FBI admits probing radical historian Zinn for criticizing bureau

[kpete]

Source: Raw Story

FBI admits probing ‘radical’ historian Zinn for criticizing bureau

By Daniel Tencer
Friday, July 30th, 2010 -- 3:22 pm


FBI files show bureau may have tried to get Zinn fired from Boston University for his political opinions

..........................

But in a release of documents pertaining to Zinn, the bureau admitted that one of its investigations into the left-wing academic was prompted not by suspicion of criminal activity, but by Zinn's criticism of the FBI's record on civil rights investigations.

On Friday, http://foia.fbi.gov/foiaindex/zinn_howard.htm the FBI released a 243-page file on Zinn, who died in January at age 87. The release describes the historian as "radical." The documents show the bureau taking an active interest in Zinn since the late 1940s, when he was a student at New York University. The interest continued through the 1950s, as Zinn worked on his PhD at Columbia University.

When the FBI again took an interest in Zinn in the 1960s, documents show the bureau evidently tried to have the historian fired from his job as professor at Boston University.

In a document from the Boston FBI office (see PDF file here), an FBI "source," whose name was redacted from the publicly released documents, was quoted as being outraged over Zinn's comment at a protest that the US had become a "police state" and that prosecutions of Black Panther Party members were creating "political prisoners."

Read more: http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0730/fbi-admits-probing-zinn-criticizing-bureau/

[IndianaGreen]

1. and nothing has changed since then!

FBI is currently keeping tabs on labour activists, and antiwar movement.

[NewEngland4Obama]

7. He was a active member of the Communist Party of the United

States, Can't blame them for keeping tabs on him

[5X]

8. You too are now being kept under tabs.

You used the word "communist" in your post, that is enough to get you flagged.

[NewEngland4Obama]

44. You are very Paranoid

[No Elephants]

85. LOL

[Scruffy1]

9. How appaling this is. But then I have a file too.

But I'm not the brilliant man he was. Miss him.

[Ken Burch]

10. No, he wasn't.

Zinn had a brief interest in the party in the 40's, but never joined. For most of his life he self-identified as being somewhere between and anarchist and a democratic socialist.

If he had been a CP member(something that wasn't illegal for most of Zinn's life)we'd all have heard about it.

[EFerrari]

15. No, he wasn't. nt

[Scruffy1]

18. Of course this misses the point.

Even though Howard Zinn was never a member of the CPUSA the FBI simply called him one to give a reason for the investigation. It is not illegal to belong to the CPUSA and once we accept that the premise that the FBI has the right to investigate you for your political beliefs it leaves us all open to witchunts. So now they can simply put in your folder that you are a member of Al Queda or whatever and carry on. Strange how some believe that freedom only extends to those they agree with.

[EFerrari]

21. Of course. n/t

[Ignis]

25. "some believe that freedom only extends to those they agree with"

That's it in a nutshell. :toast:

[Fearless]

34. +1

[defendandprotect]

56. +1000% --

[Ignis]

22. Links? Support? Anything other than speculation / wishful thinking?

:shrug:

[mbperrin]

33. You mean for making statements like this?

http://www.cpusa.org/party-voices/commentary

Obama State of the Union: He got the ball rolling
In some ways last night's State of the Union address by President Obama was a virtuoso performance. There were stirring moments, memorable turns of phrase, humor, a defense of activist government, and proposals that will be welcomed, and surely help, millions of people in need.



Wow! Pretty subversive stuff, yeah? Perhaps you're simply too young to realize how stupid the whole Red scare really was, joined by today's war on terra! terra! terra! Fear merchants got nothin' to sell without boogeymen under every bed.

[chimpymustgo]

42. WTF?????? You can't belong to a political party in the US of A???

Oh...

[liberation]

71. Exactly...

... the sad part is how many people totally missed that "minor" detail.

So what if he was?

[Swagman]

43. why ?. Has the CP ever caused trouble in the US as opposed to say,

the Repubs ?(ie: GB Jnr)

[KoKo]

46. Assume you didn't read the article...Here..for your Enlightenment:

On Friday, the FBI released a 243-page file on Zinn, who died in January at age 87. The release describes the historian as "radical." The documents show the bureau taking an active interest in Zinn since the late 1940s, when he was a student at New York University. The interest continued through the 1950s, as Zinn worked on his PhD at Columbia University.

When the FBI again took an interest in Zinn in the 1960s, documents show the bureau evidently tried to have the historian fired from his job as professor at Boston University.

In a document from the Boston FBI office (see PDF file here), an FBI "source," whose name was redacted from the publicly released documents, was quoted as being outraged over Zinn's comment at a protest that the US had become a "police state" and that prosecutions of Black Panther Party members were creating "political prisoners."

The bureau's Boston office then indicated it wanted to help the source in his or her campaign to unseat Zinn. " Boston proposes under captioned program with Bureau permission to furnish with public source data regarding Zinn's numerous anti-war activities ... in an effort to back efforts for his removal."

The bureau's response to the request does not appear to have been included in the released documents.

(Raw Story reporters will continue to mine through the documents for more details. If you want to help, you can view the FBI files here, here and here (PDF). Send us what you find to [e-mail].)

The FBI notes that its investigations of Zinn -- three in total, over 25 years -- "ended in 1974, and no further investigation into Zinn or his activities was made by the FBI."

Zinn had harsh words for the FBI during his academic career. In a paper published not long before his death, Zinn said the best thing the public could do to curb the FBI's powers was to "continue exposing them."

Of the FBI, he said, "They don’t like social movements. They work for the establishment and the corporations and the politicos to keep things as they are. And they want to frighten and chill the people who are trying to change things. So the best defense against them and resistance against them is simply to keep on fighting back, to keep on exposing them."

[defendandprotect]

53. Zinn wasn't a member of the Communist Party of US . . but it was legal for anyone to do so --

[liberation]

70. Funny I thought this was supposed to be a democratic republic....

... you know where political parties are not outlawed, or differing political affiliations are not only tolerated but encouraged.

Good grief some of you make the mythical "good Germans" look down right rioting and belligerent in comparison.

[Suji to Seoul]

83. OOooo. . .big bad Commies. Oooooo

But that MIC is a-okay!

Selective FBI work against political enemies. How Stalinistic!

[No Elephants]

84. LOL

[WVRICK13]

88. No He Wasn't

But so what if he was? Unless I am missing something we are guaranteed freedom of political thought, otherwise the KKK and other such movements would be illegal.

[AlabamaLibrul]

91. Nice post Hoover, you've got to be kidding me. (n/t)

[rurallib]

92. Lord, I love hearing the oldies being played again

[laughingliberal]

99. Stay tuned for House Committee on Un American Activities-The Sequel! nt

[tabasco]

95. Number one: Why are you a liar?

Number two: This is supposed to be a free country.

[Westcoast chico]

97. Zinn denies ever being a member of the communist party

"informants" for the fbi said he was. "informants" also said martin luther king was a communist. Did you know that? Or do you trust Hoover's "informants"?

[backtomn]

109. Fine.....I might agree, but.......

.....is he the ONLY person to criticize the FBI ??? I might have done that myself from time to time......should I be watching my back?? I think that the FBI might be a bit sensitive and may deserve some of this.

[Raineyb]

114. Yes you can.

Seriously what bullshit excuse making is this?

[dotymed]

41. Things have changed.

With the new technology available, it is easier than ever to keep us all under surveillance. I don't wear a tin foil hat. America is a police state that cares for the wealthy and wreaks havoc on anyone threatening to expose them...

[BootinUp]

2. Lets make it easier

for the FBI to get information on what we all do, they won't abuse it.

[EFerrari]

17. You pretty much can't be a great American without an FBI file.

They arrested WEB Du Bois in his 80s because that old man looked like a Commie spy to them.

Pathetic and anti-American.

[Scruffy1]

20. LOL-that makes me feel a little better

Even though I'm not even close to the same league as DuBois and Zinn.

[EFerrari]

24. Well, apparently you are on your way!

:)

[Love Bug]

40. Exactly! Any activist without an FBI file isn't trying hard enough.

[KoKo]

47. Absolutely....Good for You "EFerrari," for speaking out in these dire times....

and stating the truth!

[defendandprotect]

55. So true -- kinda also like being on Nixon's "Enemies List" . . . !!! You were a hero-!

[Ken Burch]

65. Or, as the great Faith Petric once put it in song

"You ain't done nothin' if you ain't been called a Red"!

[EFerrari]

66. lol

:thumbsup:

[dixiegrrrrl]

67. Practically everyone who was politically active in the 70's has a file.

We used to be proud of the idea of having an FBI file back then.
Makes total sense Howard Zinn would be targeted. He was aware of it, I am sure.

[Ken Burch]

68. My favorite story is that somebody in one of the FBI's regional offices

had to advise them that(in September of 1977), they should discontinue surveillance of Phil Ochs, owing to the fact that he'd been dead since April of 1976.

Phil would have enjoyed that immensely, I suspect.

[mitchum]

75. I was surprised to find out that Rex Stout had a huge FBI file

I thought he just wrote tedious mysteries

[EFerrari]

77. LOL

:rofl:

[mitchum]

78. I really wanted to like Stout's work...

Nero and Archie had the potential to be such great characters, but the writing...ugh.

[SteveM]

107. Back in 1970, a friend of mine asked for her files. They said OK, but...

...she would have to pay the freight.

[EFerrari]

110. LOL. After I helped MoveOn launch their book on the West Coast

in 2004, all my packages came pre-opened for about six months. It was unreal. But, thank gawd they didn't catch my al Qaida bath towels or those Taliban shipments from Zappos. :)

[dixiegrrrrl]

113. OMG..I LOVE Zappos.

Taliban shoes? Gotta order me some of them.
I am sure they are perfect for summer, for running, and for fleeing invasions.

[UpInArms]

3. and the politcization of the FBI marches on and on

these people are not for "the people" - they are for the powerful

I spit in their general direction.

[Ken Burch]

11. The FBI was never NOT political.

Except for the parts of it that only exist on television series.

The FBI was created for one reason and one reason only: to let J. Edgar Hoover persecute everyone he personally disagreed with:

Leftists
trade unionists(except for the "anticommunist" ones who were always useless)
the entire Rainbow Coalition
gays(other than him and Clyde Tolson)
and, let us not forget, Jews.

J. Edgar had a massive uncircumcised chubby for sticking it to the Jews.

[UpInArms]

30. okay - so "left" and "right" are not political?

hmmmm

'kay

:hi:

[Ken Burch]

32. Yes..."left" and "right" have political connotations

But accepting that doesn't mean pretending that the FBI was ever a non-political group.

Oh, and J. Edgar and the boys hardly ever went after anyone on the right, so I don't get your point.

Nor does my post deserve your condescension.

The people J. Edgar went after were on the side of justice, hope, and a better world. The people he defended were on the side of war, racism, greed and misery.

[No Elephants]

86. Self delete.

[mitchum]

76. Hoover was quite a piece of work...

in addition to his relationship with Tolson (I always imagine a bulldog slobbering on a rawhide chew toy),
apparently it was an open secret in DC society, that Johnny "had a bit of the tarbrush in him"
He was one truly fucked up individual.

[No Elephants]

87. WTF?

[mitchum]

108. Incredible, isn't it? Here's just one source (I have seen many more)...

Jay Edgar Hoover

Hoover the Mulatto

By Chance Kelsey

The evidence that former FBI director was mixed with black is very strong. His physical appearance also hints that he was mixed with black, Hoover had a quadroon phenotype. Author Gore Vidal remembers growing up in Washington D.C. back in the 1930s and that in Washington D.C. many people referred to Hoover as a mulatto.

Author Anthony Summers interviewed Gore Vidal regarding the life of Jay Edgar Hoover and his ancestry.

Gore Vidal: "Hoover was becoming famous," "and it was always said of him--in my family and around the city--that he was mulatto. People said he came from a family that had `passed.'. . . That's what was always said about Hoover."

Author Anthony Summers, in his 1993 book Official and Confidential, cites two examples. A New York Post reporter, researching J. Edgar Hoover, found that blacks referred to Hoover as "some kind of spook" and even "soul brother," and came to realize that in black communities in the East, it was generally believed that Edgar had black roots (Summers, pp. 349-350).

The reason it is so hard to find out the origins of Hoover’s birth is because -- it was said that Hoover changed his birth certificate records. It is believed that on his birth certificate he was labeled black (or maybe mulatto) but not white.


Jay Edgar Hoover’s father Ivy Hoover was the biracial son of a white slave owner and black slave woman.


Also by changing his government birth certificate record he could disassociate himself with the Hoovers who were mixed with black which is the side of the Hoover family it is believed he came from, and associate himself with the Hoovers who where white.

If Hoover was a mulatto (mixed race) he did what he did to avoid being a victim of the one drop rule (ODR). The one drop rule that says anyone with recent black ancestry is to be classified as black and a member of the black race.

This would have sent Hoover to the inferior status of American society. So it was natural for Hoover to try and avoid this mistreatment. The fear of being found out also caused Hoover to hate his black ancestry because he felt it was a hindrance if people knew his family background.

It is also rumored that Hoover was a homosexual.

This explains why Hoover disliked blacks so much. Seeing blacks reminded him that he had black ancestry. The one drop rule was heavily responsible for Jay Edgar Hoover’s behavior. If it was not for the one drop rule Hoover, and mixed race people like him would have been allowed to have their own separate communities, and ethnic Identity. Hoover possibly would have grown comfortable being a mixed race as long as he was not forced into blackness only.


Hoover’s accomplishment as a powerful FBI director does show the uniqueness of the mulattoes. It shows that Hoover was intelligent and educated and not inferior certain whites have tried to portray people mixed with black.


`Black Like Me'?
The Strange Saga of J. Edgar Hoover
by Edward Spannaus

J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation from 1924 to 1972, was notorious for his targetting of black leaders, whether in civil rights, elected officials, or other areas such as black newspaper publishers, or the singer Paul Robeson. Newly discovered evidence now sheds more light on Hoover's legendary fear and hatred of African-Americans, suggesting that this may have been a form of self-hatred on Hoover's part.

As we will show, rumors that J. Edgar was partially black were commonplace in Washington, D.C. during Hoover's reign, and were well known to associates of Hoover--and even to Hoover himself. But a new book shows that stories that Hoover was "passing for white" were also being passed down from generation to generation a thousand miles away, through a former slave family, once owned by another Hoover family, in the area of McComb, Mississippi.

We present here some preliminary findings, of an ongoing historical investigation.
Operation Fruehmenschen

In 1988, Rep. Mervyn Dymally (D-Calif.) placed before the House of Representatives a sworn affidavit from a Special Agent of the FBI, Hirsch Friedman, exposing an FBI program called "Operation Fruehmenschen" (German for "primitive man"). Friedman's affidavit declared:

"The purpose of this policy was the routine investigation without probable cause of prominent elected and appointed black officials in major U.S. metropolitan areas. It was explained to me that the basis for this Fruehmenschen policy was the assumption by the FBI that black officials were intellectually and socially incapable of governing major governmental organizations and institutions."

In Ad Hoc Democratic Platform Hearings, held in Washington, D.C. on June 22, former Tennessee judge and legislator Ira Murphy testified about Operation Fruehmenschen, which he has studied extensively. Judge Murphy said that the operation began under Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover, and it has continued since that time. Judge Murphy said that more than 300 black and minority officials have been investigated by the FBI and the Justice Department.

Hoover's obsession about blacks was well known. In 1956, in the wake of the Supreme Court's school desegregation decisions, Hoover fought with Attorney General Herbert Brownell, Jr. over Brownell's proposals for new civil rights laws and enforcement provisions. Hoover declared that "the specter of racial intermarriage" was behind the tensions over "mixed schooling," and he attacked the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and other civil rights organizations, while praising the White Citizens Councils in the South. It was also in 1956 that Hoover launched the FBI's Cointelpro (Counter-Intelligence Program) which targetted civil rights groups and leaders among others. (See Curt Gentry, J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets .)

And as early as 1957, Hoover ordered his agents to monitor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference, when the SCLC began a campaign to register eligible black voters in the South. By the beginning of the 1960s, the FBI was routinely carrying out illegal break-ins of SCLC offices, and wiretapping King.

Hoover's obsession with destroying King--or, in Bureau-speak, "neutralizing" him--became notorious. Thus it was no surprise that jubilant cries of "They got the SOB!" reverberated through the Atlanta FBI office when the news first came over the radio that Dr. King had been shot in Memphis on April 4, 1968 (Gentry, p. 606). One former FBI agent recalled another agent shouting "We finally got the son of a bitch!" (See Anthony Summers, Official and Confidential: the Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover , p. 364.)

It is of note that on March 4, 1968, FBI Headquarters issued a memorandum expanding its Cointelpro activities against "Black Nationist--Hate Groups" and warning that Dr. King, among others, could emerge as a " `messiah' who could unify and electrify the black nationalist movement." The memorandum called for the use of "imaginative" techniques, and required a report on accomplishments within 30 days. On April 4, Dr. King was assassinated. Hoover's cooperation with military intelligence units conducting surveillance and more deadly operations against King has been established. (See William Pepper, Orders to Kill: The Truth Behind the Murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. .)
What Did Washington and Mississippi Know?

Rumors of J. Edgar Hoover's black ancestry were widespread during his reign, both inside and outside of the Bureau. Hoover in fact deployed his agents to track down rumors of his racial origins, just as he did regarding rumors of his homosexuality.

Author Anthony Summers, in his 1993 book Official and Confidential, cites two examples. A New York Post reporter, researching J. Edgar Hoover, found that blacks referred to Hoover as "some kind of spook" and even "soul brother," and came to realize that in black communities in the East, it was generally believed that Edgar had black roots (Summers, pp. 349-350).

Summers also interviewed writer Gore Vidal, who grew up in Washington, D.C. in the 1930s. "Hoover was becoming famous," Vidal told Summers, "and it was always said of him--in my family and around the city--that he was mulatto. People said he came from a family that had `passed.'. . . That's what was always said about Hoover."

In the late 1950s, a young black girl in Mississippi came home from school and asked her grandfather about J. Edgar Hoover, whom her history class had been studying. The increasingly frightened young girl was told that, yes, J. Edgar was related to her family, and that he was passing for white. "This is a family secret," the girl was told. Her grandfather went on to tell her that Hoover had a lot of power, that Hoover was the grandfather's second cousin, and the youngster was warned not to ever tell anyone this, because Hoover could have them all killed. "He doesn't want the secret out, and he is a powerful man!" the trembling young girl was told.

When the young girl asked if there wouldn't be records, such as a birth certificate, which would show him to be related to the family of former slaves, her grandfather told her: "J. Edgar Hoover has a lot of power. He can destroy files, and he's already done it."

The young girl was Mildred McGhee, whose family lived in Pike County, Mississippi, on the site of the former plantation of a Hoover family. According to her account, a mixture of the family's oral history and reconstructed memories, the Washington Hoovers, a mixture of black and white, were related to the Mississippi Hoovers. The part of the family's oral history which was very specific, and oft repeated, was that she and her family are descended from the union of a slave woman and the slave woman's master, which resulted in the birth of a daughter in 1814 in Virginia, who was named Elizabeth Allan.

Elizabeth, according to the oral history, was taken to Maryland by a Hoover man. Her first born was Emily, very light-skinned, who was taken away from her to Mississippi, where she became the mistress of a plantation owner William Hoover, and bore many children by him. Meanwhile, according to the oral tradition, Elizabeth, still in the Maryland/D.C. area, married a William Hoover, and passed for white, and had seven children.

Millie had heard rumors that J. Edgar himself was not the son of Dickerson N. Hoover of Washington, as is officially reported, but that he was born in the South, probably New Orleans, and then taken to Washington, D.C. at a very young age, and raised there by the Hoover family.

In November 1998, Millie McGhee, by now an educator in California, retained a genealogist, George Ott of Heritage Consulting in Salt Lake City, Utah, to assist her in attempting to document her family history, and to see if there were any links to J. Edgar Hoover. Through his research, Ott found that many aspects of Millie's story bore a remarkable correspondence to the documentary record.

This spring, McGhee published her recollections and her preliminary findings in a book entitled Secrets Uncovered: J. Edgar Hoover--Passing for White? (Rancho Cucamonga, Calif.: Allen-Morris, 2000). The book contains a fictionalized version of the family history along with the results of the first phases of genealogical research. A second, revised edition will be published in August.

Ott, the genealogist, found that some records coincided quite well with Millie's oral history. For example, the 1860 census for Washington, D.C. shows a William Hoover, born 1804 in Maryland, married to Elizabeth A., born 1814 in Virginia. They have seven children, including a son John T. Hoover who who has a child named Dickerson N. Hoover (the father of J. Edgar Hoover).

In subsequent research, conducted since the publication of the first edition of McGhee's book, Ott has found some census records for Mississippi that also correspond to the family oral tradition regarding "Emily," and he has recently found records which appear to link the Maryland and the Mississippi Hoover families. Ott also found strange--and highly unusual--alterations and erasures in some of the census records pertaining to other Hoovers in Washington.
Who Was J. Edgar?

This writer has confirmed that there are substantial discrepancies and oddities concerning J. Edgar Hoover's early biography. McGhee and Ott located the birth records index for Washington, D.C. for 1895, in which J. Edgar Hoover's name was obviously added later than the other entries. Not only is it in different handwriting, but the format is different: The other entries give only the parents' names; Edgar's entry adds not only the child's name, but that he was male, white, and the date of birth.

This writer obtained a copy of Edgar's actual birth certificate, which was not filed until 1938. Edgar's own family history, written when he was 17, says that he was born Jan. 1, 1895, at home, with a doctor in attendance. It was legally required to report a birth, but if the doctor was present, he failed to do so. The verification of birth is provided by an affidavit by Edgar's older brother Dickerson, himself a U.S. government official; it does not mention a doctor being present.

Hoover was baptized when he was 13, under the tutelage of his brother Dickerson, who took him from one church to another, looking for the most prestigious congregation. His birth certificate, obtained by EIR, shows the date of birth to be June 1, 1895, not January.

There is also the issue of photographs. The most famous photograph of J. Edgar as a young child is the oval "family photograph," published in most biographies of Hoover. However, around 1989, the curators of the exhibit in the J. Edgar Hoover Room at the Scottish Rite Masonic Temple in Washington changed the identification of the child to Edgar's brother Dickerson, not Edgar, and it is now so identified in the exhibit in the Hoover Room.

So far, there is no "smoking gun," so to speak, and there may never be, given Hoover's known penchant for altering historical records concerning himself, even those in the National Archives (Gentry, pp. 389-390).

But taken together with the prevalent rumors in Washington, and the oral history of Millie McGhee's Mississippi family, the discrepancies in Hoover's own documentary history suggest that Hoover was hiding something.

McGhee herself says her book is not intended as an exposé of J. Edgar Hoover, and indeed, she says she never wanted to be related to him. "I don't want him to be related to me," she says, but she adds that, since it now seems that he was, "I want to be the one to erase the hate."

Eradicating the legacy of J. Edgar Hoover in the FBI and the Justice Department, would be a good place to

start.

[FiveGoodMen]

4. And Obama wants them to have MORE snooping power.

ABO.

[defendandprotect]

57. Oh .. . Obama is just "easing" the way for them on the internet . . . !!

[devilgrrl]

5. "Radical" historian...

:eyes:

[Ken Burch]

12. What the hell does THAT mean?

What did Howard Zinn do to deserve the Eye Roll of Death?

Or are you saying that historians CAN'T be radical?

If you are, you haven't been on a college campus for the last forty-five years.

Historians have done more than anyone else to teach us the radical truths about this country.

[scarletwoman]

28. Being familiar with devilgrrl's posts, I think it's safe to assume the eye roll was for the FBI --

for their characterization of Zinn as "radical".

sw

[Ken Burch]

31. Oh. Well, you can understand why someone might find it hard to tell.

n/t.

[EFerrari]

38. devilgrrl is the originator of the semi bi annual 'Let's just make shit up about Hugo Chavez" thread

[Ken Burch]

39. Oh. OK.

Well, I'm glad to hear that. It just struck me as odd the way the post was phrased. No offense intended if you're reading this, DG.

[devilgrrl]

104. Kein Problem!

:pals:

[devilgrrl]

105. Oh no! Not Hugo Chavez!

[EFerrari]

111. LOL

:rofl:

[devilgrrl]

103. The article seems to be using "radical" to slight Howard Zinn. That's why I roll the eyes.

Do get where I'm coming from?

[ixion]

6. The FBI: Destroying America one vendetta at a time.

:grr:

[harun]

13. Corruption, plain and simple.

[bluestateguy]

14. COINTELPRO

Not in the slightest surprised.

[amyrose2712]

93. +1 I've always just assumed it to be. nt

[Dawson Leery]

16. And some here question why we do not trust law enforcement.

[BootinUp]

19. devils advocate

Are you sure they are not just saying that most law enforcement people are about doing whats right? There is no question some corrupted bastards are in just about every organization.

[Dawson Leery]

23. The Maryland State Police were actively infiltrating

peace organizations during Bush's tenure.

[BootinUp]

26. Whats wrong in Maryland?

seems strange...Are you suggesting that they got orders from DC?

[EFerrari]

27. There was a torture operation in Chicago. LAPD is well known

for fabricating evidence.

But who knows why people give cops a bad rap.

[defendandprotect]

59. Planting drugs and guns . . . aberrations . . . !!

[defendandprotect]

60. JFK coup...Dallas police 50% KKK -- RFK assassination.. LAPD 50% John Birchers . . .

Here in NJ our police were under surveillance for racial profiling --

after they killed some young people on one of our major thruways!

But backed up by other observations over time --

I mean, ask yourself, what kind of people are attracted to this work these days --

there are no more traffic cops -- all replaced by traffic lights!

Would you work in a prison where you had to examine human body cavities every day?

Or punch people out when they misbehaved?

[scarletwoman]

29. I'd only be surprised if the FBI *hadn't* investigated Zinn.

Their job, after all, is to go after those who publicly defy TPTB Official Approved Narrative of America.

[G_j]

49. that's it

quite simple really..

:hi:

[defendandprotect]

61. You still can't say that Columbus didn't "discover" America -- !!!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[MicaelS]

80. Yes, I feel the same way n/t

[t0rnado]

35. And now these clowns

can't even take basic tests without cheating on them. They also had a file on MLK, Malcolm X, and tons of other civil rights activists.

[EFerrari]

37. They were cheating tests on the rules for surveillance.

:rofl:

[defendandprotect]

62. I missed that article the other day -- darn!

[G_j]

36. K&R

[KoKo]

45. Ah Ha! The Ghost of Joe McCarthy rears it's UGLY HEAD..during Democratic Administration!

FILES RELEASED! One more way for the Right Wing to go after the "FUCKING RETARDS.'

I suppose we must all PRAISE THE FBI for COMING OUT WITH THIS NOW!

-----------

On Friday, the FBI released a 243-page file on Zinn, who died in January at age 87. The release describes the historian as "radical." The documents show the bureau taking an active interest in Zinn since the late 1940s, when he was a student at New York University. The interest continued through the 1950s, as Zinn worked on his PhD at Columbia University.

When the FBI again took an interest in Zinn in the 1960s, documents show the bureau evidently tried to have the historian fired from his job as professor at Boston University.

In a document from the Boston FBI office (see PDF file here), an FBI "source," whose name was redacted from the publicly released documents, was quoted as being outraged over Zinn's comment at a protest that the US had become a "police state" and that prosecutions of Black Panther Party members were creating "political prisoners."

The bureau's Boston office then indicated it wanted to help the source in his or her campaign to unseat Zinn. " Boston proposes under captioned program with Bureau permission to furnish with public source data regarding Zinn's numerous anti-war activities ... in an effort to back efforts for his removal."

The bureau's response to the request does not appear to have been included in the released documents.

(Raw Story reporters will continue to mine through the documents for more details. If you want to help, you can view the FBI files here, here and here (PDF). Send us what you find to [e-mail].)

The FBI notes that its investigations of Zinn -- three in total, over 25 years -- "ended in 1974, and no further investigation into Zinn or his activities was made by the FBI."

Zinn had harsh words for the FBI during his academic career. In a paper published not long before his death, Zinn said the best thing the public could do to curb the FBI's powers was to "continue exposing them."

Of the FBI, he said, "They don’t like social movements. They work for the establishment and the corporations and the politicos to keep things as they are. And they want to frighten and chill the people who are trying to change things. So the best defense against them and resistance against them is simply to keep on fighting back, to keep on exposing them."

[Uncle Joe]

48. And people wonder why this is a bad idea.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4483378

Thanks for the thread, kpete.

[Downwinder]

50. Brings into question, how much of the no fly list is political

censorship or harassment?

[defendandprotect]

63. In Ted Kennedy's case, that's easy to guess . . .

[No Elephants]

89. 3 words: Senator Ted Kennedy

[KamaAina]

51. "Radical historian" Zinn?

Yes, he was a radical, and of course, he was a historian -- but as a historian, he was certainly left-leaning, but by no means radical.

Would that we had had a truly radical historian. As it is, I'm cracking open my People's History after I get back from the pizza joint!

[Ken Burch]

69. The radicalism in his historiography was in the idea

That history should be told from the bottom up, from the voices of workers, slaves, the Rainbow, dissidents, poets and outsiders in general.

Zinn was the greatest challenger, among U.S. historians, of the "great men" theory.

[Unvanguard]

52. Some of this was already known.

Zinn talks about his Freedom of Information Act request in his autobiography You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train, and notes that he remembered his old speeches via the notes that had been taken about them by FBI agents.

The FBI has long been terrified of left-wing radicalism considerably out of proportion to any threat to social order it presents.

[EFerrari]

58. FBI files have been invaluable in helping biographers

reconstruct conversations and speeches. :)

[defendandprotect]

54. In a police state, truth tellers are "radical" . . . !!!

[defendandprotect]

64. Most of all LOVED Eleanor Roosevelt for calling them a "Gestapo" . . .!!

Evidently, they were keeping track of her love affairs!!

Among other things!!

And much later -- around time of JFK coup -- one of the Senators or Reps who was

on the Warren Commission came to the floor and also used that term --

"a Gestapo" -- !!! It's Cokie Roberts father, but can't think of his name at the moment.

Shortly thereafter died in a plane disappearance in Alaska? From Louisiana, I think?

[liberation]

72. Eleanor Roosevelt is my favorite figure in American politics...

... she drove the reactionaries fucking nuts like no other public person before or after her. So maybe that is where a chunk of my admiration comes from. I only shudder to think what the gestapo file on her has. Funny how those who do the most to help the average American citizen tend to be the ones most scrutinized and feared by those agencies supposedly in charge of "protecting" us.

[defendandprotect]

73. Me, too -- obviously . . .

Hers was the first biography I read --

she was fantastic in my book!

Amazing that she and FDR came together -- quite something!!

And, on a sad note, how different the children!


But, re your observations, think this all shows how really FRAGILE the right wing is --

it's bully, it's violence, deception -- but they are really very frightened of everything.

We should keep that in mind --

Someday we may figure out what to do about the few violent among us -- !!

TRUTH is their greatest enemy which is why Howard Zinn was such a threat to them ...

I like to think of it this way --

Truth is like a pebble hitting a mirror -- it shatters their myths and propaganda immediately!

Keep on tossing those pebbles!!

:)

[MicaelS]

81. Hale Boggs

Disappeared in 1972, his plane and remains have never been found. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hale_Boggs

Disappearance and search

As Majority Leader, Boggs often campaigned for others. On October 16, 1972, he was aboard a twin engine Cessna 310 with Representative Nick Begich of Alaska, who was facing a possible tight race in the November 1972 general election against the Republican candidate Don Young, when it disappeared during a flight from Anchorage to Juneau. The only others on board were Begich's aide, Russell Brown, and the pilot, Don Jonz; the four were heading to a campaign fundraiser for Begich. (Begich won the 1972 election posthumously with 56 percent to Young's 44 percent, though Young would win the special election to replace Begich and won every election through and including 2008.)

Coast Guard, Navy, and Air Force planes searched for the party. On November 24, 1972, after 39 days, the search was abandoned. Neither the wreckage of the plane nor the pilot's and passengers' remains were ever found. The accident prompted Congress to pass a law mandating Emergency Locator Transmitters in all U.S. civil aircraft.

Both Boggs and Begich were re-elected that November. House Resolution 1 of January 3, 1973 officially recognized Boggs's presumed death and opened the way for a special election.

Speculation, suspicions, and theories

The events surrounding Boggs's death have been the subject of much speculation, suspicion, and numerous conspiracy theories. These theories often center on his membership on the Warren Commission. Boggs dissented from the Warren Commission's majority who supported the single bullet theory. Regarding the single bullet theory, Boggs commented, "I had strong doubts about it." In the Robert Ludlum novel, The Matarese Circle, Boggs was killed to stop his investigation of the Kennedy assassination.

[Downwinder]

74. Fan Belt Inspectors

[laughingliberal]

79. K & R nt

[The_Casual_Observer]

82. Our tax dollars at work protecting us from the dangerous Zinn.

[No Elephants]

90. Despite a record of FBI abuses, Pres. Obama wants to expand the FBI's powers to

bring us to "justice."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4483378

I know someone else posted the link upthread, but it bears repeating.

[tabasco]

94. When do the prosecutions begin?

Hold the perps accountable.

[The Green Manalishi]

96. I think he would have been sad and offended if they had *NOT*

I bet this great genius of history and activism would have been proud of every single thing in that file.

History will show him to be amongst the most important Americans of the last part of the 20th and first part of the 21st centuries in terms of intellectual influence. Chomsky is brilliant, yes, but Zinn could write so that any and everyone could understand.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

98. They're "protecting" us from dangerous ideas.

[Deadgnome]

102. Like...

really expensive water wings for brains.

[newspeak]

100. it's rather sad that those services that we pay for

are used against us. There are some good people in the FBI and CIA (or were) before Little Boots cleaned house. But when an agency serves their own interests or interests of those (like corporations) against the people--I wonder why we're still paying for them.

Eleanor Roosevelt and Jane Addams (Hull House) had huge FBI files. Nothing like spying on those who help poor folk and fight for labor rights. People fighting for civil rights equal bad, people or corporations making huge amounts of money while pissing on others equal good. Gee, I wonder how many Quakers (who do not believe in violence) have FBI files. Maybe their job is to keep the proles in their place, while protecting the interests of the global elite. Oh, wait, that might be a commie statement. "When I feed the poor they call me a saint, if I ask why the poor has no food, they call me a communist."

Yes, Howard Zinn thought it was a badge of honor to have that file, he was with some very admired people, like Eleanor and Jane. And, it seems that anyone who fights for civil justice or asks questions about possible illegal activities (war) are all Commies. That's their excuse--it's the boogie man commie.

[Deadgnome]

101. This is a surprise, how?

I'm sure him Noam, and all of the rest have been profiled too, as well as many here, in anti-war movements, and anything that exudes semblance of a progressive movement, thinking person, etc. The FBI can go fuck themselves. I have been flagged since I was a wee little lad because of the sensitive line of work my father is in. I may have choice words, but I have no desire nor will to ever kill, rape, maim, murder, butcher, slaughter or do anything of the sort unless I am forced by the fascistas in control to do such. When our backs our against the wall, and I see it coming down the pipe, we will be left with no other choice. But as it stands, I and many of you here have compassion, good "hearts," good minds, and a hope for humanity, while it may be declining. Us and people like us that don't zip our traps when it comes to exposing the horrors and atrocities our government has committed and continues to commit pose the most serious threat to the ignorant, despicable functions of this government and country. We should be proud to be profiled in that case. Proud to know we aren't retched pieces of shit.

[amborin]

106. the FBI went after most all leftist professors over the yrs; raided their offices during the night

told to me by a prof whose office was raided

[EFerrari]

112. The FBI is sort of like the Boy Scouts with longer pants

and no den mothers to prevent their delinquency.