Robert Reich Has a Chilling Theory About Those Berkeley Protestors

[VOX]

31. COINTELPRO redux. We've been here before...

COINTELPRO was used by the FBI during the 1960s civil rights and anti-war groups and demonstrations. The goal was to discredit and disrupt.

Yes, I know the source below is the often-unreliable Wikipedia. In this case, it's a good start, however:

COINTELPRO (a portmanteau derived from COunter INTELligence PROgram) was a series of covert, and often illegal projects conducted by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, discrediting and disrupting domestic political organizations.

FBI records show that COINTELPRO resources targeted groups and individuals that the FBI deemed subversive, including anti-Vietnam War organizers, activists of the Civil Rights Movement or Black Power movement (e.g., Martin Luther King, Jr.and the Black Panther Party), feministorganizations, anti-colonial movements (such as Puerto Rican independencegroups like the Young Lords), and a variety of organizations that were part of the broader New Left...

FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover issued directives governing COINTELPRO, ordering FBI agents to "expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, neutralize or otherwise eliminate" the activities of these movements and especially their leaders.

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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO