Mother of 9/11 Victim Condemns King Hearing on Muslim "Radicalization"
Democracy Now
New York Republican Congressman Peter King—chair of the House Committee on Homeland Security—held a controversial hearing yesterday on what he calls the "radicalization" of the American-Muslim community. Critics call the hearings a modern-day form of McCarthyism. We speak to Talat Hamdani, the mother of Mohammed Salman Hamdani, who died in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Minnesota Democrat Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, broke down in tears at the hearing when telling the story of his son. We also speak with Mark Potok, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Talat Hamdani, the mother of Mohammed Salman Hamdani, who died in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. He was 23. She is a member of the group, September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows.
Mark Potok, Director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Showing posts with label Homeland Security. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Homeland Security. Show all posts
Friday, March 11, 2011
Friday, December 03, 2010
Glenn Greenwald: Joe Liberman Emulates Chinese Dictators
Joe Lieberman emulates Chinese dictators
by Glenn Greenwald
Salon
...
That Joe Lieberman is abusing his position as Homeland Security Chairman to thuggishly dictate to private companies which websites they should and should not host -- and, more important, what you can and cannot read on the Internet -- is one of the most pernicious acts by a U.S. Senator in quite some time. Josh Marshall wrote yesterday: "When I'd heard that Amazon had agreed to host Wikileaks I was frankly surprised given all the fish a big corporation like Amazon has to fry with the federal government." That's true of all large corporations that own media outlets -- every one -- and that is one big reason why they're so servile to U.S. Government interests and easily manipulated by those in political power. That's precisely the dynamic Lieberman was exploiting with his menacing little phone call to Amazon (in essence: Hi, this is the Senate's Homeland Security Committee calling; you're going to be taking down that WikiLeaks site right away, right?). Amazon, of course, did what they were told.
Note that Lieberman here is desperate to prevent American citizens -- not The Terrorists -- from reading the WikiLeaks documents which shed light on what the U.S. Government is doing. His concern is domestic consumption. By his own account, he did this to "send a message to other companies that might host WikiLeaks" not to do so. No matter what you think of WikiLeaks, they have never been charged with, let alone convicted of, any crime; Lieberman literally wants to dictate -- unilaterally -- what you can and cannot read on the Internet, to prevent Americans from accessing documents that much of the rest of the world is freely reading.
The Internet, of course, is rendering decrepit would-be petty tyrants like Lieberman impotent and obsolete: WikiLeaks moved its website to a Swedish server and was accessible again within hours. But any attempt by political officials to start blocking Americans' access to political content on the Internet ought to provoke serious uproar and unrest. If the Tea Party movement and the Right generally were even minimally genuine in their ostensible beliefs, few things would trigger more intense objections than a political official trying to dictate to private actors which political content they should allow on the Internet (instead, you have Newt Gingrich demanding that Assange be declared an "enemy combatant" and Sarah Palin calling for his murder). Remember, though -- as The Post told us today -- it's "authoritarian governments and tightly controlled media in China and across the Arab Middle East" which are trying to prevent citizens from learning about the WikiLeaks documents.
...
If there's Nothing New in these documents, can Jonathan Capehart (or any other "journalist" claiming this) please point to where The Washington Post previously reported on these facts, all revealed by the WikiLeaks disclosures:
(1) the U.S. military formally adopted a policy of turning a blind eye to systematic, pervasive torture and other abuses by Iraqi forces;
(2) the State Department threatened Germany not to criminally investigate the CIA's kidnapping of one of its citizens who turned out to be completely innocent;
(3) the State Department under Bush and Obama applied continuous pressure on the Spanish Government to suppress investigations of the CIA's torture of its citizens and the 2003 killing of a Spanish photojournalist when the U.S. military fired on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad (see The Philadelphia Inquirer's Will Bunch today about this: "The day Barack Obama Lied to me");
(4) the British Government privately promised to shield Bush officials from embarrassment as part of its Iraq War "investigation";
(5) there were at least 15,000 people killed in Iraq that were previously uncounted;
(6) "American leaders lied, knowingly, to the American public, to American troops, and to the world" about the Iraq war as it was prosecuted, a conclusion the Post's own former Baghdad Bureau Chief wrote was proven by the WikiLeaks documents;
(7) the U.S.'s own Ambassador concluded that the July, 2009 removal of the Honduran President was illegal -- a coup -- but the State Department did not want to conclude that and thus ignored it until it was too late to matter;
(8) U.S. and British officials colluded to allow the U.S. to keep cluster bombs on British soil even though Britain had signed the treaty banning such weapons, and,
(9) Hillary Clinton's State Department ordered diplomats to collect passwords, emails, and biometric data on U.N. and other foreign officials, almost certainly in violation of the Vienna Treaty of 1961.
That's just a sampling.
This is what Joe Lieberman and his comrades are desperately trying to suppress -- literally prevent it from being accessible on the Internet. And "journalists" like Capehart play along by continuing to insist there's "nothing new" being revealed by WikiLeaks despite their never having reported any of this. And since the disclosures, does anyone believe that any of these revelations have received anything close to meaningful attention by the American establishment media? But remember -- as Capehart's newspaper taught us today -- "revelations by the organization WikiLeaks have received blanket coverage this week on television, in newspapers" in Free America -- showing what a Vibrant, Adversarial Press we are blessed with -- but "in many Arab countries, the mainstream media have largely avoided reporting on the sensitive contents of the cables."
To Read the Rest of the Commentary and To Access Hyperlinked Resources
by Glenn Greenwald
Salon
...
That Joe Lieberman is abusing his position as Homeland Security Chairman to thuggishly dictate to private companies which websites they should and should not host -- and, more important, what you can and cannot read on the Internet -- is one of the most pernicious acts by a U.S. Senator in quite some time. Josh Marshall wrote yesterday: "When I'd heard that Amazon had agreed to host Wikileaks I was frankly surprised given all the fish a big corporation like Amazon has to fry with the federal government." That's true of all large corporations that own media outlets -- every one -- and that is one big reason why they're so servile to U.S. Government interests and easily manipulated by those in political power. That's precisely the dynamic Lieberman was exploiting with his menacing little phone call to Amazon (in essence: Hi, this is the Senate's Homeland Security Committee calling; you're going to be taking down that WikiLeaks site right away, right?). Amazon, of course, did what they were told.
Note that Lieberman here is desperate to prevent American citizens -- not The Terrorists -- from reading the WikiLeaks documents which shed light on what the U.S. Government is doing. His concern is domestic consumption. By his own account, he did this to "send a message to other companies that might host WikiLeaks" not to do so. No matter what you think of WikiLeaks, they have never been charged with, let alone convicted of, any crime; Lieberman literally wants to dictate -- unilaterally -- what you can and cannot read on the Internet, to prevent Americans from accessing documents that much of the rest of the world is freely reading.
The Internet, of course, is rendering decrepit would-be petty tyrants like Lieberman impotent and obsolete: WikiLeaks moved its website to a Swedish server and was accessible again within hours. But any attempt by political officials to start blocking Americans' access to political content on the Internet ought to provoke serious uproar and unrest. If the Tea Party movement and the Right generally were even minimally genuine in their ostensible beliefs, few things would trigger more intense objections than a political official trying to dictate to private actors which political content they should allow on the Internet (instead, you have Newt Gingrich demanding that Assange be declared an "enemy combatant" and Sarah Palin calling for his murder). Remember, though -- as The Post told us today -- it's "authoritarian governments and tightly controlled media in China and across the Arab Middle East" which are trying to prevent citizens from learning about the WikiLeaks documents.
...
If there's Nothing New in these documents, can Jonathan Capehart (or any other "journalist" claiming this) please point to where The Washington Post previously reported on these facts, all revealed by the WikiLeaks disclosures:
(1) the U.S. military formally adopted a policy of turning a blind eye to systematic, pervasive torture and other abuses by Iraqi forces;
(2) the State Department threatened Germany not to criminally investigate the CIA's kidnapping of one of its citizens who turned out to be completely innocent;
(3) the State Department under Bush and Obama applied continuous pressure on the Spanish Government to suppress investigations of the CIA's torture of its citizens and the 2003 killing of a Spanish photojournalist when the U.S. military fired on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad (see The Philadelphia Inquirer's Will Bunch today about this: "The day Barack Obama Lied to me");
(4) the British Government privately promised to shield Bush officials from embarrassment as part of its Iraq War "investigation";
(5) there were at least 15,000 people killed in Iraq that were previously uncounted;
(6) "American leaders lied, knowingly, to the American public, to American troops, and to the world" about the Iraq war as it was prosecuted, a conclusion the Post's own former Baghdad Bureau Chief wrote was proven by the WikiLeaks documents;
(7) the U.S.'s own Ambassador concluded that the July, 2009 removal of the Honduran President was illegal -- a coup -- but the State Department did not want to conclude that and thus ignored it until it was too late to matter;
(8) U.S. and British officials colluded to allow the U.S. to keep cluster bombs on British soil even though Britain had signed the treaty banning such weapons, and,
(9) Hillary Clinton's State Department ordered diplomats to collect passwords, emails, and biometric data on U.N. and other foreign officials, almost certainly in violation of the Vienna Treaty of 1961.
That's just a sampling.
This is what Joe Lieberman and his comrades are desperately trying to suppress -- literally prevent it from being accessible on the Internet. And "journalists" like Capehart play along by continuing to insist there's "nothing new" being revealed by WikiLeaks despite their never having reported any of this. And since the disclosures, does anyone believe that any of these revelations have received anything close to meaningful attention by the American establishment media? But remember -- as Capehart's newspaper taught us today -- "revelations by the organization WikiLeaks have received blanket coverage this week on television, in newspapers" in Free America -- showing what a Vibrant, Adversarial Press we are blessed with -- but "in many Arab countries, the mainstream media have largely avoided reporting on the sensitive contents of the cables."
To Read the Rest of the Commentary and To Access Hyperlinked Resources
Thursday, December 02, 2010
Julianne Hing: Janet Napolitano -- DREAM Act’s Good for National Security
Napolitano: DREAM Act’s Good for National Security
by Julianne Hing
Colorlines
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano today became the latest member in President Obama’s cabinet to urge Congress to pass the DREAM Act when it comes up for a vote. A version of the DREAM Act could come up for a vote in the House as early as Friday, according to immigration advocacy groups.
“I know that Congress is going to be considering the DREAM Act soon and I wanted to reemphasize my support for it,” Sec. Napolitano said on a press call today, adding that even though the DREAM Act directly benefits many of the nation’s economic, education, and national defense priorities, it is important for her agency’s immigration enforcement work as well.
“From where I sit I think it’s important to point out that it fits into a larger strategy of immigration enforcement and complements the Department of Homeland Security plan to prioritize enforcement resources to remove dangerous criminal aliens from the country,” the Secretary said, omitting the fact that under her watch the U.S. has actually deported plenty of people with no prior criminal convictions, including DREAM Act-eligible youth.
The DREAM Act would grant undocumented youth with clean criminal records who came to the country as kids and who commit two years to the military or higher education a pathway to citizenship. Democrats are working a last-minute push to pass the bill in the lame-duck session before the Republicans take over the House and gain new seats in the Senate next year.
“The DREAM Act is one thing that Congress can do right now to help the Department of Homeland Security do its job of enforcing immigration laws in the way that makes the most sense for public safety for our national security,” Napolitano said.
Might the Department of Homeland Security consider putting a moratorium on deportations of DREAM Act-eligible youth while the bill is under consideration? Sec. Napolitano didn’t hesitate in her answer: “No.”
“Our job is to enforce the law and we’re going to continue to do that,” Napolitano said. “We do not have the option under the law to simply say we will not enforce it while Congress considers [the DREAM Act].”
Napolitano then repeated what has become a familiar boast from the Obama administration: “We have in the last two years led a historic move to remove a record number of illegal aliens of criminal offenses,” Napolitano proudly said. “195,000 just in fiscal year 2010, a 70 percent increase over the last year of the previous administration in fiscal year 2008.” In fact, the total number of those deported was 392,000—the rest had never been convicted of anything before the country forced them out.
To Read the Rest of the Report
by Julianne Hing
Colorlines
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano today became the latest member in President Obama’s cabinet to urge Congress to pass the DREAM Act when it comes up for a vote. A version of the DREAM Act could come up for a vote in the House as early as Friday, according to immigration advocacy groups.
“I know that Congress is going to be considering the DREAM Act soon and I wanted to reemphasize my support for it,” Sec. Napolitano said on a press call today, adding that even though the DREAM Act directly benefits many of the nation’s economic, education, and national defense priorities, it is important for her agency’s immigration enforcement work as well.
“From where I sit I think it’s important to point out that it fits into a larger strategy of immigration enforcement and complements the Department of Homeland Security plan to prioritize enforcement resources to remove dangerous criminal aliens from the country,” the Secretary said, omitting the fact that under her watch the U.S. has actually deported plenty of people with no prior criminal convictions, including DREAM Act-eligible youth.
The DREAM Act would grant undocumented youth with clean criminal records who came to the country as kids and who commit two years to the military or higher education a pathway to citizenship. Democrats are working a last-minute push to pass the bill in the lame-duck session before the Republicans take over the House and gain new seats in the Senate next year.
“The DREAM Act is one thing that Congress can do right now to help the Department of Homeland Security do its job of enforcing immigration laws in the way that makes the most sense for public safety for our national security,” Napolitano said.
Might the Department of Homeland Security consider putting a moratorium on deportations of DREAM Act-eligible youth while the bill is under consideration? Sec. Napolitano didn’t hesitate in her answer: “No.”
“Our job is to enforce the law and we’re going to continue to do that,” Napolitano said. “We do not have the option under the law to simply say we will not enforce it while Congress considers [the DREAM Act].”
Napolitano then repeated what has become a familiar boast from the Obama administration: “We have in the last two years led a historic move to remove a record number of illegal aliens of criminal offenses,” Napolitano proudly said. “195,000 just in fiscal year 2010, a 70 percent increase over the last year of the previous administration in fiscal year 2008.” In fact, the total number of those deported was 392,000—the rest had never been convicted of anything before the country forced them out.
To Read the Rest of the Report
Rachel Slajda: After Getting Amazon To Boot Wikileaks, Lieberman Eyes Other Firms
After Getting Amazon To Boot Wikileaks, Lieberman Eyes Other Firms (VIDEO)
by Rachel Slajda
Talking Points Memo
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, yesterday succeeded in getting Amazon.com to boot Wikileaks off its servers.
Now, Lieberman says he's widening his scope.
"We've gotta put pressure on any companies -- like Amazon, [which] just cut Wikileaks off from its servers to distribute -- there's a company now in Sweden, I think it's called Bahnhof, which is providing that kind of access to the Internet to Wikileaks," he said on MSNBC this afternoon. "We've got to stop them from doing that."
As TPM reported yesterday, Lieberman's committee staff called Amazon and asked, "Are there plans to take the site down?"
Amazon responded by removing the site, telling the committee it violated unspecified terms of use.
TPM yesterday asked a committee spokeswoman, Leslie Phillips, whether Lieberman was planning to reach out to other companies.
"The committee is not reaching out to other companies," she said. "Senator Lieberman hopes that the Amazon case will send the message to other companies that might host Wikileaks that it would be irresponsible to host the site."
To Read the Rest of the Report, Access hyperlinked resources, and watch a video
by Rachel Slajda
Talking Points Memo
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, yesterday succeeded in getting Amazon.com to boot Wikileaks off its servers.
Now, Lieberman says he's widening his scope.
"We've gotta put pressure on any companies -- like Amazon, [which] just cut Wikileaks off from its servers to distribute -- there's a company now in Sweden, I think it's called Bahnhof, which is providing that kind of access to the Internet to Wikileaks," he said on MSNBC this afternoon. "We've got to stop them from doing that."
As TPM reported yesterday, Lieberman's committee staff called Amazon and asked, "Are there plans to take the site down?"
Amazon responded by removing the site, telling the committee it violated unspecified terms of use.
TPM yesterday asked a committee spokeswoman, Leslie Phillips, whether Lieberman was planning to reach out to other companies.
"The committee is not reaching out to other companies," she said. "Senator Lieberman hopes that the Amazon case will send the message to other companies that might host Wikileaks that it would be irresponsible to host the site."
To Read the Rest of the Report, Access hyperlinked resources, and watch a video
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
On the Media: Suspicionless Laptop Searches at the Border
Suspicionless Laptop Searches at the Border
On the Media (NPR)
... the American Civil Liberties Union and two other groups filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security over its suspicionless border searches of electronic devices. While the government considers its authority to search laptops and PDAs to be consistent with its power over briefcases and backpacks, ACLU attorney Catherine Crump says that the nature of information on a personal laptop can make these searches unconstitutionally intrusive.
To Listen/Read the Episode
On the Media (NPR)
... the American Civil Liberties Union and two other groups filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security over its suspicionless border searches of electronic devices. While the government considers its authority to search laptops and PDAs to be consistent with its power over briefcases and backpacks, ACLU attorney Catherine Crump says that the nature of information on a personal laptop can make these searches unconstitutionally intrusive.
To Listen/Read the Episode
Monday, November 22, 2010
Paul Craig Roberts: TSA Gestapo Empire
TSA officials say that anyone refusing both the full body scanners and the enhanced pat down procedures will be taken into custody. Once there the detainees will not only be barred from flying, but will be held indefinitely as suspected terrorists . . . One sheriff’s office said they were already preparing to handle a large number of detainees and plan to treat them as terror suspects.(Anti-War)
TSA Gestapo Empire
by Paul Craig Roberts
Foreign Policy Journal
It doesn’t take a bureaucrat long to create an empire. John Pistole, the FBI agent who took over the Transportation Security Administration on July 1 told USA Today 16 days later that protecting trains and subways from terrorist attacks will be as high a priority for him as air travel.
It is difficult to imagine New Yorkers being porno-screened and sexually groped on crowed subway platforms or showing up an hour or two in advance for clearance for a 15 minute subway ride, but once bureaucrats get the bit in their teeth they take absurdity to its logical conclusion. Buses will be next, although it is even more difficult to imagine open air bus stops turned into security zones with screeners and gropers inspecting passengers before they board.
Will taxi passengers be next? In those Muslim lands whose citizens the US government has been slaughtering for years, favorite weapons for retaliating against the Americans are car and truck bombs. How long before Pistole announces that the TSA Gestapo is setting up roadblocks on city streets, highways and interstates to check cars for bombs?
That 15 minute trip to the grocery store then becomes an all day affair.
Indeed, it has already begun. Last September agents from Homeland Security, TSA, and the US Department of Transportation, assisted by the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, conducted a counter-terrorism operation on busy Interstate 20 just west of Atlanta, Georgia. Designated VIPER (Visible Inter-mobile Prevention and Response), the operation required all trucks to stop to be screened for bombs. Federal agents used dogs, screening devices, and a large drive-through bomb detection machine. Imagine what the delays did to delivery schedules and truckers’ bottom lines.
There are also news reports of federal trucks equipped with backscatter X-ray devices that secretly scan cars and pedestrians.
With such expensive counter-terrorism activities, both in terms of the hard-pressed taxpayers’ money and civil liberties, one would think that bombs were going off all over America. But, of course, they aren’t. There has not been a successful terrorist act since 9/11, and thousands of independent experts doubt the government’s explanation of that event.
Subsequent domestic terrorist events have turned out to be FBI sting operations in which FBI agents organize not-so-bright disaffected members of society and lead them into displaying interest in participating in a terrorist act. Once the FBI agent, pretending to be a terrorist, succeeds in prompting all the right words to be said and captured on his hidden recorder, the “terrorists” are arrested and the “plot” exposed.
The very fact that the FBI has to orchestrate fake terrorism proves the absence of real terrorists.
If Americans were more thoughtful and less gullible, they might wonder why all the emphasis on transportation when there are so many soft targets. Shopping centers, for example. If there were enough terrorists in America to justify the existence of Homeland Security, bombs would be going off round the clock in shopping malls in every state. The effect would be far more terrifying than blowing up an airliner.
Indeed, if terrorists want to attack air travelers, they never need to board an airplane.
All they need to do is to join the throngs of passengers waiting to go through the TSA scanners and set off their bombs. The TSA has conveniently assembled the targets.
The final proof that there are no terrorists is that not a single neoconservative or government official responsible for the Bush regime’s invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and the Obama regime’s slaughters of Pakistanis, Yemenis, and Somalians has been assassinated. None of these Americans who are responsible for lies, deceptions, and invasions that have destroyed the lives of countless numbers of Muslims have any security protection. If Muslims were capable of pulling off 9/11, they are certainly capable of assassinating Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith, Libby, Condi Rice, Kristol, Bolton, Goldberg, and scores of others during the same hour of the same day.
To Read the Rest of the Article
Monday, November 15, 2010
Investigation Reveals Massive, Unmanageable, Outsourced US Intelligence System; Shorrock Asks Why It Took the Washington Post So Long to Investigate
Democracy Now
Investigation Reveals Massive, Unmanageable, Outsourced US Intelligence System
An explosive investigative series published in the Washington Post ... begins, "The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work." Among the findings: An estimated 854,000 people hold top-secret security clearances. More than 1,200 government organizations and nearly 2,000 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in 10,000 locations. We speak with one of the co-authors of the series, Bill Arkin.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Tim Shorrock Asks Why It Took the Washington Post So Long to Investigate the US Intelligence System
"With all due respect to the Washington Post—and Dana Priest and Bill Arkin are very good reporters—we have to ask, why did it take them seven years to do this story?" says Tim Shorrock, an investigative journalist and author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing. "Anyone who’s been covering intelligence or national security in Washington knows that intelligence has been privatized to an incredible extent."
To Watch/Listen/Read
Investigation Reveals Massive, Unmanageable, Outsourced US Intelligence System
An explosive investigative series published in the Washington Post ... begins, "The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work." Among the findings: An estimated 854,000 people hold top-secret security clearances. More than 1,200 government organizations and nearly 2,000 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in 10,000 locations. We speak with one of the co-authors of the series, Bill Arkin.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Tim Shorrock Asks Why It Took the Washington Post So Long to Investigate the US Intelligence System
"With all due respect to the Washington Post—and Dana Priest and Bill Arkin are very good reporters—we have to ask, why did it take them seven years to do this story?" says Tim Shorrock, an investigative journalist and author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing. "Anyone who’s been covering intelligence or national security in Washington knows that intelligence has been privatized to an incredible extent."
To Watch/Listen/Read
Tuesday, October 05, 2010
Dave Lindorff: Forget Radar, Now the Government Is X-Raying You as You Drive
Getting Some Rays: Forget Radar, Now the Government Is X-Raying You as You Drive
by Dave Lindorff
Common Dreams
If you have been feeling uneasy about having to be X-rayed by a Transportation Security Administration goon who can look under your clothes every time you fly, consider this: at least you can say no, and agree to be subjected to an old-fashioned full-body search.
No opt-out for the latest in anti-terror technology though, with reports just out in Forbes Magazine and the Christian Science Monitor that the Homeland Security Department has purchased 500 mobile X-ray vans called ZBVs that can scan cars, trucks and homes without the drivers even knowing that they're being zapped.
These vans, made by a Massachusetts company called American Science & Engineering, are fitted out with what are called Z Backscatter X-ray devices, which aim a focused X-ray beam that reportedly has the capability of penetrating 14 inches of steel.
In theory, the device is supposed to be safe for human targets, because it is operated at a distance, and because the beam is weakened by penetrating the metal of a vehicle before it reaches a person. But the flaws in this kind of reassuring safety calculus are readily apparent in a photo of a small truck carrying contraband that accompanies the Christian Science Monitor story. The X-ray image, after penetrating the truck cab's metal body, clearly shows the contraband behind the driver's seat, but it also just as clearly shows the shadowy outline of the driver of the pickup. Worse yet, even his window is half-way down, so there is no shielding at all of the X-rays hitting his head.
We can expect these mobile X-ray vans to be proliferating around the country soon, if they're not out there already, but they may be hard to spot. As American Science & Engineering says in a note to investors on the company website:
A breakthrough in X-ray detection technology, AS&E's Z Backscatter Van is the number one selling non-intrusive mobile inspection system on the market. The ZBV system is a low-cost, highly mobile screening system built into a commercially available delivery van.
Prof. Peter Rez, a physicist a Arizona State University who specializes in X-ray technology, and who has been doing research on backscatter X-ray dosages, says that if used properly, the radiation doses received by targeted persons would be very minute, but then he notes that if the government begins a major campaign of surreptitious X-raying on highways and at locations of security concern (the machines are already being used at major sporting events like the Superbowl), there have to be concerns about whether the machines are being maintained in proper working condition (driving them around on America's run-down highways is subjecting the machines to quite a beating), and about whether the operators are using them properly.
To Read the Rest of the Article
by Dave Lindorff
Common Dreams
If you have been feeling uneasy about having to be X-rayed by a Transportation Security Administration goon who can look under your clothes every time you fly, consider this: at least you can say no, and agree to be subjected to an old-fashioned full-body search.
No opt-out for the latest in anti-terror technology though, with reports just out in Forbes Magazine and the Christian Science Monitor that the Homeland Security Department has purchased 500 mobile X-ray vans called ZBVs that can scan cars, trucks and homes without the drivers even knowing that they're being zapped.
These vans, made by a Massachusetts company called American Science & Engineering, are fitted out with what are called Z Backscatter X-ray devices, which aim a focused X-ray beam that reportedly has the capability of penetrating 14 inches of steel.
In theory, the device is supposed to be safe for human targets, because it is operated at a distance, and because the beam is weakened by penetrating the metal of a vehicle before it reaches a person. But the flaws in this kind of reassuring safety calculus are readily apparent in a photo of a small truck carrying contraband that accompanies the Christian Science Monitor story. The X-ray image, after penetrating the truck cab's metal body, clearly shows the contraband behind the driver's seat, but it also just as clearly shows the shadowy outline of the driver of the pickup. Worse yet, even his window is half-way down, so there is no shielding at all of the X-rays hitting his head.
We can expect these mobile X-ray vans to be proliferating around the country soon, if they're not out there already, but they may be hard to spot. As American Science & Engineering says in a note to investors on the company website:
A breakthrough in X-ray detection technology, AS&E's Z Backscatter Van is the number one selling non-intrusive mobile inspection system on the market. The ZBV system is a low-cost, highly mobile screening system built into a commercially available delivery van.
Prof. Peter Rez, a physicist a Arizona State University who specializes in X-ray technology, and who has been doing research on backscatter X-ray dosages, says that if used properly, the radiation doses received by targeted persons would be very minute, but then he notes that if the government begins a major campaign of surreptitious X-raying on highways and at locations of security concern (the machines are already being used at major sporting events like the Superbowl), there have to be concerns about whether the machines are being maintained in proper working condition (driving them around on America's run-down highways is subjecting the machines to quite a beating), and about whether the operators are using them properly.
To Read the Rest of the Article
Monday, July 19, 2010
Democracy Now: "Top Secret America" Washington Post Investigation Reveals Massive, Unmanageable, Outsourced US Intelligence System
"Top Secret America" Washington Post Investigation Reveals Massive, Unmanageable, Outsourced US Intelligence System
Democracy Now
An explosive investigative series published in the Washington Post today begins, "The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work." Among the findings: An estimated 854,000 people hold top-secret security clearances. More than 1,200 government organizations and nearly 2,000 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in 10,000 locations. We speak with one of the co-authors of the series, Bill Arkin.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Tim Shorrock Asks Why It Took the Washington Post So Long to Investigate the US Intelligence System
Democracy Now
"With all due respect to the Washington Post, Dana Priest and Bill Arkin are very good reporters, we have to ask, why did it take them seven years to do this story?" says Tim Shorrock, an investigative journalist and author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing. "Anyone who’s been covering intelligence or national security in Washington knows that intelligence has been privatized to an incredible extent."
To Watch/Listen/Read
Democracy Now
An explosive investigative series published in the Washington Post today begins, "The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work." Among the findings: An estimated 854,000 people hold top-secret security clearances. More than 1,200 government organizations and nearly 2,000 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in 10,000 locations. We speak with one of the co-authors of the series, Bill Arkin.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Tim Shorrock Asks Why It Took the Washington Post So Long to Investigate the US Intelligence System
Democracy Now
"With all due respect to the Washington Post, Dana Priest and Bill Arkin are very good reporters, we have to ask, why did it take them seven years to do this story?" says Tim Shorrock, an investigative journalist and author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing. "Anyone who’s been covering intelligence or national security in Washington knows that intelligence has been privatized to an incredible extent."
To Watch/Listen/Read
Monday, March 15, 2010
Democracy Now: David Price -- “The CIA Is Welcoming Itself Back onto American University Campuses”
David Price: “The CIA Is Welcoming Itself Back onto American University Campuses”
Democracy Now
In the latest edition of CounterPunch magazine, the anthropologist David Price reveals the US intelligence community has established academic outposts at twenty-two US universities over the past four years. Government agencies, including the CIA, FBI, National Security Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, and Homeland Security, have helped found “Intelligence Community Centers for Academic Excellence,” or ICCAEs—pronounced “Icky.” The ICCAEs aim to create a “systematic long-term program at universities and colleges to recruit and hire eligible talent for [intelligence community] agencies and components” and “increase the [intelligence recruiting] pipeline of students.”
Guest:
David Price, founding member of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, which just published The Counter-Counterinsurgency Manual: Or Notes on Demilitarizing American Society. He is also an associate professor of anthropology at St. Martin’s University in Lacey, Washington, and the author of Anthropological Intelligence: The Deployment and Neglect of American Anthropology in the Second World War and Threatening Anthropology: McCarthyism and the FBI’s Surveillance of Activist Anthropologists.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Democracy Now
In the latest edition of CounterPunch magazine, the anthropologist David Price reveals the US intelligence community has established academic outposts at twenty-two US universities over the past four years. Government agencies, including the CIA, FBI, National Security Agency, Defense Intelligence Agency, and Homeland Security, have helped found “Intelligence Community Centers for Academic Excellence,” or ICCAEs—pronounced “Icky.” The ICCAEs aim to create a “systematic long-term program at universities and colleges to recruit and hire eligible talent for [intelligence community] agencies and components” and “increase the [intelligence recruiting] pipeline of students.”
Guest:
David Price, founding member of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, which just published The Counter-Counterinsurgency Manual: Or Notes on Demilitarizing American Society. He is also an associate professor of anthropology at St. Martin’s University in Lacey, Washington, and the author of Anthropological Intelligence: The Deployment and Neglect of American Anthropology in the Second World War and Threatening Anthropology: McCarthyism and the FBI’s Surveillance of Activist Anthropologists.
To Watch/Listen/Read
Sunday, February 07, 2010
Randall Amster: Homeland Insecurity -- Why "No-Fly" Just Doesn't Fly
Homeland Insecurity: Why "No-Fly" Just Doesn't Fly
by Randall Amster
Truthout
Here's a quick quiz: What do Ted Kennedy, Cat Stevens and Nelson Mandela have in common? Okay, so that's an easy one for you folks with attention spans longer than it takes to type out a tweet. Indeed, all of these luminaries have appeared on the "No-Fly List," also known as the "Terrorist Watch List," which is used to prevent suspect persons from being able to fly on commercial aircraft in or out of the United States. The list was established after 9/11, and is estimated to contain perhaps half a million names, although its precise workings are shrouded by the vicissitudes of "national security."
Following the Christmas Day bombing attempt, it has been reported by CNN that "the US government has lowered the threshold for information deemed important enough to put suspicious individuals on a watch list or no-fly list, or have their visa revoked." Officials have stated that "the new standard is much lower than before December 25. For example, decisions could be taken to put someone on a no-fly list or a watch list based on one credible source, instead of the previous standard of using multiple sources." As Wired subsequently reported, not everyone on a "watch list" automatically winds up on the "no fly list," although the implications of being on any incarnation of these lists can include immediate arrest, the collection of biometric data, information being gathered about contacts, and notification of local "fusion centers" that bring together law enforcement agencies at all levels.
Potential abuses of such all-encompassing and secretive powers are obvious, ranging from relatively minor inconveniences such as travel delays to more serious breaches of basic constitutional rights; as the ACLU has observed, the No-Fly List "is so broad that it is certain to include many people who pose no danger and have done nothing illegal." At an even more basic level, practices and policies of this sort brush up against the spirit of the 1976 Church Committee Report on intelligence abuses in the US, which warned in unequivocal terms that "unless new and tighter controls are established by legislation, domestic intelligence activities threaten to undermine our democratic society and fundamentally alter its nature." If anything, the ensuing decades have brought about a move away from the report's recommendations, and in the process have taken us closer to the predicted demise of democracy.
Obviously, these are crucial concerns that deserve to be explored at length. And yet, despite their pragmatic repercussions, there is a sense in which these issues can become something of a theoretical abstraction deployed in the service of expounding upon the Orwellian nature of our emerging surveillance society. As tempting as this is, I have more mundane notions in mind here. These policies impact actual people, their friends and families, and their ability to travel unfettered. They keep the populace in a state of fear and anxiety, grant clandestine officials control over our lives, and justify deeper incursions into not only our civil liberties but our capacities to live freely as well. In short, such policies are dehumanizing, rendering us mere data points in a complex matrix that exists beyond our purview.
One of these dehumanized points of data, however, now has a name and a face. A longtime friend has recently been informed that he is persona non grata in the US, having found himself on the No-Fly List without explanation or meaningful opportunity for rebuttal. Because of this, he has had to cancel a speaking tour here, in which he was to visit universities and community centers around the country, discussing his three new books as well as topics including social movements and political theory. It means that he won't be able to visit with friends and colleagues or to forge new connections here around his life's work. It also places a potentially permanent constraint on his travel to the US, and an official taint on his character as well.
His name is Gabriel Kuhn. I won't detail his entire biography here (you can read more about him on Wikipedia and on his PM Press author's page), but the basic gist is that he's an award-winning author who holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Innsbruck. Kuhn has been politically active in ways consonant with his scholarship, focusing in particular on post-structuralism, social movements and anarchism. He was also a semi-professional soccer player and has lived in and traveled through numerous locales around the world. He presently resides in Sweden, where he has lived since 2006.
Beyond the mere biographical data, Kuhn is one of the kindest and most decent people you could ever hope to meet. I've known him for fifteen years and am proud to count him as one of my closest friends and colleagues. His gentle nature and good humor are evident, and he's a particularly thoughtful person when it comes to things people often take for granted, such as staying in touch across the miles and years, asking about professional activities and family news, and sharing personal stories of his life and travels. Kuhn has never been charged with a crime or an immigration violation, and is a highly respected scholar in the fields of radical politics and anarchist praxis, among other spheres of inquiry.
Yes, Kuhn is an anarchist. But don't get too excited about that - like most, he's an anarchist who believes in community and solidarity, not violence. He has a sophisticated outlook on reconciling the longstanding individual/community tension that lies at the heart of most social and political theories, as indicated by his statement regarding a recent controversy over tactics for change: "Anarchy can only work if the notion of individual freedom is accompanied by the notion of individual responsibility. Where the latter is missing, 'individual freedom' only becomes a pretext for bourgeois egoism, capitalist greed or - as in this case - disrespectful and self-centered conduct...." In other words, he believes that freedom necessitates responsibility if it is to be anything more than an excuse for self-indulgence and disrespecting others.
To Read the Rest of the Essay
More resources:
Here is Gabriel Kuhn's blog at PM Press
by Randall Amster
Truthout
Here's a quick quiz: What do Ted Kennedy, Cat Stevens and Nelson Mandela have in common? Okay, so that's an easy one for you folks with attention spans longer than it takes to type out a tweet. Indeed, all of these luminaries have appeared on the "No-Fly List," also known as the "Terrorist Watch List," which is used to prevent suspect persons from being able to fly on commercial aircraft in or out of the United States. The list was established after 9/11, and is estimated to contain perhaps half a million names, although its precise workings are shrouded by the vicissitudes of "national security."
Following the Christmas Day bombing attempt, it has been reported by CNN that "the US government has lowered the threshold for information deemed important enough to put suspicious individuals on a watch list or no-fly list, or have their visa revoked." Officials have stated that "the new standard is much lower than before December 25. For example, decisions could be taken to put someone on a no-fly list or a watch list based on one credible source, instead of the previous standard of using multiple sources." As Wired subsequently reported, not everyone on a "watch list" automatically winds up on the "no fly list," although the implications of being on any incarnation of these lists can include immediate arrest, the collection of biometric data, information being gathered about contacts, and notification of local "fusion centers" that bring together law enforcement agencies at all levels.
Potential abuses of such all-encompassing and secretive powers are obvious, ranging from relatively minor inconveniences such as travel delays to more serious breaches of basic constitutional rights; as the ACLU has observed, the No-Fly List "is so broad that it is certain to include many people who pose no danger and have done nothing illegal." At an even more basic level, practices and policies of this sort brush up against the spirit of the 1976 Church Committee Report on intelligence abuses in the US, which warned in unequivocal terms that "unless new and tighter controls are established by legislation, domestic intelligence activities threaten to undermine our democratic society and fundamentally alter its nature." If anything, the ensuing decades have brought about a move away from the report's recommendations, and in the process have taken us closer to the predicted demise of democracy.
Obviously, these are crucial concerns that deserve to be explored at length. And yet, despite their pragmatic repercussions, there is a sense in which these issues can become something of a theoretical abstraction deployed in the service of expounding upon the Orwellian nature of our emerging surveillance society. As tempting as this is, I have more mundane notions in mind here. These policies impact actual people, their friends and families, and their ability to travel unfettered. They keep the populace in a state of fear and anxiety, grant clandestine officials control over our lives, and justify deeper incursions into not only our civil liberties but our capacities to live freely as well. In short, such policies are dehumanizing, rendering us mere data points in a complex matrix that exists beyond our purview.
One of these dehumanized points of data, however, now has a name and a face. A longtime friend has recently been informed that he is persona non grata in the US, having found himself on the No-Fly List without explanation or meaningful opportunity for rebuttal. Because of this, he has had to cancel a speaking tour here, in which he was to visit universities and community centers around the country, discussing his three new books as well as topics including social movements and political theory. It means that he won't be able to visit with friends and colleagues or to forge new connections here around his life's work. It also places a potentially permanent constraint on his travel to the US, and an official taint on his character as well.
His name is Gabriel Kuhn. I won't detail his entire biography here (you can read more about him on Wikipedia and on his PM Press author's page), but the basic gist is that he's an award-winning author who holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Innsbruck. Kuhn has been politically active in ways consonant with his scholarship, focusing in particular on post-structuralism, social movements and anarchism. He was also a semi-professional soccer player and has lived in and traveled through numerous locales around the world. He presently resides in Sweden, where he has lived since 2006.
Beyond the mere biographical data, Kuhn is one of the kindest and most decent people you could ever hope to meet. I've known him for fifteen years and am proud to count him as one of my closest friends and colleagues. His gentle nature and good humor are evident, and he's a particularly thoughtful person when it comes to things people often take for granted, such as staying in touch across the miles and years, asking about professional activities and family news, and sharing personal stories of his life and travels. Kuhn has never been charged with a crime or an immigration violation, and is a highly respected scholar in the fields of radical politics and anarchist praxis, among other spheres of inquiry.
Yes, Kuhn is an anarchist. But don't get too excited about that - like most, he's an anarchist who believes in community and solidarity, not violence. He has a sophisticated outlook on reconciling the longstanding individual/community tension that lies at the heart of most social and political theories, as indicated by his statement regarding a recent controversy over tactics for change: "Anarchy can only work if the notion of individual freedom is accompanied by the notion of individual responsibility. Where the latter is missing, 'individual freedom' only becomes a pretext for bourgeois egoism, capitalist greed or - as in this case - disrespectful and self-centered conduct...." In other words, he believes that freedom necessitates responsibility if it is to be anything more than an excuse for self-indulgence and disrespecting others.
To Read the Rest of the Essay
More resources:
Here is Gabriel Kuhn's blog at PM Press
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