For Those Lazy Summer Days

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For Those Lazy Summer Days

Those times the CIA used American spies to spy on Americans

Last week, the Senate Intelligence Committee’s chair essentially accused the Central Intelligence Agency of spying on the committee’s staffers — an incident NPR called a “verbal bazooka.”

Sen. Dianne Feinstein suggested last Tuesday that the CIA’s search of computers used by the committee during its investigation into the CIA’s own activities in the post-9/11 era may have “violated the separation of powers principles embodied in the Constitution.”

“Besides the constitutional implications, the CIA’s search may also have violated the Fourth Amendment, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, as well as Executive Order 12333, which prohibits the CIA from conducting domestic searches or surveillance,” she said.

The CIA’s Director John Brennan denied the allegations. But if the facts prove otherwise, it wouldn’t be the first recorded instance of American spies spying on Americans.

GlobalPost took a look at some famous examples:

Operation Chaos

(AFP)

Between 1967 and 1973, the CIA, by its own admission, amassed files on Americans suspected of being domestic dissidents. The White House under President Lyndon B. Johnson and, later under President Richard Nixon, wanted the CIA to look into any foreign influence on the civil rights and anti-war movements. 

At its height, Operation Chaos had access to the CIA’s mail intercept program and the National Security Agency’s monitoring of international communications. It also received material collected by the FBI.

The agency found little evidence of foreign influence on leftist movements in the United States besides encouragement at international conferences and through political statements.

Project Merrimac

Closely related to Chaos, Merrimac used CIA agents to infiltrate peace groups and black activist groups with the aim of anticipating attacks on the agency itself. However, the agents also gathered details about individuals inside the groups, their funding and activities.

Project Resistance

Another Chaos cousin, Resistance’s aim was to compile information on radical groups that might target CIA activities or assets. The program compiled information from around the country, but specifically targeted college campuses in its search for radical elements. The CIA obtained additional information from local police, and campus officials.

Sept. 11, 2001

(AFP)

A CIA inspector general’s report published in 2013 found that for a decade after the Twin Towers fell, four CIA officers were embedded in the New York Police Department. The NYPD itself was in trouble at the time, facing allegations of unconstitutional surveillance of Muslim communities in New York and New Jersey.

The report found that one CIA officer operated as if he were exempt from limitations — such as those prohibiting CIA officers from domestic spying — because he was on an unpaid leave of absence. Another CIA analyst had access to “unfiltered” police reports, according to The New York Times. 

Project MK-ULTRA

(AFP)

While not an instance of domestic spying, this case of the CIA’s domestic meddling was much worse. The CIA dosed hundreds of unwitting Americans with psychoactive drugs in the 1950s and 1960′s as part of a program run by the Office of Scientific Intelligence. The agency’s experiments with LSD targeted patients in mental hospitals, prisoners, prostitutes and addicts, according to The New York Times.

All this to study the human consciousness. The Times noted that some agency employees and military officers were also involved in experiments, though they might not have known the full details. CIA Director Richard Helms ordered all files connected to the MK-ULTRA program destroyed in 1973.

Western Union

(AFP)

The Patriot Act, which the NSA cited as its legal basis for collecting the phone records of millions of Americans, is also cited by the CIA to collect information on international money transfers, according to a Wall Street Journal report from January.

The report cited anonymous officials familiar with a CIA program that tracked the financial transfers of millions, including American citizens. The CIA cannot collect intelligence on Americans, but reportedly gained authorization from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to track international transactions to detect terror operations.

Enemies of my enemies

(AFP)

In the aftermath of the Second World War, and in the first frost of the Cold War, the CIA and FBI were authorized by the National Security Council to exploit the knowledge of the flood of Eastern European immigrants coming to America, according to The Daily Beast.

In those days, there were no cellphone meta data or internet records to access, so intelligence agents asked refugee organizations in the US and Europe for information on the Eastern Europeans coming through their offices.

Government documents revealing how intelligence agencies used information from refugee organizations to recruit “informants, spies, assassins, saboteurs” were only declassified in the 1990s.

Project Mockingbird

(AFP)

The current media battle between the NSA and news sites publishing information gleaned from leaked documents isn’t the first face-off between the media and intelligence agencies — not by a long shot.

The CIA had a program to monitor journalists, using wiretaps and observation posts to keep tabs on writers who published material the Kennedy administration deemed sensitive.

Project Mockingbird, which wiretapped two reporters in 1963, was authorized by Director of Central Intelligence John McCone at the behest of President John F. Kennedy, according to The New York Times.

A declassified CIA document outlined the project: “During the period from 12 March 1963 to 15 June 1963, this Office installed telephone taps on two Washington-based newsmen who were suspected of disclosing classified information obtained from a variety of governmental and congressional sources.”

“The intercept activity was particularly productive in identifying contacts of the newsmen, their method of operation and many of their sources of information. For example, it was determined that during the period they received data from 13 newsmen, 12 of whom were identified; 12 senators and 6 members of Congress, all identified; 21 Congressional staff members, of whom 11 were identified; 16 government employees, including a staff member of the White House, members of the Vice President’s office, an Assistant Attorney General, and other well-placed individuals.”

“The newsmen actually received more classified and official data than they could use,” the report said.

The Mockingbird task force kept tabs on five reporters for three years. The Times noted that Kennedy set a precedent that would later be followed by Presidents Johnson, Nixon and George W. Bush.

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/united-states/140311/cia-american-spies-spy-americans-list-cia-spying-usa

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Those times the CIA used American spies to spy on Americans

John Kerry mocks those who deny climate change

Secretary of State John Kerry takes a selfie with a group of students before delivering a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta. Kerry called for a “global solution” for climate change in the first of several speeches he will deliver this year on the topic. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

Secretary of State John Kerry takes a selfie with a group of students before delivering a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta. Kerry called for a “global solution” for climate change in the first of several speeches he will deliver this year on the topic. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

Secretary of State John Kerry gestures during a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta. Kerry called for a “global solution” for climate change in the first of several speeches he will deliver this year on the topic. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

Secretary of State John Kerry pauses as he delivers a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta, Indonesia. Climate change may be the world’s “most fearsome” weapon of mass destruction and urgent global action is needed to combat it, Kerry said on Sunday, comparing those who deny its existence or question its causes to people who insist the Earth is flat. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

Secretary of State John Kerry sits with a group of students as he is introduced to deliver a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta. Climate change may be the world’s “most fearsome” weapon of mass destruction and urgent global action is needed to combat it, Kerry said on Sunday, comparing those who deny its existence or question its causes to people who insist the Earth is flat. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

Students listen as Secretary of State John Kerry delivers a speech on climate change on Sunday, Feb. 16, 2014, in Jakarta, Indonesia. Climate change may be the world’s “most fearsome” weapon of mass destruction and urgent global action is needed to combat it, Kerry said on Sunday, comparing those who deny its existence or question its causes to people who insist the Earth is flat. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, Pool)

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JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday called climate change perhaps the world’s “most fearsome” destructive weapon and mocked those who deny its existence or question its causes, comparing them to people who insist the Earth is flat.

In a speech to Indonesian students, civic leaders and government officials, Kerry tore into climate change skeptics. He accused them of using shoddy science and scientists to delay steps needed to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases at the risk of imperiling the planet.

A day earlier, the U.S. and China announced an agreement to cooperate more closely on combating climate change. American officials hope that will help encourage others, including developing countries like Indonesia and India, to follow suit.

China and the United States are the biggest sources of emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that cause the atmosphere to trap solar heat and alter the climate. Scientists say such changes are leading to drought, wildfires, rising sea levels, melting polar ice, plant and animal extinctions and other extreme conditions.

Also in the Jakarta speech, Kerry said everyone and every country must take responsibility for the problem and act immediately.

“We simply don’t have time to let a few loud interest groups hijack the climate conversation,” he said, referring to what he called “big companies” that “don’t want to change and spend a lot of money” to act to reduce the risks.

Kerry later singled out major oil and coal concerns as the primary offenders.

“We should not allow a tiny minority of shoddy scientists and science and extreme ideologues to compete with scientific facts,” Kerry told the audience at a U.S. Embassy-run American Center in a shopping mall.

“Nor should we allow any room for those who think that the costs associated with doing the right thing outweigh the benefits.”

“The science is unequivocal, and those who refuse to believe it are simply burying their heads in the sand,” Kerry said. “We don’t have time for a meeting anywhere of the Flat Earth Society,”

Kerry said the cost of inaction will far outweigh the significant expense of reducing greenhouse gas emissions that trap solar heat in the atmosphere and contribute to the Earth’s rising temperatures.

He outlined a litany of recent weather disasters, particularly flooding and typhoons in Asia, and their impact on commerce, agriculture, fishing and daily living conditions for billions of people.

“This city, this country, this region, is really on the front lines of climate change,” Kerry said. “It’s not an exaggeration to say that your entire way of life here is at risk.”

He added: “In a sense, climate change can now be considered the world’s largest weapon of mass destruction, perhaps even, the world’s most fearsome weapon of mass destruction.”

The solution, Kerry said, is a new global energy policy that shifts reliance from fossil fuels to cleaner technologies. He noted the President Barack Obama is championing such a shift and encouraged others to appeal to their leaders to join.

The U.S.-China statement issued just after Kerry left Beijing on Saturday said the two countries agreed on steps to carry out commitments to curb greenhouse gases, including reducing vehicle emissions, improving energy efficiency of buildings and other measures.

Beijing and Washington launched a climate change discussion last year, promising progress in five areas: reducing vehicle emissions; advanced electric power grids; capturing and storing carbon emissions; gathering greenhouse gas data; and building efficiency.

Kerry was in Indonesia on the last leg of a three-nation tour of Asia that started in South Korea. After leaving Indonesia on Monday, he planned to visit Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.

Before the climate change speech, Kerry toured Jakarta’s Istiqlal Mosque, one of the largest in the world, to pay his respects to Indonesia’s Muslim majority population.

Associated Press

Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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John Kerry mocks those who deny climate change

How Private Probation Companies Make Money From the Those They Trap in the Justice System

Governments still award services to companies with moneyed interest in jailing ever more people.

Marietta Conner watched the judge expectantly. The 63-year-old assistant minister had just pled guilty to “fail[ing] to yield to a pedestrian”—a criminal misdemeanor in Georgia—and did not have enough money to pay her $ 140 fine. The judge ordered that she be put on probation. But instead of county probation, Conner was assigned a private probation company supposed to mimic normal court probabation: meet with her once a month through a probation officer, collect payments and confirm her work and address. In the end, the company sapped Conner of well over the original amount of the fine, and even dangled an arrest warrant over her head when it erroneously claimed she had missed a payment.

Conner was lucky. She knew someone at the Southern Center for Human Rights who helped her escape the trap the correctional corporation tried to put her in. Yet for hundreds of thousands of others on probation through a private company, the experience routinely entails prolonged harassment, indebtedness and even imprisonment—and sometimes all with the blessing of a judge.

To be ensnared in America’s system of mass incarceration is to be in prison, on parole, or on probation. In 2012 1 in every 35 American adults was trapped in the criminal justice system. The surging number of people whose lives necessitate constant surveillance and management has exploded the coffers of state and federal budgets, and rather than reform heavy-handed laws to ease this burden on public funds, elected leaders have contracted incarceration services out to companies with a moneyed interest in jailing more Americans. 

The private prison industry has stoked the outrage of progressives and civil libertarians for years, as has the practice of prosecutors pushing plea bargains with heavy parole, but an equally dangerous phenomenon is the rise of private probation businesses across the country.  Since the 1970s, the private probation industry has expanded into at least 20 states—most concentrated in the South—and nearly all of its companies are entirely supported by the fees paid to them by the probationers they “serve.” In the last few years, many of these businesses have been given more power to pursue and imprison probationers, playing a starring role in what one federal judge called a “judicially sanctioned extortion racket.”

When someone is convicted of a misdemeanor crime, he or she is often placed on probation by a judge either in lieu of minor prison time or as part of a payment plan to pay off court fines levied for his charge. Traditionally, the purpose of probation has been to facilitate the rehabilitation of the probationer through constant contact with a representative of the court (a probation officer), although this concept may be farcical in an age when an adult can be placed under “community supervision” for jaywalking. With privatized supervision, the offenders are required to report monthly to a contractor acting in the same capacity as a probation officer, and they must also pay a monthly fee to the company on top of the fines they owe the court.

The distinction between fee and fine is important because, as noted by the Economist, it is through fees that private probation companies can afford to pay the salaries of their staff. A report from the Criminal Justice Review explained that “Private agencies…rely on the probationer’s paying a supervision fee to remain solvent.” Solvency, however, is hardly a concern for many of these corporations, some of which have amassed tens of millions of dollars annually off the fees they charge probationers.

One such company is Sentinel Offender Services, whose combined operations in four different states brought in $ 30 million in 2009, according to an investigation by NBC. The company has faced many legal challenges on the grounds that its employees demand payment for fees from poor probationers and then issue arrest warrants when they cannot pay, without consideration for their financial situation. Marietta Conner, the impoverished pastor, was under the supervision of Sentinel.

Although a 1983 federal ruling said that probationers cannot be jailed for being indigent, Sentinel has regularly issued arrest warrants for probationers delinquent on their payments, and has even extended the probationary sentences of thousands—illegally—in order to wrest more money from them. Sentinel has terrorized so many lives a Georgia court recently ruled that the company might have to refund thousands of payments to former probationers who had the unfortunate luck to be supervised by a company that “links its probation officers’ performance evaluations to the amount of money collected from probationers,” according to a 2010 ACLU report.

Sentinel is just one in a vanguard of 34 probation corporations in Georgia pushing to have more power to hunt down delinquent probationers. A new bill up for a vote in the Georgia’s House of Representatives, greased for quick passage by funds from industry lobbyists would give private probation officers increased “immunity from liability” and grant them more discretion to extend a person’s probation—and by extension, prolong a probationer’s “payment period.” 

Some courts have actually been complicit in the racket. A circuit court in Alabama ruled in 2012 that the local municipal judiciary in Harpersville, Alabama had operated “debtor’s prisons” together with the private probation firm Judicial Correctional Services by turning over poor misdemeanor defendants to JCS and then allowing the company to fleece them for every cent they had.

In the event that the probationers couldn’t pay their monthly fees to the company—as was the case for many probationers in the nation’s fourth poorest state—they were thrown in jail without a trial at the behest of JCS and under the blessing of the Harpersville court, who would then doom already-indigent defendants to an inescapable pit of debt by piling even more fines and fees. The presiding judge who ruled against Harpersville was scandalized so deeply by the JCS-judiciary collusion that he accused the local court of “violating almost every safeguard afforded by the United States Constitution [and] the laws of the state of Alabama.” Meanwhile, JCS continues to operate in 69 cities throughout four different states.

Perhaps the most pernicious feature of these businesses is how they enable local municipalities to perpetuate debtor’s prisons across the country. In Florida, birthplace of modern privatized probation, courts permit correctional firms to tack on a 40% surcharge on top of the debt a delinquent probationer already owes, as detailed in an investigation by the Brennan Center for Justice. The investigation also found that courts in Missouri regularly condemn people to prison when they cannot pay off the fees imposed by probation companies, and in Illinois, corporations shakedown impoverished probationers for 30% more of their standing debt if they miss payments. In total, the report found that nine states charged probationers excessive fees “payable to private debt collection firms”—in other words, private probation companies.

Efforts to resist the abuses of the private probation system have been scattered and slow building. In addition to the class-action lawsuits filed against Sentinel in Georgia and JCS in Alabama, an Idaho-based probation company was sued in 2011 for perpetually increasing probationer’s sentences by manipulating the results of drug tests (testing positive for drugs is usually a violation of probation and can mean further penalties). That same year in Tennessee, a group of former probationer’s filed a successful lawsuit against the owner of a company called Ada County Misdemeanor Probation Services for having “forced them to overpay” and holding them on probation “longer than necessary.”

Yet despite a proliferation of lawsuits across the country, municipalities seem to show no less willingness to contract out probation services. In addition to the 20 or so states that now allow some form of privatized probation, a state senator in at least one other place—Nebraska—has inquired with policy experts about implementing the correctional model in his home state. 

It does not take a legal expert to discern how for-profit correctional services threaten the freedom of Americans. Private probationary companies exist only as long as there is a steady supply of probationers from whom to extract payment, and these companies grow only if the number of people on probation grows. As evidenced further by the case of prison contractors, some of which have compelled state governors to keep prisons 90% full, a privatized correctional model maintains the American system of mass incarceration by further building it into an industry. 

 

 

Related Stories

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How Private Probation Companies Make Money From the Those They Trap in the Justice System

"D" written on those killed in Fort Hood shooting

In this courtroom sketch, Maj. Nidal Hasan, second from right, sits with his standby defense attorneys Maj. Joseph Marcee, left, and Lt. Col. Kris Poppe, second from left, as presiding judge Col. Tara Osborn looks on, during Hasan’s trial Thursday, Aug. 8, 2013, in Fort Hood, Texas. Hasan was allowed to continue representing himself on Thursday after the judge barred his standby attorneys from taking over, despite their claims that the Army psychiatrist was trying to secure his own death sentence. (AP Photo/Brigitte Woosley)

FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) — The soldier knew she had to decide quickly who she could save, so she grabbed a black marker and wrote a “D” on the foreheads of those she couldn’t. To people lingering over the dead amid the chaos of the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood, she shouted: “You need to move on!”

Sgt. 1st Class Maria Guerra recalled those moments while testifying Thursday during the trial of Maj. Nidal Hasan. The Army psychiatrist is charged with killing 13 people and wounding more than 30 others during a rampage at the sprawling Texas military base.

When prosecutors asked Guerra to describe the scene, her voice began breaking.

“I see bodies. I see bodies everywhere. And I see blood,” she said. “No one is moving. There was no movement. There was no sound. So I yelled out, ‘Is everybody OK? … I started hearing, ‘Help me. I’m bleeding. I’ve been shot. Help me.’”

Hasan — who is acting as his own attorney but has said little during the trial — raised a rare objection when Guerra said she heard the gunman silence a woman who was crying out, “My baby! My baby!”

Hasan interrupted to ask the judge, “Would you remind Sgt. 1st Class Guerra that she’s under oath?”

The judge, Col. Tara Osborn, did so. But Guerra responded by saying she didn’t want to change her testimony.

It was the only time Hasan objected as more than a dozen witnesses testified Thursday, continuing a mostly silent defense strategy that has caused tension with his standby attorneys. Hasan took responsibility for the attack during his opening statement, and the lawyers — who have been ordered to help Hasan during the trial — believe he is trying to secure himself a death sentence.

The military lawyers had asked the judge to either allow them to take over Hasan’s defense or bar him from asking for their help with a strategy they oppose, saying his strategy was “repugnant to defense counsel and contrary to our professional obligations.”

“We believe your order is causing us to violate our rules of professional conduct,” Lt. Col. Kris Poppe, Hasan’s lead standby attorney, told the judge earlier Thursday before witnesses testified.

Osborn refused and ordered the attorneys to resume their advisory role. The attorneys said they would appeal, though no appeal had been filed by the standby attorneys as of Thursday evening at the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, according to the court’s clerk. A message left with the Army Court of Criminal Appeals wasn’t immediately returned.

Jeff Corn, a law professor at South Texas College of Law, predicted that such an appeal wouldn’t delay the trial and would likely be dismissed.

“As sympathetic as I am to him (Poppe) and the miserable position he’s in, I think he’s stuck. The law is clear: If you are a standby attorney for a pro-se defendant and the defendant wants to make decisions tactically disastrous, that’s his prerogative,” Corn said.

But it could also be an intended strategy to spare Hasan the death penalty, said Joe Gutheinz, a Houston-area attorney and former Army intelligence officer.

“The judge allowed him to defend himself, you raised a timely objection. That is the basis for the appeal. And it was brilliant on the part of all the parties involved. If somebody thought up this idea, it was great,” Gutheinz said. “I really believe this is the only way, at end of the day, he will not be executed.”

As during previous days during the trial, Hasan rarely spoke Thursday as witness after witness described a chaotic, bloody scene inside the Army post’s Soldier Readiness Processing Center, where soldiers had been preparing to deploy.

Asked to describe the rate of gunfire, Staff Sgt. Michael Davis quickly hit his hand on the ledge of the witness stand.

“I still thought it was a drill, but I heard some screaming that didn’t sound like it was fake,” Davis said.

Davis testified that he saw blood spray when someone was shot and quickly took cover under a desk. When he thought it safe to flee, he stood up but was quickly shot in the back.

“It was just a cold, calculated, hard stare as he shot everything that moved,” Spc. Megan Martinez testified.

She recalled watching Hasan reload his pistol and the weapon’s green and red laser sights sweeping through the thick, hazy smoke produced by the gunfire.

“He was walking back and forth, shooting for what felt like an eternity,” she told jurors.

_____

Follow Nomaan Merchant on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/nomaanmerchant

Follow Paul J. Weber on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/pauljweber

Associated Press

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"D" written on those killed in Fort Hood shooting

McCain: We Might Drop Those 20,000 New Border Patrol Agents We Promised

Katie Pavlich
Town Hall.com
August 2, 2013

As the House of Representatives prepares to take up the issue of illegal immigration, the Senate is already prepping for conference negotiations with John McCain taking the lead.

It turns out, some of the most crucial aspects of border enforcement already passed by the Senate, including the addition of 20,000 new Border Patrol agents, are likely to be negotiated away, proving once again that the Gang of 8 was a complete sham.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) signaled Tuesday that the dramatic boost in border-security in the Senate’s comprehensive immigration bill could be one of the provisions that may be changed in a potential House-Senate compromise.

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This article was posted: Friday, August 2, 2013 at 5:01 pm

Tags: economics, foreign affairs, government corruption

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McCain: We Might Drop Those 20,000 New Border Patrol Agents We Promised

SyFy’s movie chief: “Sharknado” buzz was “one of those magical things that happen”

Few recent TV events — leaving aside the Super Bowl and the Academy Awards — have generated as much heat online as “Sharknado,” the TV movie that took Twitter by storm on Thursday night. By the time Mia Farrow weighed in, everyone but Hannah’s sisters seemed to have been sucked into the Tara Reid vehicle with the self-explanatory title.

And yet cable network SyFy (rebranded in 2009 from its stodgy Sci Fi roots) saw not much of a ratings boost from its wild night of carnivorous fish flying through air. With fewer than 1 million viewers, the movie was below even the average for SyFy’s movie offerings.

And yet SyFy brass profess to be unworried. In an interview, Thomas Vitale, the executive vice president of programming and original movies for the network, described the strategy underpinning “Sharknado” — reverse-engineering the sort of spectacle that would draw in attention and build brand awareness, regardless of a single night’s ratings. While every network cares about ratings to some degree, Vitale described a splintered media landscape in which SyFy — still working to build awareness after its rebrand — must fight to bring in new viewers to its offerings nightly. Ratings aside, Vitale said, “Sharknado” is a boon for the network’s movie franchise and the network itself; what follows is a look at what a social-media hit can and cannot do for a basic-cable network.

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Salon.com

SyFy’s movie chief: “Sharknado” buzz was “one of those magical things that happen”

Those Who Doubt the NWO Conspiracy...Listen Closely

It"s Important to Stretch Those Pedal-Pushing Legs

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It"s Important to Stretch Those Pedal-Pushing Legs