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Widespread Spying Preceded '04 GOP Convention
Frosty Piss alerts us to a story in the New York Times reporting on details that are emerging of a far-flung spying operation lasting up to a year leading up to the 2004 Republican National Convention. The New York Police Department mounted a spy campaign reaching well beyond the state of New York. For at least a year before the convention, teams of undercover New York police officers traveled to cities across the US, Canada, and Europe to conduct covert observations of people who planned to protest at the convention. Across the country undercover officers attended meetings of political groups, posing as sympathizers or fellow activists. In at least some cases, intelligence on what appeared to be lawful activity was shared with other police departments. Outlines of the pre-convention operations are emerging from records in federal lawsuits brought over mass arrests during the convention.
Police has no morality whatsoever; they are not sworn-in to the Constitution like the armed forces are, and so are open to perform all abuses for the rich and powerful.
The corruption we see today from the republican side never ceases. I am sure it has probably been as bad from the other side in the past but not in my memory. It just keeps coming. I can't think of a single truth I have heard from the current administration.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
The NYPD exhibiting "Bad Faith"?
Why am I not surprised?
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No more New Yorkers at my parties....
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Oh, wait, I read
Never mind
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Government should fear the people. The more the J. Edgar Hoover wannabees feel the need to spy on me, the more I feel like I actually have a chance to change things.
As for spying on Canada, I've read that our spy agency CSIS spends a considerable amount of time keeping an eye on American spies on our soil. Or maybe they are just saying that and have no idea if/where American spies are operating.
So, what I took from this article is that the NYPD has domestic and international espionage capabilities comparable to (or, worse, better than) our nation's designed intelligence bodies. They also seem to do a better job of sharing information between agencies than the CIA, NSA, the various military intelligence organizations, and the FBI.
This is yet another illustration of my point... the people that need to be in Iraq and Afghanistan are the NYPD and the LAPD. Their SWAT, negotiations, and (apparently!) intelligence teams are what's needed - these efforts ceased being appropriate "military actions" some time ago. What's needed now is an effective police force - which not the U.S. Army or Marines.
And, by the way, yes, I do agree with what will no doubt the general sentiment on there - that is an outrageous, appalling, and despicable invasion of the personal privacy rights of ordinary citizens around the globe... but, aside from whining about how corrupt our elected officials and expressing my outrage, I figured there was some small glimmer of upside in this piece.
"Adventure? Excitement? A Jedi craves not these things."
When I read that, I couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of well, nothing. Our government as a whole has fallen so far it is no longer suprising or even "despicable", it's almost routine, and that is the truly disgusting part.
So let's review what we know so far...
* FBI abusing its snooping authority under the patriot act
* Major telecommunications companies provide secret rooms to the government to pick through Internet communications
* Al Gonzalez authorizes (illegal) collection of phone call databases
* "Total Information Awareness" (TIA) program continues to create mass associative database of all american entities (people, businesses)
* Inkjet printers embed hidden serial numbers
* Newly issued American passports leak personal information including pictures
* Government has access to all Americans' financial transactions
* US government contracts w/private companies to harvest information (which it itself can't do)
* Law enforcement infiltrates peaceful organizations (occasionally incites and/or foments violence)
* Attorney General removes Federal Prosecutor for lack of loyalty to Administration... (raising questions about those who WEREN'T fired)
* ???
* Someone profits.
(a) Ineffectual: writing or congresspersons, letters to the editor, voting.
(b) (Typically) Crazy: armed revolt.
It's like none of us (including me) knows how to navigate the territory between those two extremes. Heck, I don't even know whether or not there is any territory in between.
Is this why we're damned to stand bye, then get over these things and go watch the newest B.S.G episode to forget about the state of the nation? We're just convinced that there's no effective way to deal with these things without resorting to violence, which we're (sensibly) loathe to do?It's kind of annoying that extremists can't seperate themselves from peaceful protesters. I mean, if you want to throw stones at cops, do it when they are beating up on civilians, or taking bribes, or driving through red lights without the siren on. Don't go fuck up a peaceful protest.
How we know is more important than what we know.
If you're my enemy's enemy, that doesn't mean you're my friend. These days you won't find an idealist anywhere.
My brother was one of the 1,800 people held for one or two days at the old vehicle maintenance facility on the west side of Manhattan. Many of these people (including my brother) were rounded up like cattle just because they were walking down a block where a protest was taking place. People were out getting groceries and arrested, with no way to place phone calls, no place to sit, and unhealthy conditions (the police who worked in the facility during the same time period have filed numerous health claims).
So all this data was gathered and used for what...to cordon off a city block with snow fence and arrest EVERYONE in that block?
Ultimately the police likely had no real way to use any of the data, and to keep their Republican guests happy they resorted instead to just rounding up as many people as they could. By the time everyone was released the convention was over. The lawsuits will drag on for years (my brother is suing the city) and cost the city a ton of money.
The police like to boast that there were no disturbances or major incidents during the convention and they take the credit. More likely the reason is that the protestors and the citizens of New York were well behaved, protested peacefully, and even welcomed many of the convention attendees. My daughters (13 and 10 at the time) and I marched in the protest on Sunday during the convention and it was a wonderful day of peaceful expression of our political feelings.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
is the fact that we have G. Gordon Liddy talking about similar plans for the '72 (or was it 76?) elections.
it's not democrat or republican specifically. It just happens that the guys who were behind what happend in '72 were also behind what happend in '04. They just happened to be republican. of course, now we have the problem that most of their ilk ARE the republican party, but that's beside the point.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
The argument I constantly hear from those on the far right -- if there actually was a conspiracy, someone would have spoken out. Well, if that is the case, how come such a national "conspiracy," if you would call it, took 3 years to come out?
We know this sort of thing costs the nation its soul, but what I can't find in TFA is what all these operations cost the city of New York. Was the city reimbursed? I thought the Bush administarion was failing to deliver on promises regarding security for NYC? Why are they helping him then?s -selling-solar.html
--
Thank goodness for sunshine: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Once the FSB determines who the troublemakers are, the Kremlin orders its loyalists in the city governments to suppress dissent. In fact, on March 24, Russian authorities arrested all the peaceful protestors before they could begin their rally.
Will Washington follow in the footsteps of Moscow and go to the next logical step after spying? I hope that the answer is "no", but I cannot be 100% certain that the answer is "no".
They must mean New York, USSR. Americans would never allow this type of stuff.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
... when I read a story like this, I usually try to stop and ask myself, "What if I did live there? Would this kind of craziness make more sense?" I cannot imagine that it would, but, like I said, I don't life in New York. ... BTW, if you haven't read the article, you really should just to catch the part about the "wireless bicycle."
7 4
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Fuck letters to the editor. Power only respects power.
Get your friends together and get yourselves registered to vote. Agree on how you'll vote on what issues.
Then get in touch with your elected representatives (and people hoping to run for office) and make it clear that you represent X voters who WILL be voting in the next election. And tell them what you want to see changed.
Then carry through and VOTE.
If you want it to happen faster, volunteer to work on the campaigns of people who are willing to vote for what you believe.
Change happens when people get out and get involved.
Sure, you'll end up with a record at Homeland Security, but anyone who doesn't have one in these times isn't much of a patriot.
"If they're spending their time investigating quakers, who are they missing?"
THE AMISH!
In Soviet Russia...
...we're all Republicans!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
The New York City Government obviously has too much money if they can waste money illegally spying on non-violent, peaceful groups. It seems highly doubtful that citizens of NYC approve of this use of their money. Therefore, the police budget should be cut and savings returned to citizens through reduced taxes.
> What does this have to do with corruption? It's about spying on a bunch of misfits and hooligans.
But you don't understand! If they are trying to blow up Republicans they are patriots and heros. Shame on the NYPD for aiding and abetting BusHitler.
Seriously though; read the whole article and reading through the painfully obvious bias the NYT put on it it looked like a textbook example of good police work. They didn't tap any phones or break the law, they read open sourses like webpages and they put boots on the ground at meetings open to the public to collect human intelligence. Yes they kept files on threats and non threats, who wants to have each team investigate the same harmless nuts? Then when the convention hit they knew which ones were the small hardcore fringe most likely to commit crimes and they culled em out of the herd while allowing several hundred thousand (misguided fools in my humble opinion, but I respect their right to BE fools) protesters to peacefully assemble and petition their government for redress of their idiot grievences.
Bottom line people, the right to protest DOES not include the right to anarchy, terror and violence. A million or so of the diehard socialist/progressive/green side need to learn the difference, including it appears 75% of slashdot's readership.
Democrat delenda est
Everytime something like this happens I log on to the ACLU site and give them another hundred dollars. At this rate I am going to broke by next week.
Um, yes there is, if he's using it to gather intelligence on political activists for later persecution based on nothing more than political activities which are explicitly protected by the first amendment of the Constitution. You should acquaint yourself with the 20th century abuses of such "innocent" behavior (particularly 1960-1975) before making such silly comments.
Of course, this is only made worse by the fact that the officers were working well outside their jurisdictions when no actual crimes had been committed or were planned. It's one thing to follow a criminal enterprise where it leads, another to speculate that someone half a country away may someday think about doing something criminal and therefore should be infiltrated by an agency that has no right to be operating in that area in the first place.
That's pretty funny, considering it's been shown by countless official documents that pretty much everyone instigating riots and throwing stones during the period I mentioned above was a police officer or FBI agent whose job was to start violence as a way to discredit the protesters.
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
The real question is whether you'd be consider an "extremist" by Washington, Jefferson or Franklin.
Sheep cannot form a Democracy. That requires informed, active participation by its citizens.
The good citizens of New York City must be delighted to know that their tax dollars and police manpower went to safeguarding the Republican Party from protesters instead of, for example, finding Al Quaeda operatives.
Vote for Guiliani for president, he really knows how to respond to terrorist threats. Not!
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Hopefully you don't mean to conflate "people who planned to protest at the convention" with "destructive assholes". And that's the problem here: the police are treating people with dissenting political views as potential criminals. That's an unfortunate situation in a supposedly free society: at the very least, it certainly has a chilling effect on free speech. I've lived in a country where you had to worry about whether your neighbor or some of your college buddies were reporting on what you said to the government. That's a very effective tool for keeping a populace in line and suppressing dissent, or at least driving it underground. Paradoxically, though, the more you do that kind of thing, the more likely you are to have a huge blowup (figuratively and literally) in future.
Have you ever sat around with a group of friends who you know share your opinions, and bullshitted about how you'd like to kill someone, or see them killed, or blow up something to make a point, etc.? People say that sort of stuff all the time, even quite respectable people, especially when they're young. Now imagine there's an undercover cop in the room, and what's going to go in his report. Watch the movie "A Scanner Darkly" (or read the book) to get a bit of a feel for this, it's quite accurate in that respect. Pretty soon you've got federal agents chasing shadows, and SWAT raids on innocent people's houses. That hasn't happened all that much in the U.S. recently, yet, but the way things are going, it seems like just a matter of time. Perhaps every few generations, it's necessary to rediscover firsthand why the iron fist approach to governance doesn't work.
That all said, cops still have a job to do. But when conducting operations like this one, they need to be held to a high standard. Did you RTFA? Here's a quote:
The problem is that when you give people power over other people, abuse all too easily follows. We saw that in Abu Ghraib, and it's been demonstrated over and over in psychological experiments. When you turn someone into a spy, especially someone who isn't properly trained, it can be difficult for them to remember their real mission -- suddenly, finding anything out about anyone starts to seem important. (Some special prosecutors seem to have suffered from this effect, too.) So with operations like this, real care and oversight is needed.
Disclosure: I don't feel like registering, so I did not read the article. My comments are based completely on the summary. Feel free to correct me if the story indicates otherwise.
That said, what the NYPD did is (1) travel to cities around the world (2) to observe public meetings of groups of people (3) who were likely to be in NYC during the convention (4) and cause significant disruptions in business and city services (5) for an extended period of time.
This is not espionage, it is scouting. The NYPD did not obtain any secret information from these meetings. These were publicly open meetings intended to disseminate the information the NYPD was after to anyone in attendance. The NYPD took action that an average person could take if they were willing to spend a several thousand dollars.
This is no different than a basketball coach attending an opposing team's game or looking at their game film. This is no different, even, than a police man listening to two people talking in the middle of a busy street. It is settled law, in the US at least, that individuals or groups of individuals have no expectation of privacy in a public area.
The NYPD did not exercise any extra-jurisdictional control over these people or use any methods that would illegal under either US, New York, or Local Country law. All they did was attend public meetings without advertising their presence. There is no evidence here that NYPD was abusing its authority in observing these groups, that it infiltrated these groups to cause internal disruptions, or that its observation invaded the privacy of these groups. In short, the NYPD did nothing legally or morally wrong.
The sun beams down on a brand new day, No more welfare tax to pay, Unsightly slums gone up in flashing light...
Of course. The Amish are so industrious, not like those shiftless Mennonites...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
I don't believe that anyone in the far right would actually use that argument. It smells more like something you might hear from a standard issue Republican.
If I have seen further it is by stealing the Intellectual Property of giants.
Ok, I did not read the part about NYPD officers posing as sympathizers. That completely blows my argument up. I was under the impression that the officers were silent, uninvolved observers. There's nothing to look at here, carry on.
The sun beams down on a brand new day, No more welfare tax to pay, Unsightly slums gone up in flashing light...
weren't free?
How amusing, I'm being labeled a troll. What exactly am I trolling?
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Operation Gem Stone back in the 60's.
It was G. Gordon Liddy's pet project that eventually ended up with the Watergate scandal in the 70's.
Then in the 80's, you've got the theory that Reagan conspired to trade arms or other goods for the safety of hostages. Not to mention Grenada, Iran-Contra, Noriega, the Savings and Loan bailout scandals...
The 90's sees the start of the cover up of the Mark Foley scandal that blossomed in this decade, not to mention the incredibly wasteful witch hunt against President Clinton in both the Government and the rightwing media. David Brock wrote about it in "Blinded by the Right." James Carville also wrote a similar covering of the impeachment that resulted in "...And the Horse You Rode In On." Sure, it was written by Democrat zealot James Carville, but it's worth a read.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Um, yes there is, if he's using it to gather intelligence on political activists for later persecution based on nothing more than political activities which are explicitly protected by the first amendment of the Constitution. You should acquaint yourself with the 20th century abuses of such "innocent" behavior (particularly 1960-1975) before making such silly comments.
No; in that case it's the oppression that's illegal, not the information-gathering. It's not illegal for the police to compile dossiers on people, or send undercover officers to public meetings.
There's a key difference between compiling information on someone and then actually using that to oppress someone, or a group of someones.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Bush: Our enemies will never stop thinking of ways to harm our country and our people, and neither will we.
Janet Reno barbequed no one.
The fire started at the compound was the result of a standoff between a paramilitary organization and the ATF and FBI. Even if the FBI was at fault for starting that fire, it was the Branch Davidians who started the stand off. The funny thing about incidents like Ruby Ridge and Waco is that people forget that these standoffs occurred during the attempt to serve due-process to the people involved.
Yes, it was under the Clinton years that we get extraordinary rendition, and I didn't like him because of that. But it's under Bush's watch that it becomes a widely used tool.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
It's the tactics of the LAPD and NYPD that you want in Iraq, not the actual blue suits themselves. You're right about them being better trained to go after non-fixed targets, but we need to be honest and say that they're not equiped (or trained) to go after people that tend to be armed with assault rifles and explosives. They would be fairly drastically outgunned.
Relax I just want some peanuts.
The thing to remember is that all monies used by "the government" to pay for anything come from the public, having been extracted essentially at gunpoint by the IRS. (Don't think so? Try not paying taxes and see what happens.) So whether it costs a thousand bucks or eleventy-gazillion dollars is immaterial. It doesn't cost the people spending it anything, only us, so in general they're never going to care what it costs. What real difference would it make if there had been a line in the article that said "Bush had the Federal Reserve issue $100B in new notes to reimburse the city" ?
It's not an unreasonable question. It's just a distraction from the underlying issue, which is mechanisms by which small numbers of people can control all the rest.
(It will be an issue that will have to be addressed in the transition to a post-capitalist society, though. What people start to see that we're only ever giving or taking money from ourselves ("notes to self: 1. take $1,000,000,000,000 out of wallet to pay self for taking out garbage 2. take out garbage 3. put $1,000,000,000,000 in wallet as payment for taking out garbage"), we'll need to come up with other kinds of agreements on how to structure society.)
The reason there seems to be cooperation between groups who we're told are adversaries (in your question NYC and BushCo) is that they have far, far more in common than they have separating them. While one group of chicken farmers may believe free-range farming is best, and the other argues animal-abusive factory farming maximizes their ROI, it's still a discussion between gentlemen farmers - conducted over chicken dinner.
There's free as in speech, free as in beer, and free as in range. American citizens are of the last kind.
so they obviously don't have any criminals or terrorists to chase.
Now there's a good way to save some tax money.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
The problem here isn't necessarily what they were monitoring, but why they were monitioring it. As the article repeatedly states, one must have grounds for an inquiry (i.e. possible illegal activity, backed up by either compelling circumstantial evidence or hard empirical evidence) before conducting a covert inquiry. As an example: it would be perfectly legal, in most cases, to begin covert surveillance of a target if the object of the investigation could in some way be demonstrated to be a possible factor involved in illegal activty, such as someone here in TN buying extremely large amounts of, say, nyquil (can be used in making crytsal methamphetamine), so long as the amounts were truly beyond any conceivable norm (compelling circumstantial evidence). While this would by no means be enough for an arrest or conviction, a judge could be convinced to allow wiretapping, diversion of assets towards surveillance, etc. However, one bottle of nyquil would not be enough (one would hope) to get this kind of permission.
In the case reported in the article, the NYPD was effectively conducting surveillance of the one bottle of nyquil people. Simply being involved in a political protest group is by no means indicitive of illegal activity; however, the police apparently deployed assets to groups with apparently peacful intentions, with no cause to suspect illegal activity (one bottle of nyquil.) Now, if the police could show that Group A. had been responsible, say, for severe property damage at the WTO riots in Seatlle, that is compelling circumstantial evidence (did it before, might do it again) that could be used in obtaining permission for covert intelligence gathering (55 gallons of nyquil, so to speak). This does not seem to be the case here, however.
The reason that this distinction is so important is that power does tend to corrupt, not necessarily morally, as the old adage is often taken to be stating, but more often ethically. You're a cop: protect and serve, preserve the peace, and all that. By the very nature of your job, if you're dedicated to it, anyways, you are going to always be pushing as close to the edge as possible. But where exactly is that edge? Where society (in the form of government, an ethical government one would hope) places it. Only when these distinctions are upheld, only when this line is constantly reinforced and restated, does the concept of checks and balances truly work. In this case, the police have overstepped their authority, it seems. Conducting an investigation with no probable cause is no different than pulling random people off of the street and interrogating them for a crime that one has no reason to suspect they comitted. Case in point: guys, how would you feel if everytime a woman was raped in your town, every male was wiretapped, followed, and snooped on? You might say that such a thing would be different, but it's not. After all, you have a penis (these people were involved in protest groups), and almost all women are raped by men (these groups are similar in form to groups that have created disruptions in the past), so all men should be surveilled equally (RTFA).
The argument can go on and on: it is logically sound. However, the thing that is most compelling to me in this instance is it reminds me of the FBI during the Cold War, expecially during the Mcarthy era, and the Vietnam war. Do we not find it disturbing that people like MLK Jr., John Lennon, and the vast majority of the faculties of NE colleges were under surveillance, that dossiers were compiled on their potential "socialist," or "Communist," leanings, due to no more evidence than that they "fit the profile,"? Same thing here. Such policies were the product of Hoover and his protegees at the FBI, which nowadays are
Mod Points: Helping you keep your opinion to yourself.
Those who prefer Unreal?
Any of you Republicans-Is-Evil people remember the '68 DEMOCRAT convention? Thought not, it might open your eyes that both sides are just as bad, meanwhile the Mass Publis wastes it's time blaming each other's chosen party.
When Frosty Piss submits an article and it gets accepted, what else can you call it?
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
That's interesting, you should let the Supreme Court know ASAP. Even back in the 50s they recognized that gathering information could itself have a chilling effect on free speech, hence their overturning the requirement that the NAACP hand membership lists to the government. There is actually a SC-recognized right to anonymity, to a certain degree, when it comes to political protest.
Of course, in the state of California, this isn't even a question, the right to privacy is explicit in the constitution and information gathering on political groups by law enforcement without reason to believe they are engaged in illegal activity is, in fact, prohibited. Somehow I doubt the NYPD officers were required to get a degree in California criminal justice before they bought their plane tickets.
Fishing expeditions against people you dislike is not only a lousy use of police resources, they are in fact quite contrary to both policy and law in many parts of the country (including NYC, which is part of why this case is so interesting -- the NYPD seems to be blatantly violating one of the most famous court-imposed intelligence-gathering restrictions in the entire United States -- imposed due entirely to the NYPD's vast PRIOR abuse of such operations to violate the civil rights of activists!).
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
"In hundreds of reports stamped "N.Y.P.D. Secret," the Intelligence Division chronicled the views and plans of people who had no apparent intention of breaking the law, the records show."
It should be comming out of your pocket, no one else should pay for this stupidity.
50% of you voted for this. Don't tell me you're shocked now that they're doing exactly what they told you they would. Youre' allowed to be outraged that the vote you sold your souls for is now being used against you. But you're not allowed to whine that it's being used against someone.
to 1972 , Sherman.
What?
As it stands, the police are only allowed to actively investigate[1] an individual if they have at least a reasonable suspicion that the person has been, is, or is about to be, engaged in criminal activity based on specific and articulable facts and inferences.
This is the standard put into play by the PATRIOT Act, and is a much lower standard than what we used to have. "Merely" collecting information can certainly be illegal.
In any event, "public" meetings can also be private. We still have the right to assemble with whoever we want. That right includes excluding people with whom we don't want to assemble. And that can certainly include the police, unless they have a warrant to collect specific evidence (in which case undercover agents are merely distasteful).
[1] As opposed to passively investigating an individual, say, by collecting an archive of letters to the editor, and other public statements.
After all, I am strangely colored.
Where do you work at where doing the minimum that is expected of you gets reported on the nightly news? And yes you DO hear about good police action ALL time, whenever a suspect of a crime is caught and arrested.
Thinking in context. Most young people agree that the government is a failure, so most likely the hawks are going to be like you - unjustifiably condescending, poor with logic, and perhaps unlike you, at least aware of these two well-documented scandals which are hard for pro-government types to deny.
My other favorite thing is experiencing a laughable attempt at character assassination during the course of an argument. Oh Noam, you old guy! Let me call you a name without referencing any fact or ideology to which I can provide an intriguing counter-example! My reputation as a slashdot reader will certainly provide some credit to my unbeatable intellect!
Of course, I know your petty little mean streak is the only thing you can hold on to with any clarity. Please continue, and leave the thinking to the rest of us. (And if you are trolling, good job - and please, continue trolling slashdot and leave the thinking to the rest of us).
I fear people like you the most of all: those who actual believe these things.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
I suspect that you are correct, that it is not illegal for
the police to compile information on people. I dont think
it is a good use of tax dollars to do so when it becomes
clear that there is no criminal intent. Also, not being
illegal does mean that all is well and "good".
emt 377 emt 4
Actually, I would like to know what sort of counseling was made available to the NYPD Officers after wading through the indymedia feverswamps.
Don't trust anyone under thirty.
We have traced the call.. It is coming from inside your house!!
Oh, do you have any lube?
I'd like to meet one of these fellows. Or maybe it's a case of the report writer writing with a flourish.
Police around the world use intimidation to discourage people from attending protests. The article states that the intelligence reports "chronicled the views and plans of people who had no apparent intention of breaking the law". They must have known this would come out at some point. Having your name end up on police files for no good reason is precisely the sort of thing that scares many people away from protesting in the first place. One common tactic in the UK is for police forward intelligence units to photograph protesters, making them feel like criminals. This going on all the time.
Now, people may say that what the police did is ok and legal because the meetings were all public, but think about it for a moment. In democratic countries we are supposed to have the right to protest and the purpose of protesting is to make a big noise, attract media attention and make governments change their minds about things. If everyone is arrested on route because the police knew exactly what train people were going to use, no big noise is made at all. That is an affront to our right to protest. The police are not there to protect governments or political parties from embarrassment. That is a complete misuse of the police force, yet it happens routinely. The easier it is for the police to stop people protesting, the worse it is for our democracies.
In the UK we now have the wonderful protest exclusion zone for a kilometer or so around parliament. Although you can apply for permission to protest, any effective protest is now impossible since the police dictate how many people you can have, how many signs you can have etc. It's not so much the protests themselves that the government fears, but rather the media attention that a protest draws. A protest outside parliament is much more attractive to the media than one in some random field, and the government knows this full well. It seems that the police are also briefed to avoid drawing media attention to protests. You will find that when celebrities attend protests, the police tend to keep their distance since their intervention could only result in more media attention.
We are the fire that lights our world.. and we are the fire that consumes it.
Huh? did you even read the article?
How is it more damaging to a democratic society to spy on disruptor's as apposed to people illegally rearranging information systems, defacing websites, disabling charter buses, and all this to interfere with a convention designed as part of the democratic process itself?
You may not agree with the republicans and that your right, But don't hypocritically claim to be protecting the freedoms and actions of a democratic society when the intent of the protesters in question is to hamper and ruin the democratic process for a minority they don't agree with.
And judging by your tone here, I would hope Washington was able to do something to stop people from interfering with the American political process regardless of who's side they are on. Of course this is mostly a one sided issue because Conservatives don't act out as criminal on the political process. They have freaks who bomb in the name of saving lives. Two separate context but i would expect the government to do something about that too.
"Gentlemen, get the thing straight once and for all -- the policeman isn't there to create disorder, the policeman is there to preserve disorder."
-Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley.
Sadly, I'd guess that the farmers in this metaphor do indeed consider each other gentlemen. After all, even the worst atrocities in history were carried out by people who believed themselves reasonable men. (And foxes don't usually imagine they own the henhouse.) So I think the metaphoric equivalent of foxes would be criminals - they prey on the chickens, and the farmer hunts them because they eat into ( :-> ) the farmer's profits, but for all the threat to the chickens they pose no threat to the farmer or the farm.
I'd also say the farmers feel that way because I can feel the part of me that would feel that way were I in their position. And I don't reject it - I just don't let it be the one in charge.
"The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."
They never will. It isn't about freedom of speech or fiscal responsibility or whatever, it's about which guys can control the ridiculously large mass of people who go by the name of the "General Public". Reality exists, but it's drowning in wave after wave of newspapers, propaganda, TV stations, etc, etc.. etc...
Literature is good, it helps the spread of knowledge and information and other things that are important to the well-being of most people, but mass-media, by nature, is a force to help minorities - the rich, the anarchists, CEOs, and so forth. It's been the same social dynamics for the last 150 years, if not 300 years, the public is just less militant now.
I'm not a liberal, nor a right-wing conservative, I consider such camps as manufactured. I just think that most people should do what's in the honest well-being of others. Of course, most people barely know how to keep themselves alive anymore, let alone help keep other people alive or help to feed others or give them some help throughout their daily work. Is this too much to ask?
So when the NYPD catches Bin Laden, they'll sodomize him with a baton? And then give him to the LAPs who beat up Rodney King? Hmmm...I'm beginning to like your idea.
Great. Spying and torture. Someone tell me what we are doing in Iraq again? Like Robin William said before it stopped being funny, "We gave them our constitution. We were not using it anyway."
How is a party that "keeps tabs" and jails potential protesters any better than the Bathists or Iranian Revolutionary Guard?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
No, we are all potential criminals. When you spy on, lie to and jail people, you are treating them as criminals.
The problem is preemptive justice. "Disrupting" your fellow citizens before they do anything is bullshit. When you give government to jail and torture you without evidence, trial or chance to defend yourself, you have not made yourself more secure, you have created a government that's a dangerous and frightening as any other terrorist organization.
I did not like hearing about domestic spying in the first place. The massive abuse shown here is worse than I expected.
Mark this down, all you big brother assholes, I'm voting you out next election. I have voted republican since Ronald Reagan told me he thought that small business were America's largest employer, best innovators and most deserving of encouragement. I liked the party that fought and out competed the Soviet Union. What I see now is a bunch of whores who get along with big business as they do with Communist China. The party who's diplomats were just stomping around Nato saying, "The West is an outdated concept," has lost more than one kind of compass. No, I'm voting for anyone but you.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Major political milestone today: a Republican senator said that impeaching Bush "might be an option".
This is starting to look like the last months of the Nixon presidency. Gonzales is on the way out, with more disclosures coming every few days. Even the Republicans want him out. Bush is trying frantically to keep Karl Rove from testifying under oath. Cheney's old chief of staff was convicted of perjury last week. Bush's approval rating is down to 30-34%, depending on the poll. Cheney is somewhere around 18%.
It's like 1973 all over again.
If you have to wait that long for the twenty seconds to pass so Slashdot will let you post, it means your comment is useless.
One thing I thought was promising in the NYT article is that there are laws in place which protect political organizations from this sort of spying. So we don't have to rely solely on voting to stop this kind of activity.
Good point, but that was just a point to say that to deny that there have been right-winger conspiracy theories is kind of wrong. But like i've posted earlier on this topic, it tends to be the SAME people. They just happen to be Republican a vast majority of the time.
Dick Cheney, Reagan, Bush Sr., Richard Armitage, G. Gordon Liddy, Donald Rumsfeld, etc.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Well, no. Money spent won't always be for good. However, the '06 election proves that the electorate can stand up, speak out and hold people in office accountable.
But my point was that a powerful Government isn't always a bad thing. Bad things happened under Clinton. Elian Gonzales, Rendition, DMCA, NAFTA, GATT, ESRB(not a Government program, but formed out of pressure from folks like Tipper Gore and Hillary Clinton), etc. But that's not to say that there wasn't anything good done. Competent leadership in key areas like FEMA meant that Government programs meant to help people, actually helped people. Federal grants and other support meant that crime was on a drop. Was it perfect? No. Was it PROGRESS? Yes. As Stuart Smalley would say, "Progress, not perfection."
Skepticism towards a Government is a fine thing, but you're talking about all out cynicism, which is really unhealthy to the whole process. It's why we've had several decades of just god awful leadership in the House and Senate. I mean, as much as I like alot of the Republicans and Democrats, very few of them are willing to lead and be bold. Granted, I think I saw more spine and backbone from the various random acts of humanity that Harry Reid had in the last few years before he became Senate Majority leader than out of say, Bill "Diagnosis Cam" Frist or Trent Lott, but that's probably due to my own biases.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Wish I had mod points, cause I don't think anyone read past that first funny line!
This point about representation being ineffective (or dominated by media) when you have a ratio of citizens to representatives of 6 million to 1 is extremely important.
Is part of the problem for the USA that it has effectively outgrown it's old boots? The states were formed when the population of the US was a tiny fraction of what it is today.
Democracy works best when it's personal and local.
NPR is not socialist.
CNN is not socialist.
BBC is not Socialist.
Fox Noise Channel is not socialist.
MSNBC is not socialist.
Keith Olbermann is (probably) not a socialist.
The only person in the mainstream media who HAS admitted to being a socialist is Lewis Black. He's on COMEDY CENTRAL for god's sake.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Don't feed the trolls. Don't feed the trolls. Don't feed the... ah, crap.
The current controversy is because firing US Attorneys en masse in the middle of a President's term is unprecedented. Lots of presidents appoint new attorneys when they take office. If you think Clinton is getting a free pass, here's a brain twister for you: Bush did the same thing when he took office, and nobody said a thing about it. If it's really "it's okay if Clinton does it, but not Bush!" then why didn't anyone complain then? Maybe because what's happening now isn't the same thing?
I don't know. What exactly *is* a democracy? For me at least, a democracy is not just defined by the existance of laws, regulations, procedures etc. that are normally associated with democratic states (i.e., free speech, right to vote, presumption of innocence and so on) but also by the actual reality of the political system. That's why some states are not democracies even though they hold sham elections (like the GDR did, or Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and so on).
When your rights still exist on paper but aren't worth anything in reality anymore, you don't live in a democracy anymore, and therefore, spying (on innocent people for no other reason than the fact that they are not in favour of the current government, no less!) is, at the very least, dangerous for democracy.
I certainly agree with the rest of your comment, though.
butter the donkey
You hit the nail on the head. I recently had a discussion an individual who turned out to, well, rather like Bush a heck of a lot. It went about like so:
me: so, what about this latest scand -
neoncon (interrupting): la la la la I see nothing important about the destruction of DOJ impartiality la la la
me: wtf? Now every aspect of every facet of every prosecution carried out by the DOJ is suspect. You don't think that matters?
neocon: la la la this latest scandal isn't happening lalala I can't here you la la la la
me: *starts to walk away*
neocon: la la la la
LA LA LA LA
CLINTON DID IT LA LA LA LA LA LA WHAT'S THAT, CLINTON DID IT? LA LA LA LA LA CAN'T HEAR YOU CLINTON DID IT! LA LA LA LA LA LA LA
(For those of you who don't live in America, yes. Yes. This absurd Clinton shit really is the latest prefab Republican talking point & the best they have to offer.)
Anyone smell something here or am i mistaken ?
Read radical news here
So they took money from New Yorkers (upstate, too?) to overprotect one of the political parties. The only good thing I see here is that I didn't pay for it. At least, directly.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Someone please tell me were the issue is?
Very simple, the police have no authority whatsoever to secretely spy on lawful political activity. That means, unless they have some indication of unlawful activity on the part of the individual or organization they are NOT ALLOWED TO DO THAT. Do you get it now?
(of course, i do realize it is very easy for the police to pull some kind of fantasy suspicion out of their collective ass and take it from there)
So my issue here with you is this. You don't seem to like activists who plan to rally against the Republican Party. So logically, you think all kind of police activity against these people is fine. And you probably don't think of yourself as someone who's against democracy. So, you simply proclaim these people to be criminals. Well, that is not impressive, at all. So, how about some argumentation, next time?
It's more than that.
l /dp/1583227563/
There is no argument that USAs serve "At the pleasure of The President".
*IF* George Bush had simply asked them to resign, there would be no scandal.
*BUT* George Bush chose to lie about the reasons they were asked to leave, defaming those USAs who in fact had very highly rated performance reviews.
Pay attention to this simple fact:
It's not the action, it's the cover-up.
And the kicker here? NO COVER UP WAS NEEDED. They just did the cover-up move out of habit.
And then Gonzales lied to Congress. And it all fell apart.
Hmmm.. Why is it important for all the USAs to be "Loyal Bushies" to use the criteria Alberto Gonzales office was using according to their emails?
It's the simple fact that the entire administration is vulnerable to charges for violating 18 USC 371.
Let me excerpt a bit of Elizabeth de la Vega's book, from the Model Indictment she drew up. ( She's an ex-United States Attorney, btw. )
From USA v. Bush. http://www.amazon.com/United-States-George-Bush-a
11. Pursuant to the Constitution, their oaths of office, their status as Executive Branch employees, and their presence in the United States, BUSH, CHENEY, RICE, RUMSFELD, and POWELL, and their subordinates and employees, are required to obey Title 18, United States Code, Section 371, which prohibits conspiracies to defraud the United States.
12. As used in Section 371, the term "to defraud the United States" means "to interfere with or obstruct one of its lawful government functions by deceit, craft, trickery, or at least by means that are dishonest." The term also means to "impair, obstruct, or defeat the lawful function of any department of government" by the use of "false or fraudulent pretenses or representations."
13. A "false" or "fraudulent" representation is one that is: (a) made with knowledge that it is untrue; (b) a half-truth; (c) made without a reasonable basis or with reckless indifference as to whether it is, in fact, true or false; or (d) literally true, but intentionally presented in a manner reasonably calculated to deceive a person of ordinary prudence and intelligence. The knowing concealment or omission of information that a reasonable person would consider important in deciding an issue also constitutes fraud.
14. Congress is a "department of the United States" within the meaning of Section 371. In addition, hearings regarding funding for military action and authorization to use military force are "lawful functions" of Congress.
15. Accordingly, the presentation of information to Congress and the general public through deceit, craft, trickery, dishonest means, and fraudulent representations, including lies, half-truths, material omissions, and statements made with reckless indifference to their truth or falsity, while knowing and intending that such fraudulent representations would influence Congress' decisions regarding authorization to use military force and funding for military action, constitutes interfering with, obstructing, impairing, and defeating a lawful government function of a department of the United States within the meaning of Section 371.
It looks like it would take a SINGLE United States Attorney with the guts to do their job, as per their oath, and the ENTIRE administration would be perp-walked at the same time.
Explains why Bush will ultimately give away whatever he's asked. That's a hella big club to hold over his head.
Technology -- No Place For Wimps! Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia Chatroom -- http://www.wemissjerry.org
One of the consequences of a command economy is that those with political power control things like the banks. China's elite has been forcing the banks to lend huge amounts of money to failing state-owned enterprises, which can never repay these loans. The purpose is to buy off the employees of these enterprises and keep them pacified rather than threatening the elite.
The financial consequence is that the banks have huge portfolios of non-performing loans. The only thing keeping them solvent is the net flow of savings into the system. If a recession interrupts that flow, the whole house of cards comes down.
Sustainability and energy independence essay
"If it's really "it's okay if Clinton does it, but not Bush!" then why didn't anyone complain then? Maybe because what's happening now isn't the same thing?"
Not to take sides, but this logic is... iffy. If it wasn't wrong then, then it wasn't wrong then. Why would anyone complain about something that wasn't wrong then?
As to whether Bush did the same thing, or something different and less acceptable, I have to say it was different, but I have no real idea if it was wrong because I don't particularly trust the news sources that seem to be covering it.
I have no problem with what the Police Department did. For those who bothered to read the article, you will notice that many of the groups did indeed conspire to conduct unlawful activity or find ways to breach security for whatever purposes. Other groups planted hoax bombs, disrupting traffic, and other non-peaceful activities. I am 100% for the right of peaceable assembly and peaceful protest. I am also 100% for the safety and security of those who are being protested against. If this means that groups which are open to the public end up with a couple of interested parties gathering information to facilitate the latter - then so be it. There is no 'right' to 'privacy' when you open up your membership to anyone. I am also quite certain that the same sort of activity took place at the DNC in 2004. I also support that as well. Freedom of speech doesn't give you the absolute unhindered right to express yourself by bringing harm to others - or endangering others.
"To work for libertarianism -- to oppose the growth of government and aid the liberation of the individual -- used to be
Time spent on investigation is "good police work" if it's investigating something illegal. In your own jurisdiction. If you think there's something going on outside of your own jurisdiction, contact the proper authorities.
(IANAL)
It seems as though you are confusing the term "unprecedented" with "illegal". I suggest you open up a dictionary to figure our that those terms are not remotely synonymous.
Ah, we have a winner.
So tell me again how Clinton did it?
First, numerous federal statutes were indeed broken including Criminal Interference with an Ongoing Investigation, Obstruction of Justice, Witness tampering, etc.
It was also unconstitutional and an impeachable offsense.
For reference, please read the US Constitution --- for historical reference, please see the Proceedings of the House of Representatives (concerning creation of government), June 17, 1789, and James Madison's declaration of it as an impeachable offense.
It is not that there have been impeachable offenses committed by the Bush administration people, it is that most salient fact that everything they have done to date falss into the category of impeachable offenses.....
Bikes Against Bush Creator Busted
Funny, haven't yet seen the Slashdot story mentioned in this current thread. There's probably a few commenters here who commented then (quickly checks that I didn't).
It sounds like the police, having compiled the 4 page dossier on him, were planning to arrest him as soon as he got to NYC. And they did, because being 'capable of spraying anti-R.N.C.-type messages' is dreadful.
It took months and several thousand dollars to get the case dismissed, a year to get his computer and phone back, and they "lost" his bicycle.
I am an individual that likes President Bush a heck of a lot. Based on my experience interacting with people that share your political views, I'm guessing the discussion went more like this:
hxnwix: I can't believe how much of a criminal that Nazi Shrub is!
neocon: What law did he break?
hxnwix: (interrupting) WHAT LAW HASN'T HE BROKEN? THE EVIL MORON LIAR CHIMP FIRED 8 ATTORNEYS!
neocon: He has the constitutional authority to staff political appointees as he sees fit. Why are we even talking about this?
hxnwix: THOSE WHO GIVE UP FREEDOM FOR SAFETY GET NEITHER! DON'T YOU SEE?
neocon: See what?
hxnwix: IT WAS A CONSPIRACY BY ROVE AND HALIBURTON! YOU ARE JUST BRAINWASHED TO NOT SEE THAT WE LIVE IN A POLICE STATE!
neocon: Huh?
hxnwix: BUSH LIED, PEOPLE DIED! DICK CHENEY!
neocon: Well, I'm glad that two people can still have a rational debate in this country.
hxnwix: NIGERIAN YELLOWCAKE! WMD! NO BLOOD FOR OIL! WTC BUILDING 7! SADDAM HATES AL QAEDA! *gurgle* *spit*
Why the fsck are city police allowed to have "Secret" documents anyway? In the city government I work for, *every* document or piece of writing is available for public viewing at anytime, including police documents. It looks to me like NYPD may be getting to big for its britches.
Although I see nothing wrong with your accusations against Bush, I do wonder why you feel the compelled to characterise his opponents in this manner.
Object to the substance, or lack thereof. For example, the Iraq war cassus belli proved to be fraudent.
The patriot act does indeed invade our privacy and does indeed impinge upon constitutional freedoms. Oh, and by the way, the USA firings are authorized by an obscure clause of PATRIOT act. You can add "protecting big tobbacco" to the list of unintended Patriot Act consequences. Don't dismiss the abuse of the PATRIOT act to damage the DOJ in order to protect big tobacco just because you don't like how it sounds.
Buddy, it sounds bad because it's criminal behavior. Grow up.
Er, I didn't mention it. You did. Anyway, I didn't think that I needed to spell this out so explicitly, but I guess I do, so here goes.
- Claiming that we justified the war because Iraq was trying to buy uranium in Africa is patently absurd. Here are the three major public speeches that were given right before the war explaining the reasons for it. You will notice that none of them even mention Iraq's attempts to procure uranium: 1, 2, 3.
- The conclusion that Iraq was trying to buy Uranium in Niger had nothing to do with the forgeries found in Italy. In fact, multiple sources had already confirmed Iraq's uranium efforts in Africa before the forgeries even existed (again, I refer you to the Butler report).
- Saddam's attempts to buy uranium in Africa are documented fact, confirmed by multiple sources including Joe Wilson himself. I don't know how you can claim that it has been "debunked".
I defy you to find any lie or untruth in Tony Blair's speech that I linked to (and that you so trivially dismissed).The point that just majestically soared over your head is this- we already compromise freedoms in exchange for safety in almost every aspect of our daily lives. To feign outrage and single out the PATRIOT act because it invades privacy and impinges on freedoms is disingenuous.That said, you do have some pretty extreme misunderstandings about what the PATRIOT act authorizes. Lets have a look at your claims:
- "they authorize the president to fire US Attorneys"- The President has been authorized to fire US Attorneys since 1789 when the position was created. 28 USC 541(c): US Attorneys are "subject to removal" by the President.
- "secretly arrest citizens" - Pure fiction. Just what section do you think authorizes this? The closest I can think of is section 412 that mandates the arrest and detainment of non-citizens that are engaging in terrorism, with an explicit right to petition for habeas corpus and continued judicial review (in other words, nothing like what you said).
- "secretly try them in a secret jail with secret evidence for secret crimes" - Again, this is pure fantasy. The PATRIOT act authorizes nothing like that. Not even close.
I don't know if it could be any more clear that you do not know what you are talking about. If you would like to clarify which section of the PATRIOT Act it is that you think authorizes this hyperbole, I will be all ears.Fascinating. You accuse me of lying, and the only "evidence" you have to support that is a quote that completely backs up what I had written. What gives? It is exactly as I said before: prior to the PATRIOT Act, when a US Attorney was fired, the interim appointee could serve up to 120 days without Senate confirmation. The PATRIOT Act removed that 120 limit. Considering it hasn't even been 120 days since the attorneys were fired, and that all of the internal memos that have been made public indicated that they intended on submitting the new appointees for regular Senate confirmation, this change is pretty irrelevant, don't you think?