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Pentagon Good. President Bad.

Everyone should read the article by Robert Dreyfus in Rolling Stone (4/20) reviewing the Pentagon's domestic intelligence operations since 9/11 .

In 2002 the President authorized the creation of Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), to consolidate all military intelligence capabilities with the hope it could head-off any future attacks or sabotage. This program was later expanded to include a program called Threat and Local Observation Notices (TALONs), which quiet literally gathered tips from local law enforcement and regular folks on any suspicious activities especially in and around military facilities.

Overtime, this program has become somewhat abusive, if not a bit ridiculous.  For example, among the groups added to the CIFA’s database where totally harmless anti-Iraq war groups like Truth Project and the Raging Grannies. The danger with a program like this is obvious. CIFA could have grown into a sort of American Gestapo with neighbors calling on neighbors.  But it did not exactly work out that way, as one a retired Army intelligence officer Christopher Pyle made clear, “a lot of them (TALONs) are filed by paranoid housewives and rabid, retired colonels with nothing better to do…”

And the military, in stark contrast to the Executive Branch, has admitted the error of its ways and is in the process of reviewing the program. As acting deputy undersecretary of defense for counterintelligence and security indicated, “We’ve laid our dirty laundry on the table, we recognize that have to sharpen our focus.”

How refreshing? Little Brother Is Watching wishes the Executive Branch of the Government of the United States could have that kind of honor and foresight.

EFF, AT&T and Mark Klein

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed evidence supporting a motion for preliminary injunction in its class-action lawsuit against AT&T.

The new evidence was based on documentation provided by whistle-blower Mark Klein, a retired AT&T employee, who claims that the NSA has secretly placed a system to monitor phone calls at a switching station in San Francisco. For all the radio patriots out there who scream that a transparent review of the government’s wire-tapping procedures will somehow help terrorists, the EFF made the filing under seal -- a well-established procedure that prohibits public access and permits only the judge.

No matter the outcome of this case, we can all be hopeful for a future when the United States can still produce heros like Mark Klein. In the words of EFF Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl, "Mark Klein is a true American hero...he has bravely come forward with information critical for proving AT&T's involvement with the government's invasive surveillance program."

Little Brother Is Watching could not agree more. Bravo Mark. Bravo EFF.

Book Review: The Whiskey Rebellion

A new book The Whiskey Rebellion by William Hogeland  has been published at serendipitous time. This history of the rebellion by Pennsylvania frontiersman against the federal government's tax on domestic Whiskey covers many of the themes we face today. It’s all here, the power of moneyed interests on the government, Congressional and Executive self-dealing to fund the war effort, the role and rights of the executive branch in a time of war, domestic terrorism, masked insurgents, religious absolutism, and the impact the national debt has on politics.

The Whiskey rebels were the Al Qaeda of the day and by the end of the book, Washington and Hamilton make a final push to round them up. This final phase has eerie parallels to the present day. And as Hogeland makes clear,  "almost every adult male was fair game for capture. The fact that most of those arrested would have to be turned loose later was not an issue…” It seems, sadly, the more things change the more they stay the same.

Republicans have bad memories

Given the quick response from most Republicans defending the President’s right to secretly wire-tap American citizens it is surprising to remember that Republican were once even stronger defenders of the right to privacy than the Democrats.  In fact, when the Clinton Administration tried to loosen the rules regarding surveillance to hunt potential terrorists it was the Republicans who put a stop to it.

Learn more:

Daily Kos
News Max
City Journal

Remember when we Spied on Spies

Just a little levity here. Anyone else wistful for those halcyon days when domestic spying conjured images of deft James Bond-types uncoving drunken, sad sack CIA agents and wannabe Commies?

Aldrich Hazen Ames