Former CIA director: In order to spy on domestic dissidents, just call them terrorists

[Ichingcarpenter]

Back in 2012, the ACLU of Massachusetts published a report called 'Policing Dissent', exposing the Boston Police Department's 'red squad' surveillance operations, directed at antiwar and economic justice organizers. Among thedocuments we obtained through a public records lawsuit were so-called 'intelligence reports' from the Boston police fusion center, the Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC). These documents shocked the public. In files labeled "HOMESEC-DOMESTIC", "GROUPS-CIVIL DISTURBANCE", and "GROUPS-EXTREMISTS", detectives described the entirely peaceful activities of groups and individuals ranging from Veterans for Peace and CodePink to Howard Zinn and a former city council member.

While the BPD files didn't explicitly call these non-violent activists 'terrorists', detectives working at a so-called 'counterterrorism fusion center' came about as close as they could get to doing so without spelling out the T word in black and white. But it's no secret that other law enforcement agencies jumped that shark long ago. In recent years, undercover informants have infiltrated antiwar movements targeted as "domestic terrorists". While the past decade's terror wars have given local, state, and federal law enforcement seemingly endless funds to pursue activists simply for challenging government policy, the US government's conflation of peaceful dissent with terrorism has a long history in the United States, dating back at least to the 1970s.

Betty Medsger's new book on the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI, "The Burglary", contains some relevant and largely suppressed history. In the wake of the Media, PA burglary and the subsequent newspaper articles exposing J. Edgar Hoover's red squad surveillance programs, some CIA officers began to voice dissent internally about their own agency's troubling domestic operations, codenamed MHCHAOS. In 1972, Medsger writes, CIA director Richard Helms


https://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/former-cia-director-order-spy-domestic-dissidents-just-call-them-terrorists

[Coyotl]

1. "monitoring and destruction of the more than five hundred alternative newspapers staffs"

OMG!

[think]

2. That is kind of chilling. Yikes even.....

[Enthusiast]

28. Yeah, but they were commie newspapers.

[KoKo]

3. The abuses of Hoover/McCarthy years rise again... Recommend Read...

[riderinthestorm]

4. Waiting to be informed about how its only metadata 1!!1 Or that Carl Bernstein says everything's ok

Nothing to see here, no reason to worry. Trust our government! They'll " never" do anything illegal with the information against Americans!



I'm sick to death of the NSA apologists. Sick to death of what my government is doing.

Sad and furious K&R

[mindwalker_i]

11. That's the first thing that came to my mind too

You've got ODS!

[bvar22]

13. This guy must have ODS too!

[RC]

5. Gee, I wonder what the NSA's roll is in this?

Naa, they're OK. Edward Snowden is a traitor and his girl friend is a poll dancer in a box or somptin, so that proves the NSA is on the up and up. (Just in case) ---->

[cali]

6. and sadly there are lots of people on the left (supposedly)

who will deny or defend or work on pretending this isn't a big deal.

lots of these, er, types right here at DU.

and if people who are supposedly on the left do that shit.....

[RC]

9. They are not really on the Left.

They just are saying they are and are hiding behind the Right side of the (D).
The TOS really needs to be clarified a bit to eliminate the Raa, Raa! for the Republican Lite (D)'s. Like get back to our roots.

[solarhydrocan]

10. +1 "hiding behind the Right side of the (D)" -Perfect. Brilliant even. nt

[progressoid]

7. But I feel so safe now.

[G_j]

8. so just don't dissent,

keep your head down, be a good citizen and STFU.

[nilesobek]

12. Yeah, just go to work,

do what you're told and keep your mouth shut. If you are hurt or sick, don't tell anyone, don't go to the doctor, just suck it all up, dry heave in your car and clock in.

[stillwaiting]

22. That's what I do everyday!

See ya at the 2 minute hate!!

[reddread]

14. like I said

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4453131

[allan01]

15. hem

this is why i feel that the agency should be disbanded or reformed. too big for its own shoes .

[zeemike]

21. No it's citizens are SO afraid of the government.

And that is why they do intimidation and harrasment...and need a police force willing to do it...to keep us afraid to speak up...and to act.

Welcome to DU.

[stillwaiting]

25. I think you are both correct.

The fear runs both ways.

The fear that the elite have of the citizens is probably often hidden underneath a lot of false confidence, but several of the global elite have been in the media recently where they do betray their fear and disgust of the great majority of citizens throughout the world.

The elite have successfully crushed our collective community and spirit, and the citizens definitely know the government does not represent them now and are scared of it. Just as the elite have planned. Manage expectations downward.

[zeemike]

33. Good point.

They have a right to fear the unwashed masses...they are outnumbered.

[Enthusiast]

27. Many in government should fear being hung by the neck until dead for treason.

That should include those that conspired to give the nation's jobs away in the name of profit and those that conspired to enable the largest heist in human history through key pieces of deregulation like Gramm-Leach-Bliley.

[toby jo]

17. They did this to us 240 years ago - called us rebels and rabble.

Infiltrated us, shot at us, and then lost to us.

One third of the citizenry at that time were pro-crown. It's like they never went away. A hatred and fear of change, a command of power that insulates the status quo, and spirits that speak not truth but cowardice to power.

[WillyT]

18. HUGE K & R !!!

[gvstn]

19. Wonderful picture. I'm saving it for later. :)

[cprise]

20. K&R

[MynameisBlarney]

23. We are in the 2nd guilded age

[Enthusiast]

26. Worse

[stillwaiting]

31. Yes. In today's age there is little strength in the left movement.

It's been co-opted by partisan politics.

Our opponents have learned many lessons during the 20th century it seems, and they have crafted a society today that currently is but a lamb to their rapaciousness.

[Enthusiast]

24. Fuck. I knew this all along.

It's right in your face. Look how local police came down hard on Occupy while they ignored Tea Party protestors openly carrying firearms.

If you aren't on the side of Fascism you are considered far left and an enemy of the nation. That is where we are at this time in the nation's history. Off the tracks. Completely off the tracks as a nation.

But who is the real enemy? The true enemy stole a presidential election, allowed 911 to happen, tortured like the WWII style Nazis they are, faked up reasons for a second unnecessary war and assorted other evil acts that many DUers wouldn't believe if they were shown proof.

[ConservativeDemocrat]

29. RICHARD HELMS HAS BEEN DEAD FOR 12 YEARS

That is the "Former CIA director" this article is talking about. And he reputedly said this (with one witness) in 1972.

So this entire article is a LIE, about as relevant to modern day as saying "Former President in favor of Slavery" (because Thomas Jefferson was). There is no living advocate for this view.

Discussing how to rein in the Boston Police (and other departments) and keep them from being twisted into anti-activist tools is a very reasonable topic of discussion, but instead you try to gild the lily by adding this absurd disingenuous bullshit. It just detracts from all reasonable conversation, making you sound like outrage-a-holics.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community

[Ichingcarpenter]

30. The last 'conservative Democrat I knew

was when I grew up in the south during the civil rights crisis.


Are you opposed to fracking? Then you might just be a terrorist



Over the last year, a mass of shocking evidence has emerged on the close ties between Western government spy agencies and giant energy companies, and their mutual interests in criminalising anti-fracking activists.

Activists tarred with the same brush

In late 2013, official documents obtained under freedom of information showed that Canada's domestic spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), had ramped up its surveillance of activists opposed to the Northern Gateway pipeline project on 'national security' grounds. The CSIS also routinely passed information about such groups to the project's corporate architect, Calgary-based energy company, Enbridge.

The Northern Gateway is an $8 billion project to transport oil from the Alberta tar sands to the British Columbia coast, where it can be shipped to global markets. According to the documents a Canadian federal agency, the National Energy Board, worked with CSIS and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to coordinate with Enbridge, TransCanada, and other energy corporations in gathering intelligence on anti-fracking activists - despite senior police privately admitting they "could not detect a direct or specific criminal threat."

Now it has emerged that former cabinet minister Chuck Strahl - the man appointed by Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper to head up the CSIS' civilian oversight panel, the Security Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC) - has been lobbying for Enbridge since 2011.

But that's not all. According to CBC News, only one member of Strahl's spy watchdog committee "has no ties to either the current government or the oil industry." For instance, SIRC member Denis Losier sits on the board of directors of Enbridge-subsidiary, Enbridge NB, while Yves Fortier, is a former board member of TransCanada, the company behind the proposed Keystone XL pipeline.


http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jan/21/fracking-activism-protest-terrorist-oil-corporate-spies

[ConservativeDemocrat]

32. Again, a classic strawman/lie

In the entire article you quoted there is not a single quote from any official accusing anyone of terrorism for expressing environmental concerns.

In fact, the only place the word "terrorist" is used anywhere is in the lede. It is a word used solely by the Guardian to try to deceive people into thinking that such an outrageous accusation was made, when it was not.

Again, actual news (reported by real news organizations like the CBC) are exposing real misuse of police functions. But then they are then drained of much of their credibility by the Guardian's typical sort of hack-writing.

- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community