“Secret database obtained by NBC News tracks ‘suspicious’ domestic groups”:
A year ago, at a Quaker Meeting House in Lake Worth, Fla., a small group of activists met to plan a protest of military recruiting at local high schools. What they didn’t know was that their meeting had come to the attention of the U.S. military.
A secret 400-page Defense Department document obtained by NBC News lists the Lake Worth meeting as a “threat†and one of more than 1,500 “suspicious incidents†across the country over a recent 10-month period.
“This peaceful, educationally oriented group being a threat is incredible,†says Evy Grachow, a member of the Florida group called The Truth Project.
[…]
The Defense Department document is the first inside look at how the U.S. military has stepped up intelligence collection inside this country since 9/11, which now includes the monitoring of peaceful anti-war and counter-military recruitment groups.
“I think Americans should be concerned that the military, in fact, has reached too far,†says NBC News military analyst Bill Arkin.
The Department of Defense declined repeated requests by NBC News for an interview. A spokesman said that all domestic intelligence information is “properly collected†and involves “protection of Defense Department installations, interests and personnel.†The military has always had a legitimate “force protection†mission inside the U.S. to protect its personnel and facilities from potential violence. But the Pentagon now collects domestic intelligence that goes beyond legitimate concerns about terrorism or protecting U.S. military installations, say critics.
The DOD database obtained by NBC News includes nearly four dozen anti-war meetings or protests, including some that have taken place far from any military installation, post or recruitment center. One “incident†included in the database is a large anti-war protest at Hollywood and Vine in Los Angeles last March that included effigies of President Bush and anti-war protest banners. Another incident mentions a planned protest against military recruiters last December in Boston and a planned protest last April at McDonald’s National Salute to America’s Heroes  a military air and sea show in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
The Fort Lauderdale protest was deemed not to be a credible threat and a column in the database concludes: “US group exercising constitutional rights.†Two-hundred and forty-three other incidents in the database were discounted because they had no connection to the Department of Defense  yet they all remained in the database.
The DOD has strict guidelines (.PDF link), adopted in December 1982, that limit the extent to which they can collect and retain information on U.S. citizens.
Still, the DOD database includes at least 20 references to U.S. citizens or U.S. persons. Other documents obtained by NBC News show that the Defense Department is clearly increasing its domestic monitoring activities. One DOD briefing document stamped “secret†concludes: “[W]e have noted increased communication and encouragement between protest groups using the [I]nternet,†but no “significant connection†between incidents, such as “reoccurring instigators at protests†or “vehicle descriptions.â€Â
The increased monitoring disturbs some military observers.
[…] “Somebody needs to be monitoring to make sure they are just not going crazy and reporting things on U.S. citizens without any kind of reasoning or rationale,†says Lotz. “I demonstrated with Martin Luther King in 1963 in Washington,†he says, “and I certainly didn’t want anybody putting my name on any kind of list. I wasn’t any threat to the government,†he adds.
The military’s penchant for collecting domestic intelligence is disturbing  but familiar  to Christopher Pyle, a former Army intelligence officer.
“Some people never learn,†he says. During the Vietnam War, Pyle blew the whistle on the Defense Department for monitoring and infiltrating anti-war and civil rights protests when he published an article in the Washington Monthly in January 1970.
The public was outraged and a lengthy congressional investigation followed that revealed that the military had conducted investigations on at least 100,000 American citizens. Pyle got more than 100 military agents to testify that they had been ordered to spy on U.S. citizens  many of them anti-war protestors and civil rights advocates. In the wake of the investigations, Pyle helped Congress write a law placing new limits on military spying inside the U.S.
But Pyle, now a professor at Mt. Holyoke College in Massachusetts, says some of the information in the database suggests the military may be dangerously close to repeating its past mistakes.
“The documents tell me that military intelligence is back conducting investigations and maintaining records on civilian political activity. The military made promises that it would not do this again,†he says.
And there’s the gist of this story: for many Americans, domestic intelligence gathering, provided there are checks, is a necessity—particularly (and ironically) in a free country, where we keep our borders open, we don’t check people’s “papers,” and we value of all else of ability to move around freely. To protect this way of life against the current threats means safeguarding ourselves actively by targeting particular groups and individuals for a degree of internal scrutiny; we are at war with a group that wears no insignia and follows no military code, and so we cannot simply react to their movements after the fact—because after the fact generally means scooping up and bagging both their body parts, and the body parts of those who’ve they blown up in malls or on buses.
I recognize that in an intellectual ethos where deconstruction, irony, and “hypocrisy” is king, many will revel in the their abilities to deconstruct the military intelligence gathering effort to show that we’ve “become what we are defending against”—that in order to remain free we are taking away freedoms. This they will find ironic. And they will howl about the hypocrisy of it all.
But what is the alternative? Internment camps? Showy, “random” checks that will inconvenience the vast majority of US citizens and visitors we know have absolutely no ties to terrorism and mean us no harm whatsoever? From what I can gather, none of these people or groups n the database have been harassed. No one has been rounded-up and interrogated without cause. And so this seems to me to be a perfectly reasonable necessary evil in a time when we simply must be extra vigilant.
Jihadists have openly declared war on the US. They are known to infiltrate domestic organizations (universities, for instance), they blend in with the local population, and then they trike. It makes sense to act on what we know to be their patterns for recruitment and action, does it not? And to do so in the least obtrusive way possible? Will critics propose an alternative solution? Or have they simply decided that it is their job to act as watchdogs over our liberties—right up to the point where our liberties are taken away by ball bearings and nails from a suicide bomb being detonated outside of a Limited Express.
The real irony here, if you want the truth, is that NBC has “obtained” “secret” documents and has chosen to expose them. Luckily, there is very little here that will do any damage. But what is perfectly clear is that the legacy media is committed to the idea that the war we are fighting is “Vietnam 2: The Empire Strikes Back”—even trotting out counterculture heroes like Pyle from the Vietnam era to huff and wag fingers.
But this is not Vietnam. And revealing documents like these is not doing us any good. Instead, it weakens us, I fear. And worse—it shows that the press believes, as do many on the progressive left, that the ends justify the means, that printing classified information obtained illegally is in the best interests of the country because it blows the lid off the powerful.
Such a construct—press as hero and champion of the little man—has become, sadly, hackneyed, because we know that the protection of the average citizen has become far less important to the legacy media than embarrassing the Pentagon, the administration, and those who are trying to protect us while not forcing us to change our way of life.
The pro-Bush American Future disagrees with the program, writing:
Everyone who reads this blog knows that I’ve consistently supported the Bush administration’s Iraq policy. Tonight, however, I heard a profoundly disturbing report. NBC has obtained documents showing that the military has been collecting information on the identities and activities of anti-war protestors. While I strongly disagree with the protestors, it’s their right as American citizens to express, in a non-violent fashion, their disagreement with the administration’s policies. This is all-too reminiscent of the FBI’s activities during the Vietnam era. Then, at least, there was concern about Communist infiltration of the anti-war movement. No such excuse exists today. The military’s action is beyond the pale.
No such excuse?
Well, perhaps he’s right and I’m being too paranoid, but I’ve argued before that should the kind of terror campaign we see in Israel, say, ever come to the US, terror groups will likely try to recruit from within. Some of the places where they are likely to look would be, one presumes, prison converts, mosques, Islamic centers, and anti-war rallies and protests. It is there you find the true believers, and it from within those ranks that you are likely to try to recruit willing bombers.
Not only that, but we are also fighting a propaganda war, and it would be nice to know, as we evidently didn’t make clear enough during the Vietnam war, who exactly is funding some of these “anti-war” groups—some of which will prove to be legit, others of whom will no doubt be getting their financing from the enemy. Should we know if the Saudis are providing money to more than just Harvard, for instance?
The Bushies were excoriated for “not connecting the dots” before 911. But if critics had their way, there would be very few dots gathered for our intelligence services to connect.
Why I don’t generally refer to myself as a libertarian (preferring instead classical liberal) is that in civil libertarians I find a self-righteous streak that, in its ideological purity, borders on fanaticism. We live in a sovereign country, and we must protect in. We must do so while disrupting liberties in as few instances as is possible.
Again, I’m open to suggestions as to how we might do so in a way that is better suited toward protecting liberties than what we are seeing here. But at the same time, I am not so pure that I am willing to throw the baby out with the bathwater in order to make certain my tub is absolutely spotless.
****
Pajamas Media has a nice roundup of reaction here.
****
update: “Undercover marshals patrolling public areas and scanning crowds for suspicious people? The Pentagon spying on anti-war groups? Is this East Germany or the United States? It’s getting harder to tell each fucking day.”
Is it really? Or is that just what we’re conditioned to say when the press pushes our outrage buttons?
And honestly: if this is East Germany? I’d still rather be living here than next door to a Sbarros in Israel.
Long response writ short: apoplectic
I’m bloody apoplectic that these damned fools are hoisting the bloody Banner Of Plame, while continuing to spill the beans on classified information and operations.
Secondly, I’d bet dollars to donuts that the specific agency in question is the NSA doing signal intercepts. Sorry, kids, but that’s who does the signals intelligence.
Third, how the hell do you think you’re supposed to do data mining without, you know, actual, um da-fricking-ta. You know, that information stuff, used to generate um… intelligence?
Fourth, is it just me or is blindingly frikking obvious that the concern isn’t over what an individual group is doing, but trying to see who affiliates themselves with them. That they might be looking for the Achmed with the sunglasses and big bank roll who simply happens to show up at a lot of places.
I’m speechless. Fortunately, however, I can still type.
TW: The world has taken leave of its senses.
Short and to the point thought:
Anyone that can demonstrate that ACTUAL harm has come to them from this program, please step forward. I paraphrase Christopher Hitches quote: The anti-war left claims everything is fascism except actual fascism.
I would venture to say that no one has actually been harmed by the Pentagon’s Santa-style list making. However, the targets of investigation seem quite weak.
Or perhaps all left-wing peace activists would jump at the chance to join Al Qaeda? Why else would the Pentagon spy on Quakers, anti-recruitment groups and anti-war activists as opposed to potential terrorists.
I doubt NBC has obtained the database. I also doubt that their reporting reflects what might actually be in such a database.
If they had obtained the database, they would release it for us to scrutinize, so that we could compare what they report to what is actually in the database.
CBS did that with the forged documents. NBC will not release this database, however, because they don’t really possess it.
Of course, if they release the database, we might even be able to write a new story – about the classified intelligence leakers who work for NBC at the Pentagon.
Excuse me, but if there are
anti-war, peaceblame America protests are PUBLIC, why the knotted knickers over passive observation?I really like how all the radical and anti-Semitic nutjobs at places like the Hollywood “protest” are whitewashed as it if were the Rose Parade. The type of language, signs, chants were just this side of open aggitation to violence.
When people parade with signs that say “We support the troops when they shoot their officers”, to deliberately IGNORE and not check out where rhetoric ends and true threats begin is unconscionable.
i’m sick of people and their so-called “right” to privacy!
the government can and SHOULD keep notes on anyone and EVERYONE who has the slightest difference with the current administration.
and what’s your problem with having travel authorization papers? i don’t think anyone could argue that they wouldn’t make us safer. if we know where everyone is going to be, it’d be a lot harder to plan more terror attacks inside our borders.. which should be a lot harder to get out of by the way.
shouldnt we be scrutinizing those trying to LEAVE the U.S. as much as those trying to get in? what are they in such a hurry to leave for anyways?
I personally don’t think that there is any wrong doing. To gather info on theses groups is just simply keeping an eye on what individuals keep coming up on radar and to investigate said individuals to find out any evidence of terrorists activities or affliations. What does happen when they do strike? Well first the left will blame the administration for the lack of info that should have been gathered on the Jihadis. Catch 22 if yo ask me……..
Jeff,
I’m in complete agreement with you that terror groups will likely try to recruit from within. It is for precisely this reason that I strongly favor discovering the identities and monitoring the activities of the recruiters.
Yes, there will be recruiters at anti-war rallies. But the overwhelming majority of the people at the rallies aren’t going to be persuaded to become terrorists. Should someone be entered into a government database because a camera captures a known recruiter talking to him? In all likelihood, he probably told the recruiter to go to hell.
What I fear is guilt by accidental, random association. What I favor is a doubling and then a redoubling of our penetration of organizations that endanger our country and provide the recruiters. We know the names of these organizations.
Perhaps I can further clarify my position with an admittedly less-than-perfect analogy. In the war on drugs, it’s more productive to go after the pushers (the recruiters) than the users (the anti-war protest attendees).
but marc.. the war on drugs is an indisputable failure.
It is idiotic to claim an expectation of privacy for a public meeting or to demand that the government close eyes to a potential threat. There is nothing wrong with taking notes of public occurances and using that information for any legal purpose.
Fire Departments are allowed to sniff for smoke.
So everyone is allowed to peaceably assemble and speak freely, except the people protecting our right to peaceably assemble and speak freely aren’t allowed to peaceably assemble with us and take notes.
Call me when they start breaking up meetings with attack dogs and riot clubs, until then get a fucking life already.
Personally, I would like to see who is on the list, and hear what they’re being checked for. If it’s a witch hunt that will be easy to see. If it’s not that will be apparent too. Perhaps NBC could help me out and release the list, if they have it. If they don’t then maybe the story isn’t quite as well developed (and sourced?) as it should be before it was run nation wide.
i’m with B Moe on this.. call me too.
also call me when they start infiltrating these meetings using assumed names…
oh wait. that already began.
Yeah, rev quitter, as this administration has shown–it stifles dissent at the point of a gun. Just ask Michael Moore or Al Franken how their assets were seized and their every move watched.
That was sarcasm.
On the other hand, Zarqawi and his gang WOULD like to recruit some eager young minds to cut your head off.
I question the documents.
Marc —
I’m sure that’s being done. But as Bravo points out above, a lot of what is being done is likely a way to datamine—the fruits from which might find patterns of attendance, etc., and help locate potential recruiters.
And re: you war on drugs analogy (I’m not a fan of that “war,” for the record)—sure, we concentrate more on the pushers. But that doesn’t mean we don’t pay at least some attention to the users, particularly the ones who start hanging around the pushers a bit too much. Because you never know when they might start offering to do a little oral work for a fix.
Looks like a plague of Defeatists.
Nasty little critters, them quitters.
yes wishbone, they’re coming to get me so i better give up all my so-called rights. i’ve heard that song about a million times in the last five years.
that a threat exists is not in dispute. i guess i’m too hung up on actual freedom, not just using the word as often as possible.
my bad.
but seriously, what is yours.. or anyones, arguement AGAINST issuing travel papers inside the U.S. it would definitely provide an additional level of security.
Over at the blog “Journal of Doubt”, which was featured on this blog once (upper left hand side of the page, with a quote about Jeff) , the writer seems to think that the Islamicists are OVER THERE, but the Christian zealots are OVER HERE and are a “mortal threat”.
I know this doesn’t say much to address this thread, but what I’m concerned about is how the “progressives” in America are much more afraid of their own government and of enthusiastic Christians than anything within our borders that may align itself with Islamic terror.
It’s exaclty that sort of irony that flummoxes me. Those who believe themselves to be the height of enlightened progress can’t see too clearly when presented with the chance that their dissent may align with other forces that wish for our destruction.
Michael Moore’s F-9-11 film had a sequence involving a Quaker group which had been investigated. I can’t imagine that it’s very much fun to be contacted by the FBI if you’re stridently opposed to the way the federal government is operating currently. But also, if you’ve nothing to hide, then there might be less of a reason to be upset, outside the principal of what you feel constitutes privacy.
One last thing…an ex-girlfriend of mine rented an apt. in Brookline, MA. The landlord was Pakistani. Within a few weeks of 9-11, the landlord got a visit from the FBI and was questioned. Nothing came of that.
I’m with Wishbone on this one. Actual proof of harm…where’s it at?
And your rights have been taken away exactly how? Examples please. Fight the power! Put that tinfoil on tighter!
Nice straw man on travel docs. Sorry, I don’t play crazy.
Considering how many “anti-war” groups have links with hard core anti-American groups (International ANSWER, etc.) I damn well hope the government is keeping an eye on them.
This is nothing like Vietnam. As far as I am aware, the North Vietnamise never even considered attacks on the U.S. homeland. The jihadis have already killed 3,000 of our citizens.
That’s an attempt at parody, correct? Or are you seriously referring to the best guarantees of individual freedom in the history in the world as “so-called rights”?
No doubt about it.
http://www.zombietime.com/tookie/
What the consuming public should be asking is, “Who leaked the fuching docs”? Did anybody pick up this little tid bit:
Sounds to me like the DOD was doing what it was supposed to be doing. Check ‘em out. No threat. Not our business.
I’m confused, again. So the military has no right to investigate groups that plan to protest against the against the militaries very legal practise of recruiting at a public high school. So, in effect the military is free to know about groups that might choose to disrupt lawful military activity, or even harm members of the military, but they are not free to gather information that might result in the military doing anything about it? The explaination that the military gave for doing these investigations, force protection, seems perfectly reasonable to me, and probably to the JAG as well.
Look, any group demonstrating or agitating to remove recruiters from high schools is working against the interests of the military, but the military has said that they do not pose a threat, they were not jailed and interrogated, beaten or threatened. They were investigated by a group concerned with their own security, and rightly so.
this is more sky is falling horsecrap from people who are willing to believe the worst in anyone except the people who actually hate them.
Oh yeah, anyone who gave this list to the media should be prosecuted to the fullest extent.
damn the “whistle-blower laws”.
…said rev quitter to B Moe….
NBC should release the docs. Otherwise we’re having to take their word for what they represent. And frankly, I have a hard time believing any reporter when he starts babbling about super secret documents and confidential sources…especially when the sources are unimpeachable.
This could be nothing, could be something…we won’t know until we see the documents.
<style list making. </blockquote>
It doesn’t matter if anyone was harmed and it doesn’t matter if the meetings were in public or not. There are tons of laws in place on intelligence oversight that very strictly limit what and when anyone in the government can collect intellligence data on US persons. If NBC’s article is correct and the military is collecting on US persons then only one of two things can be the case here.
The first is that the Pentagon went through an enormously complicated and stringent approval process and received authorization for this mission from the Joint Chiefs-Attorney General level. If this is the case then the Pentagon had reasons to collect on somebody at that meeting that were pretty damn good. It also means that NBC has no more reason to get worked up about this than when the FBI wiretaps a suspect’s phone. One distintion that they miss is that it doesn’t matter what kind of group that is. They can collect on them during that meeting if they are there associating with an individual that is a target of their investigation.
The second possibility is that the article is right completely. If that’s the case then this went way beyond the limits of Intel Oversight and the careers of anyone involved in this are rightly toast.
Sean,
That’s the reason NBC should release all the documents.
Of course, if we’re talking about a legitimate investigation NBC will have blown it to Hell and back, but they all ready have. They did when they ran the story. If it’s not a legitimate investigation, well the chips will fall where they may. There’s no reason for them to sit on the documents, at all. Let us see them.
I agree. From the article it sounds to me like this stuff was collected in the course of investigating specific people. I’d be willing to bet that what they’re flipping out over is data that’s basically ‘Very Bad Man A went to protest, these people were there, nothing but citizens exercising right to protest’. Something like that is perfectly legal.
Provided they’re authorized to collect on Very Bad Man A.
If that’s the case we should know. There’s no reason NBC should sit on the documents and tell the rest of us how they should be interpeted. Release them.
I’ve been keeping an eye on my cross-the-street neighbors house while they’ve been gone to their lakehouse for the holidays. I’ve noticed that the maid continues to show up every Wednesday afternoon. She used to be our maid too, but my wife got tired of cleaning up the house enough that she wouldn’t be embarrassed to let the old slut come in and clean. And their lawn dude came by yesterday. He blew all the leaves out of their yard and into the street. I haven’t actually entered these observations into a data bank, per se, but I was thinking about reporting it to the local army recruiter just to see if he thought it was pertinenent. The maid is anglo and the lawn dude is hispanic, by the way.
Sticky, if that’s the sort of thing the documents reveal then for sure we aren’t getting our money’s worth out of the Intelligence folks on this. Maybe NBC can release the documents and we can find out?
When groups advocate treason—the levying of war against the US—I certainly hope the military’s gathering information on them. If, while gathering that information, the military determines there’s no threat, and makes note of that, where’s the harm?
Fer crissake, if the Southern Poverty Law Center can do it, why can’t the Pentagon?
IIRC, the Quaker groups have been known to attack nuclear submarines with hammers, and “peaceful protests” at recruiters have led to vandalism.
It makes perfect sense for the military to say “a groups is protesting at this base at this time, they say that it will be peaceful. but history suggests they will try to enter the base and support the troops by throwing blood on them.”
Then when they check out OK the work stops. I am VERY familiar with the rules of intelligence oversight, I also think that there is a lot less to this than NBC says.
Geez guys, I don’t really have any experience at defending myself against charges of being soft on Islamofascism. Before assigning me to the “progressive” camp, why not take a long hard look at my blog at http://americanfuture.net
I agree with the calls to release the database; I think it’s in the interest of the citizenry to be informed in total when a news organization is privy to this sort of information, regardless of whether I agree with the leaking of such info in the first place (re: BRD’s comment, I agree with the charge of hypocricy towards folks who variably applaud and damn the leaking of classified info, depending on whose agenda is being persued). If a news organization is working on behalf of the American people, how can they argue otherwise? Note that while they mention the DOD’s guidelines on domestic intelligence gathering, they do nothing to analyze whether this effort surpassed those limits–just that the alleged “increase” in monitoring concerns some critics. Hopefully someone from within NBC will leak the full database in a fit of irony.
I’m from Brookline, BTW–it’s a small upper-middle-class liberal suburby town right off of Boston, and right next to Newton, which IIRC was named the safest city in the US. (just some color/background)
Marc —
I’m not calling you soft on Islamofascism. I’m disagreeing with you here and arguing that your outrage is misplaced.
I think we all of us at times look for problems in the waging of the war on terror in order to show we are not Sean Hannity. I think the mainstream media—bent on refighting the fighting of Vietnam—has become masterful at shaping these stories to provoke outrage from those who prize liberty.
What they fail to do, however, is put these things into a the larger perspective—to offer the real counterarguments (as opposed to propping up strawmen to represent contrary views).
In short, I think the press dupes us into the outrage we’re always willing to show should we find the military or government stepping out of line.
Go ask John Cole, who’s swallowed to righteousness of the entire McCain anti-torture push.
QUAKEOPHOBE!!
We always look at this as a trade-off, like we ought to be willing to give the Feds a little slack so they can protect us. What’s more likely is that they cannot protect us and provided they were capable of protecting anybody it would be themselves. The argument that a military base needs protection against raging Quakers just doesn’t cut it for me.
I think it may be worth noting that there will be plenty of folks who will be utterly outraged at this story that, on the other hand, are ok with things such as gun registration for U.S. citizens.
I’m calling my new policy the “Ramada Inn Standard.†It’s an easy standard to apply: if it’s something the Ramada Inn wouldn’t do, it’s unacceptable. No sleep deprivation, no loud yelling, thermostat is on the wall, and if the detainee so requests, the sheets will be turned down.
http://www.ramada.com/Ramada/control/about
</blockquote>Dear Ramada® <s>Guest</s> detainee:
On behalf of the Ramada family, it is my pleasure to welcome you
and wish you an enjoyable and productive stay with us. Whether you are <s>traveling</s>
detained for business or pleasure, we sincerely appreciate your business.
At Ramada, we are committed to providing you with the highest
quality of <s>hotels and services</s> detainment, and we have never been more
intent on consistently providing comfort and value to each of your <s>accommodation</s>
prison experiences with us. We know that little things matter when you are <s>on
the road</s> imprisoned. That’s why Ramada employees are dedicated to providing
excellent <s>customer</s> prisoner service in a friendly atmosphere.</blockquote>
No matter how high the bar is set, someone is going to call it torture, or tantamount to torture, or approaching the line of torture, or nuzzling the labia of torture, or gently licking the aureolae of torture. So the hell with it.
The reality is, there is no other way the U.S. can avoid being labelled a torturer. John’s hypothetical 58 degree standard won’t be acceptable to someone else who thinks cells should be kept at at least 59 degrees. We’ll hear expert testimony that 58 degrees can kill people. That debate will never end. There will always be one side who says the other side is “pro-torture,†and another side that says the first side is a bunch of pansy-ass whiners who are going to lose the war.
So screw it. The only way that debate can ever end is to hold ourselves to a standard so high it’s impossible to criticize.
The “WWRD” (What would Ramada Do?) bumper stickers will be available shortly.
I’m calling my new policy the “Ramada Inn Standard.†It’s an easy standard to apply: if it’s something the Ramada Inn wouldn’t do, it’s unacceptable. No sleep deprivation, no loud yelling, thermostat is on the wall, and if the detainee so requests, the sheets will be turned down.
http://www.ramada.com/Ramada/control/about
No matter how high the bar is set, someone is going to call it torture, or tantamount to torture, or approaching the line of torture, or nuzzling the labia of torture, or gently licking the aureolae of torture. So the hell with it.
The reality is, there is no other way the U.S. can avoid being labelled a torturer. John’s hypothetical 58 degree standard won’t be acceptable to someone else who thinks cells should be kept at at least 59 degrees. We’ll hear expert testimony that 58 degrees can kill people. That debate will never end. There will always be one side who says the other side is “pro-torture,†and another side that says the first side is a bunch of pansy-ass whiners who are going to lose the war.
So screw it. The only way that debate can ever end is to hold ourselves to a standard so high it’s impossible to criticize.
The “WWRD†(What would Ramada Do?) bumper stickers will be available shortly
Spongeworthy, I don’t think you understand the danger posed by raging Quakers. Last year I saw three Quakers on horseback take out a Bradley fighting vehicle with manure-based pipe bombs. Or wait, maybe they were Amish…
Sticky B, sounds like your former maid is banging the lawn guy every Wednesday. If I were you I’d report them to Rumsfeld’s office immediately.
I can never quite tell if thedefeatists are conservative satirists poking fun at the left or simply retards. Or both. Retarded satire, perhaps?
What harm comes to him if he did, in fact, tell the recruiter to sodomize himself? None. What harm comes to us if, by handling these things with kid gloves, we miss a jihadi that we ought to have caught? I think we know that answer.
Well, Jeff, you have inadvertently stumbled across the truth in your update.
We are getting to be more like East Germany. Too many f***ing commies here, too.
Them sneaky bastards have these lists with almost everyone’s names – phone books.
Ask the left about the really intrusive list keeping, by the IRS, and they would see nothing wrong with it, at least not until their none profit corp was audited.
Longer Post (less apoplectic, more infuriated) now with Choice Quotes.
But first, a point – there are some 13 agencies throughout the government that do intelligence. Of these, domestic intelligence is the province of the FBI, ATF, and DEA. Of these organizations, none of them are well equipped for signals gathering. The NSA, however, is. And they reside in the… you guessed it – DoD. Moreover, when it comes to singals gathering, there is no real way to distinguish between domestic and international. Systems just really aren’t designed that way. So, no it’s not the “military”, so you can put down the slander-o-matic, and chill. So, onwards to the next point:
Maybe I’m all crazy-like but isn’t that what you’re supposed to be doing? It’s kind of like keeping your reciepts. IN this case, you can go back and say “Huh, guess we were wrong about this guy – we probably shouldn’t pester him anymore. So if this name comes up again, I can look at my records and establish that someone has already looked at this, and it’s not in our jurisdiction/relevant/whatever.”
<blockquote>Still, the DOD database includes at least 20 references to U.S. citizens or U.S. persons. Other documents obtained by NBC News show that the Defense Department is clearly increasing its domestic monitoring activities. One DOD briefing document stamped “secret†concludes: “[W]e have noted increased communication and encouragement between protest groups using the [I]nternet,†but no “significant connection†between incidents, such as “reoccurring instigators at protests†or “vehicle descriptions.â€Â</blockquote>
So, like, that quote reads to me at least like the end result was that Shifty Achmed With The Big Sunglasses doesn’t hang around too much at these things, so we needn’t worry, and go focus on other stuff. I mean this is a hell of an uproar over what essentially amounts to an organization saying “Hmm… I guess there’s nothing to see here. Move along, folks.”
On my last re-read, I don’t know what the actual accusation being made here really is.
Sorry for cocking up the tags.
BRD,
We’re all wrapped up in the GRAND C-O-N-S-P-I-R-A-C-Y.
Exactly what the plot is intended to accomplish depends on the day of the week/gasoline prices/phases of the moon/Cheney’s pacemaker setting/subliminal messages in King Kong’s roars/secret DoD records that indicate citizens are exercising their constitutional rights.
As B Moe said above, when the round up of Quakers begins, please wake me. Otherwise, try living in places where repression actually exists (I’d suggest Zimbabwe for the wildlife; Saudi Arabia for the diving; or Cal-Berekely for leftards in their natural habitat).
And I don’t think former residents of the German Democratic Republic would understand the comparison being made in the update. Even a little.
eh. me, a threat? to what, myself?
let’s be honest.
my appetite for porn is probably more dangerous than my propensity for violence. at least, in the eyes of the attorney general.
this politics stuff is boring.
Jeff don’t let your disillusion with the left turn into, well, an actual delusion. they’re relatively harmless. except when they vote. now that’s annoying.
and please ignore my pathetic defeatist brethren. they know they’re lame. they know they’re bad at what they do. and what you should be most proud of is your ability, and your standard commentor’s here abilities to completely get under their skins.
I send your links/posts their way because I know it pisses them off, to read what you write and what your commentors spew. but I know that’s one of the only way(s) to get them to interact in some sort of meaningful way (ha!) with the opposition, and that which they hate, will not tolerate, and abhore.
anything to challenge their intellect (ha!) and preconceived notions.
the only thing that scares me about the military is that they think they know what’s best for me. which kind of goes against one of my core beliefs, which is, don’t trust no motherfuckers. that and, I will determine what is and isn’t a threat to me and my own.
just don’t inconvenience me, ok? I have a life to live. all I’m saying.
uhh kyle,
we prefer “satirically challenged”, show a little compassion would you?
besides, we thought this whole site was satire. it is, isn’t it?
and mr. fun.. or should i say fredo.
you broke my heart. wanna go fishing?
This type of informaton gathering is a necessity; however the level of investigatory intrusivness needs to be clarified/qualified before a conclusive argument is made to the potential benefit or damage such practices (in our “post 9/11 world”) will produce.
Opponents of such forms of military intelligence gathering, and now NBC, are quick to imply, by using terms such as “disturbing” or “concerning” and quoting an ex-military surveillance officers’ warped view of history, that days of McCarthyism and COINTELPRO are lerking around the corner.
I wont be concerned until reports are uncovered that describe protestors as dissidents and use language such as expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and neutralize. Until then…
See there, “quitter”? Here I was being all nice and accomodating, and—like the liberal fucktard that you are—you had to go and interpret my graciousness as I sign I owe you even more leeway to malign my point of view.
You don’t like my site? Get the fuck off it. What, you think moronic, limp-wristed, defeatist, wanna-be intellectual ironist progressives are in short supply or something? The coffee shops are CRAWLING with them.
I have no problem booting your ass and finding me a pet progressive who won’t piss on the carpet. So watch yourself, “rev.”
ha! limpwristed. funny. oohh those homos! always good for a put-down.
no offense intdended, “jeff”
There was a case last year where neither local law enforcement nor the FBI were “allowed” to subpeonea members of a Catholic Workers Group or a Quaker group after sitting in on a public meeting on a public university campus.
Didn’t matter that these same people from these same groups protest weekly at state Guard headquarters, hand out flyers that call troops murderers at sendoffs and homecomings, that they regularly climb/cut the fence and access a military installation, (for which they’ve been arrested over and over) or that one moron told an officer that they planned to “take over” JFHQ armory.
But hey, it’s not any of the FBI’s business, local law enforcements business or the Guard’s business..they’re just peacful, law abiding citizens..and Government survellience is bad bad bad.
Limpwristed means effete. Why you make the jump to guys playing Brokeback Mountain is your own hangup, “prick.”
Seriously I thought this site was a humor blog. It’s listed in the “Best Humor Category” for 2005. I do like the oatmeal conversations.
Whee, how precious!
We’ve gotten invaded by the, “I sure do think I’m witty, because I’m a pseudo-intellectual dork who thinks irony is a form of argumentation.”
All said and done, I’d rather have PIATOR commenting than this pack to motards.
oh jeez.
back to your cage, Rev.
sorry we let him out. sometimes he escapes on his own, though.
he is a ”goat,” Jeff. take that into consideration.
and I’m a fucking robot. maybe we need the unshaven wearing organicfairtrade latte sipping marx book carrying hipster angryyoungman archetype. we prefer the mexican wrestlers, though. it almost always come down to taste, which we have little of. trust us, we suck.
Jeff, you do realize you rock. cheer up.
look on the bright side, you’re not us.
This summarizes what, in my mind, is the government’s challenge/dilemma in protecting us from terrorists: the people demand the government gather information with which to assess potential threats, but various sections thereof simultaneously protest when the government does try to gather intelligence.
Intelligence = information. “Gathering information on Americans” sounds much less threatening than “gathering intelligence on Americans,” but it’s one and the same thing.
I say: good going, gov. Keep it up. As long as it’s not intrusive. Of course, I don’t know how one can even argue that what the government is doing is illegal or immoral. What’s the difference between government agents and journalists writing notes about gatherings? Ought we to bar journalists from gatherings too?
well put fredo, welcome back to the family.
jeff, i may be effete, limpwristed, a prick, etc., but are a-ok. the “to do lists” and conversations with inanimate objects are funny as hell.
have a nice day.
Chill out Jeff and friends. I know I suck. So don’t be one of the nattering nabobs of negativism. And that’s coming from me, the ghost of Spiro T.
Ignore what I said before. I overlooked the force protection part of that article. The military can and does collect information on protests that occur near DoD facilities or in areas that their personnel frequent when they’re off duty. They do that so they can warn personnel away from areas that have a risk of violence.
It seems to me that NBC is failing to consider that off-duty military personnel frequently visit places that aren’t near military bases. The Hollywood & Vine example in the article is a crock because I’d imagine a pretty fair number of DoD personnel stationed in SoCal play tourist in that area. The DoD would have a damn good reason to check to see if the protests there ever got ugly.
I’m very doubtful that this is what NBC is trying to make if out to be. The Intelligence Oversight rules for the government are very strict and very specific on what you can and can’t collect on US persons. They were also put into place in 1981 because of the way the government overstepped in the Vietnam era so all those 60s references in the article are just plain silly.
Say I’m an Air Force captain with the 1111st Intel Group and it’s my job to watch protests around my base. Executive Order 12333 states how and when collection on US persons is allowed and gives congress oversight of intelligence activities. I also have a DoD regulation, a Dep of the Air Force regulation, a MajCom regulation, a Wing regulation, and a Group regulation telling me exactly how EO 12333 applies to me and exactly what it does and doesn’t allow me to do to accomplish my job. Anyone with access to classified material is briefed at least yearly on all of that and anyone collecting intelligence is briefed like crazy on it. I also know it’s folks like Teddy Keddedy and Hillary that have oversight of my activities and intelligence.
If I’m that captain and I break the rules on what I can and can’t collect then I have broken federal law by violating EO 12333. I have also broken the law several times under the UCMJ by violating the standing orders of the various regs. At a minimum I’m losing my security clearance for good and totally destroying my military career when I get caught. Anyone that is aware of my activities or my data that doesn’t report it has broken the same laws and faces the same consequences when they get caught. I can’t put into words how much I doubt that this database seriously crosses any lines.
The primary reason for the firewall between domestic and foreign intelligence is the fear that the connection between the left wing and the USSR, confirmed by Venona, would come out. This is less a concern now that the paychecks no longer come.
Two things occurred to me on the ride home:
o Does the oath taken by servicemen include a part about defending the Constitution against threats “both foreign and domestic”?
o How much hair-pulling and garment-rending did NBC do when it was discovered that the Clinton’s had illegally obtained hundreds of FBI background check files on political opponents? That those files had been handed to a hired political thug? That the proclaimed excuses about it all being an accident were as false as Anna Nicole Smith’s cleavage?
Because, really, if we’ve reached the point in the US that crimes by one political party are ignored while governance by the other party is described as criminal, we’re not going to have a republic for much longer.
Except those checks have been replaced by ones coming from the Chinese, the French, and the Saudis, so the concern remains.
Too bad all these little bastards didn’t feel this way back in the 50s and 60s, if we could’ve kept the damn FBI from infiltrating the Klan we wouldn’t be having alot of these problems today.
I’m calling my new policy the “Ramada Inn Standard.â€Â
I think it should be the “Ramadan” Inn Standard.
If you read the NBC report, the most inflamatory aspect is the headline, as usual. There’s no there, there.
What is there is the continuing effort to raise the spectre of Vietnam. Quotes for attribution by named persons mostly analogize a comparison to Vietnam. Unnamed sources are identified as military or government critics.
Other quotes for attribution are two members of the “Quaker” group called “The Truth Project” who, of course, claimed they weren’t doing anything illegal.
Now that’s a shocking statement for the record!!
There is a link to an 8-page summary that NBC developed at:
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/
DODAntiWarProtestDatabaseTracker.pdf
Sorry, if my link screws everything up. I put a return in the address after /news/ so be sure to take it out if you copy it.
Jeff, small beer, IMO.
So, protecting Larry Flynt’s rights under the auspices of Franklin’s free-speech principles has finally been overcome. Are we now enforcing privacy via the dual standards of sacred gay bedroom buggering and the constitutional sovereignty of the individual voter?
A little help here; just want to keep the scorecard updated…
When Larry Flynt starts hosting Jihad chapters, then whack him. Since the connection between advocacy and action has narrowed, and since the consequences of waiting until they pull the trigger is so heavy, Keep up the surveilance.
The Able Danger details have yet to be fully disclosed, but it sounds like the Able Danger project may have come close to spotting the 9-11 crew before they could launch their disastrous attack upon America.
The global war on terror is not being waged against a nation state defined by geographical boundaries. It is being waged against a horrifically deviant state of mind that recognizes no rules of civilized society, and instead concentrates on spectacular stealth attacks on innocent civilians at weddings, hospitals, malls, etc. We need good intelligence to find these murderous thugs as they hide in plain site among us. We need to to exploit the data gathering abilities we have as a means to track these scum and render them harmless.
Rather than worry that our government is acquiring data on us, I worry that they aren’t acquiring enough. I fear the intelligence phase of the war on terror will be compromised by utopians who think we can fight this war in a pristine environment wherein idealistic rules of engagement help the enemy and hold us back. You can see this happening right now as we agonize over rendition and aggressive interrogation techniques like waterboarding.
Does anyone remember the Clinton Admin’s Y2K Project Megiddo or his Presidential Directive 63?
tw: What goes around, comes around.
This is the second or third time I’ve run afoul of the rev. quitter and his buds.
Can someone please explain to me what the point is behind that roving gang of douchebags?
I’m being serious here. It’s not funny, and doesn’t really make anything that qualifies as logical argument. Paint huffers? Drunken high school chess geeks?
And Bill Arkin from NBC is an America-hating asspipe.
So? And if the db entry was immediately erased how the hell is anyone supposed to cross check with a similar report comes in?
A certain percentage of the police reports that cross my desk will never be filed. They’ll be rejected for any number of reasons, including insufficient evidence. We staple the turndown memo on the report and file it away. The initial case goes into our database…where it will stay, FOREVER (even if we destroy the physical reports after 3 years, except for those with certain charges). This is not as bad as the DoD database …how?
And, anecdote from about 1980. My [then] husband worked for Northrop, at the time involved very top-secret defense work—B1 stealth bomber. One of the things I remember about the FBI briefing (besides them telling us that Soviet satillites probably already had our car license plate and they Knew Who We Were) was that we were to promptly report to them any change of neighbors in our neighborhood, so they could be checked out.
Really, I’m surprised by the faux-rage at the ostensible loss of virginity concerning domestic intelligence and storage of information.
The Left and their fellow travelers in the MSM don’t like Bush. And they abhor that military rank and file DO like GW. Demonizing the military, from the troops to the Pentagon has increased just as their campaign of blatant lying grows ever more desparate.
Maybe it’s just me, but as a former Intel collector for the USAF and being up on 12333 and all, I really think you need to give a lot more weight to what SeanH is saying (and not just because I know where he works) and an awful lot less to NBC.
prarie biker,
This is just an extension of the requirement for more lawyers and politicians that’s being put more solidly in place with each passing day.
If you know WTF you’re talking about, you clearly have a conflict of interest and can’t be trusted to contribute. You are qualified to comment on intelligence matters only if you can absolutely prove that you have no intelligence whatever. By a curious coincidence…
Regards,
Ric
I love the irony
Anyway, if it were against the law, I think they would say so, instead of sitting aroung being “disturbed”.
Ah, looks like we were spying after all … think it had anything to do with the Patriot Act provisions getting shot down?
Uh, if you scroll up, you’ll see that several people here predicted that the MSNBC sorry was precisely about this kind of thing.
Which I posted on today. And which the administration defends, saying no laws were broken.
So, uh, what’s your point?
And which the administration defends, saying no laws were broken.
Oh, that’s the same administration that says they don’t torture … sorry, my bad.
Seriously, how could a comic genius like yourself lose to a lefty like Jesus’ General for funniest of all dudes in dudedom? How when you clearly are the master of comedy? How could you lose to a dork like that lefty loser in a Weblog Award competition conducted by Wizbang?
You never fail to amaze.
UP
Apology accepted.
Heretik— you forget to mention that he’s, like, five times funnier than me, too!
Who knows. Maybe I need a steady schtick. Too much nuance, not enough role playing and one-note comedy.
Lefties, after all, are such joiners. Maybe I can win some of them over if I let them address me as General.
Or, if that’s treading too close to somebody else’s stuff, Czar might work.
Like, I could be the Drug Czar. Heh. That’d be a hoot.
Jeff, you do have your moments. As we all should. The one note bit seems to be an blog song these days. And the one note brings the echo. Did somebody say echo?
I did, I did. I want you to come up with a one note thing. Maybe you could be the guy who could replace heh with something out there with more imagination. I prefer oy myself. You can take the boy (or is it the oy) out of New York, but you can’t take the New York out of the oy (or is it boy?). What I love about New York is even with all the different people and the conflicts, something beyond the shouting occasionally gets heard. Occasionally people warm up, the mask melts, and there is some honest communication.
I wonder, wonder sometimes if that is possible on these things called blogs. I have been reading your stuff and clearly you know your way around some of these great issues. At some point all Americans must face these issues together or we will look back with sadness.
But enough of that. I want more light and less heat.
And because I know you have your moments and I know you would love to satirize a satirist, maybe when April Fools Day comes around, you could give the General a dig with a goof blog called Corporal Punishment. Or something.
Lord knows we could all use a laugh. Laugh. It’s good for you. And for all of us. Oy.
that list is as useless as the absconder list I worked on. -useless.
sorry kids. the folks at homeland security are busy trying to keep their systems from crashing, and looking for other jobs at other agencies before they’re contracted out to private companies.
“limp-wristed”? “effete fucktard” this after you threatened (three times, so delighted you were with your own puerility) to smack kevin with your cock.
your “im so much more butch than you, but can i see your penis first just to make sure?” schtick has just gotta stop.
look, goldstein, it’s real simple. you need to pull out of john derbyshire, and the both of you kick open the closet door already.
it’s all right. it really is. the only thing that makes it ugly is the self-loathing.
What’s the matter—can’t use the shift key with you cock in your fist?
Fuck off. If I was interested in your opinion I’d visit your site. And if Kevin doesn’t want his ears boxed by my dick, he shouldn’t come to my site and call me a coward.
Corporal Punishment with Czar Goldstein.
Sounds good, Heretik.
I fully admit that we defeatists suck. But come on, anyone who goes by the name RETARDO is just asking to get bashed.
and jeff replies with something about penises.
i’m just guessing here.