Whistleblowers UNITE!

Sibel Edmonds continues her brave fight to bring the truth about the literally deadly corruption in Government. Please give her all the support you can. There is strength in numbers'.

Blue Ibis
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Rob Kall Interviews Sibel Edmonds

Rob Kall
OpEdNews.com
Sat, 16 May 2009 17:21 UTC

© Unknown

Thanks to Luke Ryland for transcribing the interview. He says, "The following is a partial transcript. All errors, edits and omissions are mine."

Sibel Edmonds:

[SNIP]

We (NSWBC) stopped our activities for a while, and we are restarting them again, and I just launched my blog, and the first series that I'm posting there is on the mainstream media, and in the next few days, you're going to see more than 300 whistleblowers who are going to post their comments at the blog too, about their experiences with various people in the mainstream media.

So that's going to be the main discussion, because currently we review the mainstream media as the culprit, because if they were to do their jobs, they would put pressure on the people in the congress, because these people want to get re-elected, and therefore that pressure would act as a catalyst to get these things that we, the people, have been asking for - the real hearings and accountability. But without the mainstream media putting that pressure, going after them, well, they don't have anything really to fear. You know, you have to have carrots, you have to have sticks, but there have been no sticks for these people. They get away with everything.

And even when we have some coverage, it only lasts for a couple of days, you don't get what you saw, let's say, with Watergate. You have to keep at it, and the mainstream media is not doing this. And the best example of this is the Harman case, it just popped out, and then in a couple of days it disappeared, and it has been buried.

[SNIP]

They never ask "Why State Secrets Privilege?" and that is what I always bring up with people

Rob Kall: Well, why is there the State Secrets Privilege?

SE: That is the question, right. There are people in the, I would not even say the alternative media, some good researchers in the blogosphere who have worked on it and have been able to at least answer some of that question.

RK: What were the answers?

SE: Well, the answer is, from 1996 to 2002, there were certain investigations under one file within the FBI, that involved criminal activities by US persons, and these are the US government people, whether elected or appointed - and I'm talking about criminal deeds with some severe consequences, and if my case were to be public - to go to court all the way, or have hearings in congress, and you have the FBI agents as witnesses come and testify, with other witnesses, and myself, you will see a lot of these people go to jail.

You will see immediately a Special Prosecutor in this case and you will see the trial for these people because you are looking at very, very serious issues, very, very serious illegal activities.

[SNIP]

SE: Vanity Fair ran the story on Dennis Hastert and the fact that he may have been one of the top targets of the FBI in this corruption and criminal matters involving Turkey, because of his relationship, and some of the illegal activities he was engaged with, with certain Turkish and Turkish American people...

[SNIP]

RK: What was the scandal regarding Turkey?

SE: Well, the fact that he was receiving suitcases full of cash from certain Turkish organizations, to do certain things in Congress, and in the Senate (?) for them, and that some of his activities involved, actually, narcotics in Chicago.

[SNIP]

As soon as Hastert came out of Congress, he goes and becomes an agent for Turkey, getting $35,000 per month for serving this interest, and most likely, his son will be replacing that service provided from the inside (if the son gets elected to Hastert's seat). That's how it works with Congress - even when they are out, they are not really out.

You see, before Dennis Hastert, OK, the person who was serving this interest (Turkey) in congress was Bob Livingston; he was the Speaker of the House. And I can not tell you whether the FBI had thick files on Bob Livingston or not. Well, Bob Livingston resigned, left the Congress in 1999, OK, Hastert replaced him. In 1999 when Bob Livingston left Congress, a few months later he, again, registered himself as the agent for the Turkish interests, under FARA, Foreign Agents Registration Act, under this company that he set up, The Livingston Group, and he received $1.5 million per year for eight years.

His boy, Dennis Hastert, was left behind and became Speaker of the House. Now, Dennis Hastert is out and receiving $35,000 per month serving the Turkish interests. I'm sure he has several boys left behind there who would be doing what Hastert did while he was inside, and then when they come out, they will get their $35,000 or $50,000. That's how it works. And it's not only with the Turkish Lobby; you see that a lot with the Israel Lobby. A lot of people know this, but as I said, we get these crusty people and then we keep re-electing them. Why? Because a lot of people don't know about this, and they don't know about it because the mainstream media is not reporting it.

RK: What did Turkey get in the deal?

SE: It is not the Turkish government - it only looks like it is the Turkish government, but these are certain entities, and again there is plenty of information out there, these are certain Turkish entities that are engaged in certain international activities, some of them legal, some of them illegal.

Comment: Hmmm... could these activities be in any way linked to the Ergenekon scandal?

And again, there are many pieces written on this, one is by Phil Giraldi .... which talks about what these Turkish entities do, and who they are... He links these Turkish entities directly to Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and Eric Edelman and Marc Grossman and Dennis Hastert, and he makes those links fairly accurately... He is a pretty solid freelance writer, he's very good, and very intelligent, and also knowledgeable with direct information on certain angles on my case, because that is what he did, he did work in Turkey, and he was involved in operations that involved, basically, some of the same people.

[SNIP]

RK: So Turkey basically gets better treatment from the US, they get access to military technology, maybe they get to be a little nastier with the Kurds...

SE: Yes, and when you're getting into the military technology, or intelligence stuff, you're basically looking at espionage activities, and they can obtain information from the Pentagon and State Department or congress. Classified information that belongs to the American government that is not supposed to go to other countries, but they're able to get whatever they want because they have their people in place.

[SNIP]

RK: What do you think of AG Eric Holder?

SE: He's basically the same old dung, the same crap, putting it crudely. There is no difference between him and Ashcroft or Gonzales, and unfortunately every day that passes in these four years we are going to see that. We are already seeing this. They dropped the AIPAC court case. Who did it? Obama's Justice Department, his AG decided, despite all the evidence on these Israeli spies, that they were going to drop it. Even the Bush administration didn't go that far - because some of the FBI agents were out there who would have screamed, and they did. Because that is why we got that CQ piece on Harman. So they said 'we will not go after you.' Obama's administration right now, they are pressuring the British government saying we don't want you to pursue this torture case in your courts because it involves some of our classified information, and we don't want you to do that. It's not only that they are classifying things here, trying to cover up with secrecy, they're trying to do it overseas, with England! That is ridiculous. It's the same with torture. It is this administration, this Justice Department that is saying that everybody is going to get off the hook...

[SNIP]

RK: Now you have a new website. What is it?

SE: www.123realchange.blogspot.com . And my first series is going to be on the mainstream media... and there will be a surprise element, because in the next few days there will be an announcement there, and I believe that will bring a lot of attention from the mainstream media. It may turn the whole thing into a war zone but we'll see about that, so some exciting things are going to happen there. I hope we will get more visitors and I hope I'll find more ways to promote...

I hope people will cross-post what I write I'm hoping to get tons and tons of comments at the blog, and we'll have the surprise announcement in the next few days which will be good, because we have about 300+ members and sub-members for NSWBC - people from the NSA, FBI, CIA, DoD, people such as Russ Tice, and all these people are going to be active with the blog, posting comments, some anonymous, some with their pseudo-names. Keep following the blog - because when the attack comes, and they start doing it, the mainstream media, I'm going to need all the support I can get! Don't leave me alone there! And I'm also working on the next op-ed piece which is going to be on Obama with some of the stuff we just talked about... And anyone can take any of these articles and reprint them, absolutely. And if people can point back to my blog, because I'll need these people to come and comment, I'll need these supporters because the attacks will follow, I know it's going to come.

RK: What kind of attack? What are you talking about?

SE: Well, this is going to be a pretty interesting thing. You're going to find out in two days - so that's something to look forward to, because, in a way, us, the whistleblowers, are going to turn the table on the mainstream media.

In fact, to say the 'mainstream media is the culprit' in a way let's them off the hook, because it's just a general term, like saying 'congress' but when you start going individually after individuals, or individual papers with specific cases it becomes a different story... These are the things we are going to put on my blog, and I'm going to hit them. Name, paper, incident, cases.

Israeli Spying: The Mother of all Scandals

Israeli Spying: The Mother of all Scandals

WRH
Wed, 22 Apr 2009 20:59 UTC

© middleeast.org

At the heart of the investigation are two people who work at The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a powerful pro-Israel lobby in Washington. The FBI investigation, headed up by Dave Szady, has involved wiretaps, undercover surveillance and photography that CBS News was told document the passing of classified information from the mole, to the men at AIPAC, and on to the Israelis.

CBS sources say that last year the suspected spy, described as a trusted analyst at the Pentagon, turned over a presidential directive on U.S. policy toward Iran while it was, "in the draft phase when U.S. policy-makers were still debating the policy." This put the Israelis, according to one source, "inside the decision-making loop" so they could "try to influence the outcome." [CBS News]

Once again Israel denies wrongdoing, or faced with incontrovertible evidence (in this case one of the spies has reportedly cooperated with the FBI) dismisses the spying with the claim that such spying is harmless, because Israel and the United States are such good friends.

Well, let us take a closer look at that idea of "harmless espionage" by recalling Israel's most famous failed spy, Jonathan Pollard.

Jonathan Pollard is an American of Jewish descent, born in Galveston Texas, who established a career as an intelligence analyst for the US Navy. There have been many theories offered as to why Pollard decided to betray his country of birth to the Jewish state, but that Pollard did betray his country of birth to Israel is beyond all doubt. Pollard's defense was that he did not spy so much against the United States, only that he spied for Israel, sending them documents that in his opinion the US should have shared with Israel anyway.

That it was never Pollards job to decide what documents Israel should have was apparently irrelevant. Pollard arrogated that authority to himself. From his position of trust within the US Navy, Pollard delivered over 1000 classified documents to Israel for which he was well paid. Included in those documents were the names of over 150 US agents in the Mideast, who were eventually "turned" into agents for Israel.

But by far the most egregious damage done by Pollard was to steal classified documents relating to the US Nuclear Deterrent relative to the USSR and send them to Israel. According to sources in the US State Department, Israel then turned around and traded those stolen nuclear secrets to the USSR in exchange for increased emigration quotas from the USSR to Israel. Other information that found its way from the US to Israel to the USSR resulted in the loss of American agents operating inside the USSR. Casper Weinberger, in his affidavit opposing a reduced sentence for Pollard, described the damage done to the United States thus, "[It is] difficult to conceive of a greater harm to national security than that caused by... Pollard's treasonous behavior."

This should end the suggestion that Israel's spies are harmless. They are not. The United States' nuclear deterrent cost an estimated five trillion taxpayer dollars during the 50s and 60s to build and maintain, and less than $100,000 for Pollard to undermine. Israel waited 13 years to admit Pollard had been spying for them, and now lobbies for his release, having granted him Israeli citizenship.

Pollard is hardly the only Israeli spy operating in the United States. He just had the misfortune to get caught. Here are just a few examples of the Israeli spy operations that have been detected.

1947 Information collected by the ADL in its spy operations on US citizens is used by the House Select Committee on Unamerican Activities. Subcommittee Chair Clare Hoffman dismisses the ADL's reports on suspected communists as "hearsay."

1950 John Davitt, former chief of the Justice Department's internal security section notes that the Israeli intelligence service is the second most active in the United States after the Soviets.

1954 A hidden microphone planted by the Israelis is discovered in the Office of the US Ambassador in Tel Aviv.

1956 Telephone taps are found connected to two telephones in the residence of the US military attaché in Tel Aviv.

1954 "The Lavon Affair". Israeli agents recruit Egyptian citizens of Jewish descent to bomb Western targets in Egypt, and plant evidence to frame Arabs, in an apparent attempt to upset US-Egyptian relations. Israeli defense minister Pinchas Lavon is eventually removed from office, though many think real responsibility lay with David Ben-Gurion.

1965 Israel apparently illegally obtains enriched uranium from NUMEC Corporation. (Washington Post, 6/5/86, Charles R. Babcock, "US an Intelligence Target of the Israelis, Officials Say.")

1967 Israel attacks the USS Liberty, an intelligence gathering vessel flying a US flag, killing 34 crew members. See Assault on the Liberty, by James M. Ennes, Jr. (Random House). In 2004, Captain Ward Boston, Senior Legal Counsel for the Navy's Court of Inquiry into the attack swears under oath that President Lyndon Johnson ordered the investigation to conclude accident, even though the evidence indicates the attack was deliberate. Given the use by Israel of unmarked boats and planes, and the machine-gunning of USS Liberty's lifeboats, the most likely explanation is that USS Liberty was to be sunk with all hands, with evidence left to frame Egypt for the sinking. This would have dragged the US into the war on Israel's side.

1970 While working for Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson, Richard Perle is caught by the FBI giving classified information to Israel. Nothing is done.

1978, Stephen Bryen, then a Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffer, is overheard in a DC hotel offering confidential documents to top Israeli military officials. Bryen obtains a lawyer, Nathan Lewin, and the case heads for the grand jury, but is mysteriously dropped. Bryen later goes to work for Richard Perle.

1979 Shin Beth [the Israeli internal security agency] tries to penetrate the US Consulate General in Jerusalem through a "Honey Trap", using a clerical employee who was having an affair with a Jerusalem girl.

1985 The New York Times reports the FBI is aware of at least a dozen incidents in which American officials transferred classified information to the Israelis, quoting [former Assistant Director of the F.B.I.] Mr. [Raymond] Wannal. The Justice Department does not prosecute.

1985 Richard Smyth, the owner of MILCO, is indicted on charges of smuggling nuclear timing devices to Israel (Washington Post, 10/31/86).

1987 April 24 Wall Street Journal headline: "Role of Israel in Iran-Contra Scandal Won't be Explored in Detail by Panels"

1992 The Wall Street Journal reports that Israeli agents apparently tried to steal Recon Optical Inc's top-secret airborne spy-camera system.

1992 Stephen Bryen, caught offering confidential documents to Israel in 1978, is serving on board of the pro-Israeli Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs while continuing as a paid consultant -- with security clearance -- on exports of sensitive US technology.

1992 The Samson Option, by Seymour M. Hersh reports, "Illicitly obtained intelligence was flying so voluminously from LAKAM into Israeli intelligence that a special code name, JUMBO, was added to the security markings already on the documents. There were strict orders, Ari Ben-Menashe recalled: "Anything marked JUMBO was not supposed to be discussed with your American counterparts."

1993 The ADL is caught operating a massive spying operation on critics of Israel, Arab-Americans, the San Francisco Labor Council, ILWU Local 10, Oakland Educational Association, NAACP, Irish Northern Aid, International Indian Treaty Council, the Asian Law Caucus and the San Francisco police. Data collected was sent to Israel and in some cases to South Africa. Pressure from Jewish organizations forces the city to drop the criminal case, but the ADL settles a civil lawsuit for an undisclosed sum of cash.

1995 The Defense Investigative Service circulates a memo warning US military contractors that "Israel aggressively collects [US] military and industrial technology." The report stated that Israel obtains information using "ethnic targeting, financial aggrandizement, and identification and exploitation of individual frailties" of US citizens.

1996 A General Accounting Office report "Defense Industrial Security: Weaknesses in US Security Arrangements With Foreign-Owned Defense Contractors" found that according to intelligence sources "Country A" (identified by intelligence sources as Israel, Washington Times, 2/22/96) "conducts the most aggressive espionage operation against the United States of any US ally." The Jerusalem Post (8/30/96) quoted the report, "Classified military information and sensitive military technologies are high-priority targets for the intelligence agencies of this country." The report described "An espionage operation run by the intelligence organization responsible for collecting scientific and technologic information for [Israel] paid a US government employee to obtain US classified military intelligence documents." The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs (Shawn L. Twing, April 1996) noted that this was "a reference to the 1985 arrest of Jonathan Pollard, a civilian US naval intelligence analyst who provided Israel's LAKAM [Office of Special Tasks] espionage agency an estimated 800,000 pages of classified US intelligence information."

The GAO report also noted that "Several citizens of [Israel] were caught in the United States stealing sensitive technology used in manufacturing artillery gun tubes."

1996 An Office of Naval Intelligence document, Worldwide Challenges to Naval Strike Warfare reported that "US technology has been acquired [by China] through Israel in the form of the Lavi fighter and possibly SAM [surface-to-air] missile technology." Jane's Defense Weekly (2/28/96) noted that "until now, the intelligence community has not openly confirmed the transfer of US technology [via Israel] to China." The report noted that this "represents a dramatic step forward for Chinese military aviation." (Flight International, 3/13/96)

1997 An Army mechanical engineer, David A. Tenenbaum, "inadvertently" gives classified military information on missile systems and armored vehicles to Israeli officials (New York Times, 2/20/97).

1997 The Washington Post reports US intelligence has intercepted a conversation in which two Israeli officials had discussed the possibility of getting a confidential letter that then-Secretary of State Warren Christopher had written to Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat. One of the Israelis, identified only as "Dov", had commented that they may get the letter from "Mega", the code name for Israel's top agent inside the United States.

1997 US ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, complains privately to the Israeli government about heavy-handed surveillance by Israeli intelligence agents.

1997 Israeli agents place a tap on Monica Lewinsky's phone at the Watergate and record phone sex sessions between her and President Bill Clinton. The Ken Starr report confirms that Clinton warned Lewinsky their conversations were being taped and ended the affair. At the same time, the FBI's hunt for "Mega" is called off.

2001 It is discovered that US drug agents' communications have been penetrated. Suspicion falls on two companies, AMDOCS and Comverse Infosys, both owned by Israelis. AMDOCS generates billing data for most US phone companies and is able to provide detailed logs of who is talking to whom. Comverse Infosys builds the tapping equipment used by law enforcement to eavesdrop on all American telephone calls, but suspicion forms that Comverse, which gets half of its research and development budget from the Israeli government, has built a back door into the system that is being exploited by Israeli intelligence and that the information gleaned on US drug interdiction efforts is finding its way to drug smugglers. The investigation by the FBI leads to the exposure of the largest foreign spy ring ever uncovered inside the United States, operated by Israel. Half of the suspected spies have been arrested when 9-11 happens. On 9-11, 5 Israelis are arrested for dancing and cheering while the World Trade Towers collapse. Supposedly employed by Urban Moving Systems, the Israelis are caught with multiple passports and a lot of cash. Two of them are later revealed to be Mossad. As witness reports track the activity of the Israelis, it emerges that they were seen at Liberty Park at the time of the first impact, suggesting a foreknowledge of what was to come. The Israelis are interrogated, and then eventually sent back to Israel. The owner of the moving company used as a cover by the Mossad agents abandons his business and flees to Israel. The United States Government then classifies all of the evidence related to the Israeli agents and their connections to 9-11. All of this is reported to the public via a four part story on Fox News by Carl Cameron. Pressure from Jewish groups, primarily AIPAC, forces Fox News to remove the story from their website. Two hours prior to the 9-11 attacks, Odigo, an Israeli company with offices just a few blocks from the World Trade Towers, receives an advance warning via the internet. The manager of the New York Office provides the FBI with the IP address of the sender of the message, but the FBI does not follow up.

2001 The FBI is investigating 5 Israeli moving companies as possible fronts for Israeli intelligence.

2001 JDL's Irv Rubin arrested for planning to bomb a US Congressman. He dies before he can be brought to trial.

2002 The DEA issues a report that Israeli spies, posing as art students, have been trying to penetrate US Government offices.

2002 Police near the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station in southern Washington State stop a suspicious truck and detain two Israelis, one of whom is illegally in the United States. The two men were driving at high speed in a Ryder rental truck, which they claimed had been used to "deliver furniture." The next day, police discovered traces of TNT and RDX military-grade plastic explosives inside the passenger cabin and on the steering wheel of the vehicle. The FBI then announces that the tests that showed explosives were "false positived" by cigarette smoke, a claim test experts say is ridiculous. Based on an alibi provided by a woman, the case is closed and the Israelis are handed over to INS to be sent back to Israel. One week later, the woman who provided the alibi vanishes.

2003 The Police Chief of Cloudcroft stops a truck speeding through a school zone. The drivers turn out to be Israelis with expired passports. Claiming to be movers, the truck contains junk furniture and several boxes. The Israelis are handed over to immigration. The contents of the boxers are not revealed to the public.

2003 Israel deploys assassination squads into other countries, including the United States. The US Government does not protest.

2004 Police near the Nuclear Fuel Services plant in Tennessee stop a truck after a three mile chase, during which the driver throws a bottle containing a strange liquid from the cab. The drivers turn out to be Israelis using fake Ids. The FBI refuses to investigate and the Israelis are released.

2004 Two Israelis try to enter Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base, home to eight Trident submarines. The truck tests positive for explosives.

This brings us to the present scandal. Two years into an investigation of AIPAC's possible role as a spy front for Israel, Larry Franklin, a mid-level Pentagon Analyst is observed by the FBI giving classified information to two officials of AIPAC suspected of being Israeli spies. AIPAC hires lawyer Nathan Lewin to handle their legal defense, the same lawyer who defended suspected Israeli spy Stephen Bryen in 1978.

Larry Franklin worked in the Pentagon Office of Special Plans, run by Richard Perle, at the time Perle (who was caught giving classified information to Israel back in 1970) was insisting that Iraq was crawling with weapons of mass destruction requiring the United States to invade and conquer Iraq. There were no WMDs, of course, and Perle has dumped the blame for the "bad intelligence" on George Tenet. But what is known is that the Pentagon Office of Special Plans was coordinating with a similar group in Israel, in Ariel Sharon's office.

With two suspected Israeli spies (at least) inside the office from which the lies that launched the war in Iraq originated, it appears that the people of the United States are the victims of a deadly hoax, a hoax that started a war.

The leaking of the investigation of AIPAC to the media on August 28th, 2004 gave advance warning to other spies working with Franklin. The damage to the FBI's investigation was completed when United States Attorney General John Ashcroft ordered the FBI to stop all arrests in the case. Like the Stephen Bryen case and the hunt for "Mega", this latest spy scandal seems destined to be buried by officials who have their own secret allegiances to protect, barring a massive public outcry.

The organization at the heart of the latest spy investigation, AIPAC, wields tremendous influence over the US Congress. Through its members and affiliated PACs, AIPAC directs a huge flow of campaign cash in favor of, and occasionally against, Senators and Representatives solely on the basis of their willingness to support Israel. As an example, in 2002, U.S. Rep. Artur Davis, D-Birmingham received so much help from pro-Israeli pacs that 76% of his campaign budget came from OUTSIDE the state of Alabama, mostly from New York.

Let me repeat that. A Congressman AIPAC wanted elected received more money from pro-Israel groups outside his state than from his own constituents inside his state. Who is that Congressman going to be thinking of when he votes in Congress?

So here is the mother of all scandals.

For two years, the FBI has suspected AIPAC of spying for a foreign country, and for those two years (and for decades before) that group suspected of spying for Israel has been reshaping the US Congress for the benefit of a foreign government.

And THAT is the mother of all scandals.

Think about that as billions of your tax dollars flow to Israel while your roads and schools crumble and decay and services are cut.

Think about that as the coffins come home with your loved ones inside.

Think about that when you and a million of your fellow citizens march down the streets of America opposing wars built on lies and deceptions and wonder why the government just doesn't want to listen to you any more.

Osama Under the Bed! (and other fairytales)

Forget Osama. Here's the thing you should really be scared of

Blue Ibis

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Intelligence Centers Tap Into Personal Databases

Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Washington Post
Wed, 02 Apr 2008 11:57 EDT

Intelligence centers run by states across the country have access to personal information about millions of Americans, including unlisted cellphone numbers, insurance claims, driver's license photographs and credit reports, according to a document obtained by The Washington Post.

One center also has access to top-secret data systems at the CIA, the document shows, though it's not clear what information those systems contain.

Dozens of the organizations known as fusion centers were created after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to identify potential threats and improve the way information is shared. The centers use law enforcement analysts and sophisticated computer systems to compile, or fuse, disparate tips and clues and pass along the refined information to other agencies. They are expected to play important roles in national information-sharing networks that link local, state and federal authorities and enable them to automatically sift their storehouses of records for patterns and clues.

Though officials have publicly discussed the fusion centers' importance to national security, they have generally declined to elaborate on the centers' activities. But a document that lists resources used by the fusion centers shows how a dozen of the organizations in the northeastern United States rely far more on access to commercial and government databases than had previously been disclosed.

Those details have come to light at a time of debate about domestic intelligence efforts, including eavesdropping and data-aggregation programs at the National Security Agency, and whether the government has enough protections in place to prevent abuses.

The list of information resources was part of a survey conducted last year, officials familiar with the effort said. It shows that, like most police agencies, the fusion centers have subscriptions to private information-broker services that keep records about Americans' locations, financial holdings, associates, relatives, firearms licenses and the like.

Centers serving New York and other states also tap into a Federal Trade Commission database with information about hundreds of thousands of identity-theft reports, the document and police interviews show.

Pennsylvania buys credit reports and uses face-recognition software to examine driver's license photos, while analysts in Rhode Island have access to car-rental databases. In Maryland, authorities rely on a little-known data broker called Entersect, which claims it maintains 12 billion records about 98 percent of Americans.

In its online promotional material, Entersect calls itself "the silent partner to municipal, county, state, and federal justice agencies who access our databases every day to locate subjects, develop background information, secure information from a cellular or unlisted number, and much more."

Police officials said fusion center analysts are trained to use the information responsibly, legally and only on authorized criminal and counterterrorism cases. They stressed the importance of secret and public data in rooting out obscure threats.

[OH, where have we heard that before??]

"There is never ever enough information when it comes to terrorism" said Maj. Steven G. O'Donnell, deputy superintendent of the Rhode Island State Police. "That's what post-9/11 is about."

Government watchdogs, along with some police and intelligence officials, said they worry that the fusion centers do not have enough oversight and are not open enough with the public, in part because they operate under various state rules.

"Fusion centers have grown, really, off the radar screen of public accountability," said Jim Dempsey, vice president for public policy at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a nonpartisan watchdog group in the District. "Congress and the state legislatures need to get a handle over what is going on at all these fusion centers."

Fusion centers were formed in the wake of revelations that counterterrorism and law enforcement authorities missed or neglected evidence that the Sept. 11 attackers were in the United States while preparing to strike.

Because they are organized by the states, the centers have developed in different ways. Some are small operations focused on crime, while others are full-fledged criminal and counterterrorism operations. From 2004 to 2007, state and local governments received $254 million from the Department of Homeland Security in support of the centers, which are also supported by employees of the FBI and other federal law enforcement agencies. In some cases, they work with the U.S. Northern Command, the Pentagon operation involved in homeland security.

The centers have been criticized for being secretive, but authorities said that this is largely for security reasons. Activists want to know more about their activities, the kinds of information they collect and how the information is being used.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a lawsuit in Virginia last month seeking the release of records about communication among state fusion center officials and the departments of Homeland Security and Justice. Marc Rotenberg, the privacy center's executive director, said his group was responding to a proposed state law that would sharply limit access to records about the fusion centers' activity.

Sue Reingold, deputy program manager in the Information Sharing Environment office, a federal operation with a mandate to improve information sharing, said state and local officials "must have access to a broad array of classified and unclassified information" to perform their mission. But Reingold said that an "important part of this is appropriate training and oversight that is well understood and transparent to the public."

"Fusion centers are vital to state and local efforts to fight crime, including terrorism," she said.

The list includes a wide variety of data resources along with software that finds patterns and displays links among people.

Most of the centers have subscriptions to Accurint, ChoicePoint's Autotrack or LexisNexis. These information brokers are Web-based services that deliver instant access to billions of records on individuals' homes, cars, phone numbers and other information.

Some of the centers link to records of currency transactions and almost 5 million suspicious-activity reports filed by financial institutions with the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network.

Massachusetts and other states rely on LocatePlus, an information broker that claims that it provides "the most comprehensive cell phone, unlisted and unpublished phone database in the industry." The state also taps a private system called ClaimSearch that includes a "nationwide database that provides information on insurance claims, including vehicles, casualty claims and property claims," the document said.

The center in Ohio has access, through authorized users, to an FBI "secret level repository," the document said.

Rhode Island reported that it has access, also through the FBI, to "Top Secret resources" such as "Proton, which allows queries of CIA databases," the document shows. Officials at the Rhode Island State Police, FBI and CIA declined to discuss the system and the kinds of information it contains.

In addition to databases run by Entersect, Maryland fusion center analysts have access to wage and property records, corporate charters, utility records and a host of government files, including criminal justice information and traffic tickets. Jason Luckenbaugh, the center's chief of staff, acknowledged concern about the government's ability to tap into new sources of information. But he said the databases enable analysts to fight crime and protect against terrorism, and help local authorities do the same. "We're not trying to threaten them in any way," he said.

The Fruits of 9-11

Do you feel safer?

Blue Ibis
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In Honour of Black History Month - Looking Back on the Real Black Panthers

A short retrospective on the origins and goals of the Black Panthers, which began as a community-based group dedicated to improving the lives of black children through the provision of free breakfasts for all school childrend who needed one. The PTB found this so threatening they put the FBI on it full-time with the creation of the COINTEL program. This nefarious project (still active btw, don't you believe otherwise) pulled the full arsenal of dirty tricks to discredit, disrupt and eventually destroy a positive, empowering movement. Read "Black Child's Pledge" at the end and weep for the waste of human potential wrought by psychopathic greed.

Blue Ibis

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Pathocracy Begets Idiocracy



A. Branson
Signs of the Times
Thu, 01 Feb 2007 14:40 EST


I recently rented the movie Idiocracy, having heard from several people that is was hilariously funny and, from a few others, that it would make me weep. As usual, the few were closer to the mark.

Idiocracy is the latest film from Mike Judge, who also brought us the biting satire of Beavis and Butthead, King of the Hill and Office Space. Clearly, the man has a fascination with the less cultured side of what is known as 'American culture'. He has however found a rich comic niche for himself that others have left largely untouched. It isn't that others haven't dealt with the less palatable side of American life, it's just that no one else has done it with such verisimilitude. The characters in this movie are not caricatures. They are real. Far too real.

The premise of Idiocracy is simple. The most average man in the world - the guy at the very middle of the bell curve, literally - and a prostitute are put to sleep in a military cryogenics experiment. Like Planet of the Apes, our cryogenically frozen heroes awake much later than anticipated, finding themselves on a drastically altered, future Earth. Unlike Planet of the Apes, in which the dominant species were apes that had made the evolutionary leap to human-like intelligence, the world of Idiocracy is run by humans who've gone a long way down a devolutionary slide toward ape-like intelligence. And wackiness ensues. I suppose I would've found all that wackiness a lot funnier if it weren't so depressingly close to modern day reality.

While I can't be sure about the plot of Planet of the Apes, I can assure you we are in no danger of ever facing a world like that of Idiocracy. There will never come a time when there are only idiots left in charge, as portrayed in this movie. Maybe that sounds like optimistically good news. It isn't. What is happening is far worse.

I used to teach inner city kids. I taught at one of those technical "colleges" that caters to the underprivileged and poorly educated. As it turns out, this particular school was really only interested in using these kids to suck money out of the Pell Grant program and SallieMae via student loans that almost none of the students intended to pay back. In order to qualify for these grants and loans, these kids would have to pass a test of their basic skills. The school, wanting to get as many loans as possible going, would hedge things in favor of each entrant passing by allowing certain "testing aids." For example, students were allowed to use calculators for the arithmetic portion of the test.

Sadly, I would see kids coming out of those testing rooms each week beaming with pride at having passed. They were proud that they'd just passed an arithmetic test using a calculator! For some of them, this was quite possibly the first time in their lives that they had a feeling of accomplishment and acceptance. I found their excitement pitiful, heartbreaking and sweet all at the same time. Emotionally and intellectually, they were still small children.

The problem isn't that these kids are black, Hispanic, poor or were descendants of slaves. These populations did not become how they are today because they have simply been disenfranchised or were dealing with the wounds of their past.

They have been mercilessly manipulated by a government that is anything but compassionate.

Ignored, perhaps they would've created a subculture that met their needs with what they had available to them. But, they have not been ignored. They have been the target of an ongoing campaign of abuse and psychological warfare with the specific goal of keeping them under the thumb of law enforcement and trapped in an economic prison.

Consider, as an example, The Black Panther Party. The Panthers were, without a doubt, a revolutionary organization. Were they anti-white, as has often been claimed? Two of the original Panthers had white wives. Were they violent? They were not opposed to the use of force in defending themselves, but they did not promote the use of force as part of a revolution against the tyranny of an oppressive government. While the Panthers did march to the California capital building fully armed to protest the legislatures attempt to outlaw the carrying of loaded weapons in public (a cause since taken up by the largely white National Rifle Association), their only action on that day was the reading of a statement of protest by Bobby Seale.

What the Panthers did was far more radical than carrying guns and calling for political reforms. Instead, they took positive action to address the problems of the inner city. In January 1969, they began the Panther's Free Breakfast for School Children Program at St. Augustine's Church in Oakland, California. By the end of 1969, the Panthers were feeding over 10,000 children across the country, for free.

Just what were the Panthers trying to achieve through this program? According to the article To Feed Our Children in The Black Panther magazine of March 26, 1969:


"The Free Breakfast for School Children is about to cover the country and be initiated in every chapter and branch of the Black Panther Party. This program was created because the Black Panther Party understands that our children need a nourishing breakfast every morning so that they can learn."

"It is a beautiful sight to see our children eat in the mornings after remembering the times when our stomachs were not full, and even the teachers in the schools say that there is a great improvement in the academic skills of the children that do get the breakfast. At one time there were children that passed out in class from hunger, or had to be sent home for something to eat. But our children shall be fed, and the Black Panther Party will not let the malady of hunger keep our children down any longer."

In response, then head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, called the Panthers the "greatest threat to the internal security of the country." What is it about poor children receiving adequate nutrition so that they can learn that bothered him so? It does make one scratch their head in wonder, doesn't it? Could it be that our government wanted these children malnourished and poorly educated?

It is easy to look at the chaos of our inner cities today and assume that they brought it on themselves or that they are simply weak. In fact, many put up a valiant fight. The Panther's Free Breakfast program was begun the year following the killing of unarmed 17 year-old Bobby Hutton (one of the original Panthers) by Oakland police and the assassinations of both Martin Luther King (just two days before Hutton's death) and Bobby Kennedy. It would've been easy to let anger overtake them, but they didn't. Instead, they organized in a peaceful manner to feed children. A threat to the internal security of the country?

The attacks on the Panthers and other groups seeking to organize and improve the lives of oppressed populations at the time - attacks that included violence, infiltration, planting of false evidence, faking letters and literature and planting false news stories - were carried out for the most part by COINTELPRO. This was the FBI's counter intelligence program, begun specifically to destroy these kinds of organizations. We could go on and on with stories about COINTELPRO and their destructive actions. They attacked every organization that worked for social justice and equitable treatment of the disenfranchised and downtrodden. But, let's take a look at the present and results of their work.

Far too many people today believe COINTELPRO ended. They believe that Black and Hispanic populations today are a product of their own laziness or, perhaps, genetic inferiority. They believe these people are given ample opportunity to rise above their poverty and history to become productive members of society. Nothing could be further from the truth.

During my tenure teaching kids from areas like South Central, East LA and Compton, places that only appear in the news in conjunction with a drive-by shooting, drug bust or gang activity, I saw a clearer picture of what these kids face today. In these neighborhoods, attempts to get out only mark them for abuse. The abuse might come from gangs or friends, but it will just as likely come from the police.

I had a student who was handcuffed and shoved face first into the hood of a police car simply because he was alone in a Laundromat doing his laundry. Another was kept in a cold cell for hours then threatened with prison time because the officers who picked him up claimed that someone identified him as the person who had committed a robbery at gun point several hours earlier, during which time he was in my classroom. Tellingly, he was never placed in a lineup for a more positive identification. He was just let go after several hours of psychological abuse.

We could go on and on with these stories, too. The abuse by authority is endless in these neighborhoods. If you walk in a group of three or more there, you are considered a gang. If you walk alone, you are suspected of planning something nefarious and, most likely, picked up by a passing patrol car. After a round of threatening remarks and claims of "knowing what you are up to" you will be dropped of in a neighborhood controlled by a gang that is unfriendly to the one that controls your home neighborhood.

In the world of gangs, there is no such thing as being neutral. If you live in a gang neighborhood, you are considered an affiliate of the gang, like it or not. You take your life in your hands walking in a rival neighborhood. The common phrase used to determine your affiliation is, "where you from?" delivered in a cool, vaguely threatening manner. The officers that dropped you off in the rival neighborhood are well aware of these dynamics. Given the history of COINTELPRO and the civil rights movement, the reason for playing these dynamics to an often disastrous conclusion is clear. The fear and hatred generated is a hedge against another Black Panther Party, Cesar Chavez or Martin Luther King ever rising up from their ranks.

The abuse, the beating down, the counter intelligence attacks continue unabated and largely unnoticed by anyone outside the inner city. In that sense, nothing has changed. In another sense, quite a lot has. Today, the revolutionary spirit that once drove the inner cities to action seems nearly dead. A sort of stupefaction has overcome these people after decades of attacks they didn't understand and, so, could not protect themselves against. Their lives are more miserable than most of us can comprehend. (Why do you wear your shoes to bed in the 'hood? Because you can't afford to turn on the heat and you never know when you might have to run for your life in the middle of the night.) Yet, something is still there. The struggle continues. A spark is still alive. And, there is still the shoe of governmental authority doing its level best to stamp out that spark.

In an article on his website (http://awol.objector.org/mumia/son_cointel.html), Mumia Abu-Jamal states the reason for the attacks on groups in the civil rights movement by COINTELPRO succinctly and, I think, accurately:


"When King and Cesar Chavez were vilified by the FBI, it wasn't because they threatened public order, but because they threatened the private accumulation of capital. They were thus enemies of Empire. For this, they were harassed, harried, humiliated, and run aground."

The manipulation of the inner city is only a part of the plan to accumulate capital and power in the hands of a few. That is why we are in no danger of ever living in the world of Idiocracy. Not as it is specifically portrayed. Most of the world may become functional idiots, but they won't be the ones in power. The goal is to turn you and me into cattle. Sadly, the sound of mooing is getting louder every day.

I have to admit that I did chuckle a few times while watching Idiocracy. That the only thing that hadn't changed at all in that dystopian world was Fox News was kind of funny. Even the style of speech and overly dramatic mannerisms common in the inner city make me laugh in a sad sort of way. It's hard for me to keep a straight face when I hear someone say, "It off da hizzle fo' shizzle" [English translation: it's off the hook for sure]. On the other hand, making them the brunt of a crude joke without any thought as to why this has happened to a large segment of our population is, in my opinion, not funny at all.

When I first began teaching, I was horrified by what I found in my classroom. I had been warned before hand that I would spend most of my time entertaining and acting as a surrogate father. The warnings didn't prepare me for the reality of the situation. The kids were all past high school age, yet most of them would struggle with school work at a third grade level. The few who had managed to learn something in school were so traumatized by their environment that their efforts to learn or "go straight" could be derailed by one carelessly spoken phrase. They were, in short, casualties of a war that most of us have no idea is being waged.

What the authors of Idiocracy don't seem to understand is that these things don't happen by accident. In the 60's, Black and Hispanic groups were fighting hard to make a life for themselves that was more than mere survival. They saw clearly what the government of the U.S. was about and were working to make a positive change. For that, they were attacked and, eventually, brought to their knees.

If you still find Idiocracy a funny take on the degradation of American culture, take a moment to consider the inner city back in 1968, when The Black Panther published the following on December 26th of that year. Think about the spirit of the people in the inner cities then, how far we have fallen since, and why it happened. Think about the fact that the attacks to keep them down are ongoing. And, think about this: those attacks are spreading to other segments of the population.


Black Child's Pledge

by Shirley Williams

I pledge allegiance to my Black People.

I pledge to develop my mind and body to the greatest extent possible.

I will learn all that I can in order to give my best to my People in their struggle for liberation.

I will keep myself physically fit, building a strong body free from drugs and other substances which weaken me and make me less capable of protecting myself, my family and my Black brothers and sisters.

I will unselfishly share my knowledge and understanding with them in order to bring about change more quickly.
I will discipline myself to direct my energies thoughtfully and constructively rather than wasting them in idle hatred.

I will train myself never to hurt or allow others to harm my Black brothers and sisters for I recognize that we need every Black Man, Woman, and Child to be physically, mentally and psychologically strong.

These principles I pledge to practice daily and to teach them to others in order to unite my People.