FBI illegally monitored civil rights activists, peace groups, environmentalists, church groups, and others they considered subversive. I have yet to experience a moment's embarrassment over my vocal and extreme negative reaction to these activities.
During the Church Committee hearings in 1975, which publicly revealed the existence of the NSA in the process of looking into misconduct of Americas intelligence agencies, Lew Allen Jr., the the NSAs director at the time, said that Congress passed a law in 1959 that provides authority to enable the NSA as the principal agency of the Government responsible for signals intelligence activities, to function without the disclosure of information which would endanger the accomplishment of its functions. In other words, it could pretty much do what it liked.
The NSA used that freedom...to establish secret facilities in several cities, including New York, San Francisco, Washington DC, and San Antonio. In each city, NSA employees would go to the major telegraph companies and copy telegrams, with the companies permission but without warrants. http://www.vice.com/read/a-brief-history-of-the-united-states-governments-warrentless-spying
The NSA used that freedom...to establish secret facilities in several cities, including New York, San Francisco, Washington DC, and San Antonio. In each city, NSA employees would go to the major telegraph companies and copy telegrams, with the companies permission but without warrants. http://www.vice.com/read/a-brief-history-of-the-united-states-governments-warrentless-spying
Yeah, a lot of people have been mad about this stuff for a long time.
Orwell's Winston Smith thought he could outwit them at the beginning of 1984:
He thought of the telescreen with its never-sleeping ear. They could spy upon you night and day, but if you kept your head you could still outwit them. With all their cleverness they had never mastered the secret of finding out what another human being was thinking. . . . Facts, at any rate, could not be kept hidden. They could be tracked down by inquiry, they could be squeezed out of you by torture. But if the object was not to stay alive but to stay human, what difference did it ultimately make? They could not alter your feelings; for that matter you could not alter them yourself, even if you wanted to. They could lay bare in the utmost detail everything that you had done or said or thought; but the inner heart, whose workings were mysterious even to yourself, remained impregnable.
But in the end he discovered that once they collect all your information, altering your feelings is the easiest trick of all. That is the whole point of Orwell's novel.
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not at all. not when you have folks on your side who surely have their hair flaming
cali
Jun 2013
#11
My hair used to be calm...because I mistakenly believed we had a government that would
dkf
Jun 2013
#98
What about those of us without any hair? Okay, I guess that's a discussion for
SlimJimmy
Jun 2013
#151
What is this 'metadata' you are speaking of? I was told by the President that my
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#138
It seems more like a 'trust' vs. a 'dis-trust' divide to me. There are those who
HardTimes99
Jun 2013
#124
The lesser of two evils is catching up fast. Cuts to food snaps (Senate Dems voted for it),
forestpath
Jun 2013
#9
Straw men, labeling, other ad hominem tactics, thats the order of the day if you dont completely buy
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#176
I'm also prior service and also took an oath. Why do you feel the need to keep bringing it up?
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#204
You are correct. Once I researched the facts and put them out there both on my show and via
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#152
Thanks for kicking this thread, I almost missed it and it is a very excellent OP.
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#79
Those who disagree with you PREFER to live under an authoritarian state
BeyondGeography
Jun 2013
#38
And here we are discussing it freely on technology that was handed down by the military
BeyondGeography
Jun 2013
#63
You're not missing anything, same old same old yawn inducting 'rah rah' I'm so funny and it is it
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#81
Weak attempts, yes. Considering the sources though your credibiity is being hugely enhanced
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#87
It is not what they believe. Just another distraction technique, best to ignore it. Did you see the
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#84
Consider the sources. I never get upset by anything said by these people, although accusing DUers
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#99
Lol, I went to political bootcamp when Bush was installed in the WH. I used to go to sites
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#103
And those "liberals" who desperately search for any sign of imperfection in the President?
baldguy
Jun 2013
#51
Yeah, but they didn't seem to really care until these allegations were leveled against Obama.
baldguy
Jun 2013
#56
The allegations, what allegations? Leaks is what the President called them. That means they are
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#89
That is NOT what people are upset about. They are upset, try to read this carefully, about
sabrina 1
Jun 2013
#97
their abuse is not entertaining, but it is a testimony to your irrefutability
carolinayellowdog
Jun 2013
#119
Then those things should stand up to an examination of the facts, right? nt
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#177
lol Well true, there is that! The OP and another person seem to lovingly stroke their ignore lists
Number23
Jun 2013
#185
They will post 100 saying Obama is dog...that's good enough for the bashers
uponit7771
Jun 2013
#108
stick to the issues and avoid characterizing the motives of folks who bother to respond to you
bigtree
Jun 2013
#147
On this issue, they can't and they seem to know that the facts don't support them.
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#170
Asking you questions is NOT BAITING YOU. Why start the damn OP if you're just going
Number23
Jun 2013
#184
The attacks started by those who attacked anyone who didnt think the sky was falling from the
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#155
Doesnt work Nadin. There are lots of articles like this one in 2006 in USA Today
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#165
The ACLU? I quote them. I know, you can't handle the facts here. Like all the rest on your side.
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#168
I know the history already, it's in the transcript from my show. The facts are against you.
stevenleser
Jun 2013
#171