Author Archives: Gene Berkman

Salon exposes “The NSA-DEA police state tango”

Posted on by Standard Reply

So the paranoid hippie pot dealer you knew in college was right all along: The feds really were after him. In the latest post-Snowden bombshell about the extent and consequences of government spying, we learned from Reuters reporters this week that a secret branch of the DEA called the Special Operations Division – so secret that nearly everything about it is classified, including the size of its budget and the location of its office — has been using the immense pools of data collected by the NSA, CIA, FBI and other intelligence agencies to go after American citizens for ordinary drug crimes. Law enforcement agencies, meanwhile, have been coached to conceal the existence of the program and the source of the information by creating what’s called a “parallel construction,” a fake or misleading trail of evidence. So no one in the court system – not the defendant or the defense attorney, not even the prosecutor or the judge – can ever trace the case back to its true origins.

On one hand, we all knew more revelations were coming, and the idea that the government would go after drug suspects with the same dubious extrajudicial methods used to pursue terrorism suspects is a classic and not terribly surprising example of mission creep. Both groups have been held up as bogeymen for years, in order to scare the public into accepting ever nastier and more repressive laws. This gives government officials another chance to talk to us in their stern grown-up voices about how this isn’t civics class, and sometimes they have to bend the rules to catch Really Bad People.

On the other hand, this is a genuinely sinister turn of events with a whiff of science-fiction nightmare, one that has sounded loud alarm bells for many people in the mainstream legal world.Full report by Andrew O’Hehir @ Salon http://www.salon.com/2013/08/10/the_nsa_dea_police_state_tango/singleton/

Kelly Vlahos:”The Right Rallies to Edward Snowden”

Posted on by Standard Reply

A funny thing happened between Hong Kong and Russia: Edward Snowden, teller of National Security Agency secrets and American dissident at large, started to become a conservative hero.

“Support for Snowden is actually consistent with the tradition of American conservatism,” declares Craig Shirley, a longtime conservative political consultant in Washington and author of three Ronald Reagan biographies. After 30 years at the game, he’s not shy about calling things big.

“I think Snowden might end up being the John Brown of the 21st Century—reviled and unpopular but unleashing a debate that led to the rebirth of freedom,” Shirley told TAC, referring to the abolitionist who was hanged for treason for initiating an armed insurrection against the U.S. government over slavery.

Complete article by Kelly Vlahos @ The American Conservative http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-right-rallies-to-edward-snowden/

Napolitano:”Justin Amash Leads Liberty’s Backlash”

Posted on by Standard Reply

“Last week, Justin Amash, the two-term libertarian Republican congressman from Michigan, joined with John Conyers, the 25-term liberal Democratic congressman from the same state, to offer an amendment to legislation funding the National Security Agency (NSA). If enacted, the Amash-Conyers amendment would have forced the government’s domestic spies when seeking search warrants to capture Americans’ phone calls, texts and emails first to identify their targets and produce evidence of their terror-related activities before a judge may issue a warrant. The support they garnered had a surprising result that stunned the Washington establishment.”

“It almost passed.”

“The final vote, in which the Amash-Conyers amendment was defeated by 205 to 217, was delayed for a few hours by the House Republican leadership, which opposed the measure. The Republican leadership team, in conjunction with President Obama and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, needed more time for arm-twisting so as to avoid a humiliating loss.”

“But the House rank-and-file did succeed in sending a message to the big-government types in both parties: Nearly half of the House of Representatives has had enough of government spying and then lying about it, and understands that spying on every American simply cannot withstand minimal scrutiny or basic constitutional analysis.”

Full article by Judge Napolitano @ Reason http://reason.com/archives/2013/08/01/rep-amash-leads-libertys-backlash

Vlahos: Antiwar.com Under Surveillance

Posted on by Standard Reply

“Irreverent and unyielding in its opposition to U.S. foreign policy, Antiwar.com has been called many things. But that Washington might consider the 17-year-old news and opinion website a threat to national security should be cause for alarm—especially today.”

“The Obama administration has come under scrutiny this summer following revelations that it’s been snooping on journalists in connection with the unprecedented number of federal leak prosecutions in recent years. Meanwhile, thanks to revelations by Edward Snowden, the American public now knows the government has more access than ever to our Internet browsing habits, e-mails, Facebook accounts, and phone and Skype records.”

“The all-seeing eye may be putting the chill not only on privacy and free speech but also on investigative national-security journalism and the public’s right to know. And this is not limited to the high-profile cases affecting big mainstream players like Fox News, the Associated Press or the New York Times, which have received most of the attention.”

“In May, with considerably less fanfare, Antiwar.com announced it was suing the FBI, demanding the release of records the editors believe the agency has been keeping on founder and managing editor Eric Garris and editorial editor Justin Raimondo. The suit stems from a 2004 memo a reader found through an unconnected FOIA request and passed along to Antiwar.com in 2011. The heavily redacted 94-page document clearly states the FBI had secretly investigated and monitored the website and declared—despite acknowledging there was no evidence of any crime—that further surveillance of Antiwar.com was necessary to determine if “[redaction] are engaging in, or have engaged in, activities which constitute a threat to national security on behalf of a foreign power.”

Full Report by Kelly Vlahos @ The American Conservative http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/antiwar-com-under-surveillance/

Reason:”Yes, We Do Have a Debt Problem”

Posted on by Standard Reply

“In mid-May, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) revised its previous estimate of the federal government’s 2013 deficit downward by 24 percent. The fiscal year (which ends on September 30) will feature red ink of merely $642 billion, down from the $1 trillion-plus of the previous four years, said the CBO. For many Democrats, this proved what they knew all along: The national debt is not a clear and present threat.”

“We don’t have an immediate crisis in terms of debt,” President Barack Obama declared in an ABC News interview in March. “In fact, for the next 10 years, it’s going to be in a sustainable place.” In the same month and venue, Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner (Ohio) joined the president in a rare moment of agreement: “We do not have an immediate debt crisis,” Boehner claimed.

“This attitude is reminiscent of the yarn about a man jumping off the roof of a 10-story building and, around the third floor, saying, “Everything looks fine so far!” ”

“After years of bipartisan overspending, public debt today—that’s the money that the federal government owes to domestic and foreign investors—is almost 90 percent higher than at the onset of the financial crisis in 2008. It climbed by $1 trillion dollars between December 2011 and December 2012 alone to its current level of $12.03 trillion, according to the CBO in May. Public debt is now 75.1 percent of GDP, the highest level since 1950, and it is projected to reach 76.2 percent next year.”

Full column by Veronique de Rugy @ http://reason.com/archives/2013/07/16/yes-we-do-have-a-debt-problem

IBD: “Think NSA Spying Is Bad? Here Comes ObamaCare Hub”

Posted on by Standard Reply

John Merline at Investor’s Business Daily reports that the Obamacare Hub will collect data on almost all working age Americans and share it with seven other federal agencies, including the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense.

“Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., asked HHS to provide “a complete list of agencies that will interact with the Federal Data Services Hub.” The Hub is a central feature of ObamaCare, since it will be used by the new insurance exchanges to determine eligibility for benefits, exemptions from the federal mandate, and how much to grant in federal insurance subsidies.”

“In response, the HHS said the ObamaCare data hub will “interact” with seven other federal agencies: Social Security Administration, the IRS, the Department of Homeland Security, the Veterans Administration, Office of Personnel Management, the Department of Defense and — believe it or not — the Peace Corps. Plus the Hub will plug into state Medicaid databases.”

“And what sort of data will be “routed through” the Hub? Social Security numbers, income, family size, citizenship and immigration status, incarceration status, and enrollment status in other health plans, according to the HHS.”

The complete article by John Merline can be read @ http://news.investors.com/062513-661264-obamacare-database-hub-creates-privacy-nightmare.htm

FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe Asks Senator Lindsey Graham for His Email Password

Posted on by Standard 1

Washington, DC- At a press conference today, FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe addressed the growing list of civil liberties violations that have surfaced in recent weeks, and extended an open invitation to South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham to walk the walk implied by his casual dismissal of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. If he has “nothing to worry about,” he should be willing to publicly release his email password. The petition can be found at http://www.LindseysPassword.com.

In a Fox and Friends interview last Thursday, Senator Graham defended the National Security Agency’s (NSA) warrantless surveillance of American civilians, telling the show’s hosts, “I don’t think you’re talking to the terrorists. I know you’re not. I know I’m not. So we don’t have anything to worry about.” Senator Graham then went one step further, concluding that he was “glad” the warrantless surveillance activity was happening in the NSA.

Kibbe commented, “Privacy is a citizen’s right to choose what information you prefer to tell the public about, and what you choose to keep to yourself. Senator Lindsay Graham recently asserted that violating the Fourth Amendment to implement warrantless government surveillance is not only acceptable, it’s welcomed. If we’re not talking to terrorists, we have nothing to worry about.”

“Respectfully, Senator, we ask you to lead by example and make your email account password available to the American people. If you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to worry about. Right?”

Kibbe also announced that FreedomWorks will be mobilizing its membership to support of Senator Rand Paul’s class action lawsuit on the constitutionality of the NSA’s secret surveillance of American citizens. “FreedomWorks plans to help Senator Paul and the ACLU organize grassroots Americans to join the legal effort to defend our Fourth Amendment rights,” Kibbe added. “Taking on the Big Brother behemoth requires the voices of many individuals across the country, and FreedomWorks wants to help give those citizens a microphone.”

FreedomWorks is a grassroots service center to a community of over 6 million activists dedicated to advancing the ideas of individual liberty and constitutionally-limited government. For more information, please visit http://www.FreedomWorks.org, or contact Jackie Bodnar at JBodnar@FreedomWorks.org.

Source: http://www.freedomworks.org/press-releases/freedomworks-president-matt-kibbe-asks-senator-lin

Sen. Rand Paul: Big Brother Really Is Watching Us

Posted on by Standard Reply

“When Americans expressed outrage last week over the seizure and surveillance of Verizon’s client data by the National Security Agency, President Obama responded: “In the abstract, you can complain about Big Brother . . . but when you actually look at the details, I think we’ve struck the right balance.” ”

“How many records did the NSA seize from Verizon? Hundreds of millions. We are now learning about more potential mass data collections by the government from other communications and online companies. These are the “details,” and few Americans consider this approach “balanced,” though many rightly consider it Orwellian.”

“These activities violate the Fourth Amendment, which says warrants must be specific—”particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” And what is the government doing with these records?”

Full column by Sen. Rand Paul @ The Wall Street Journal http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324634304578537720921466776.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

McCarthy:”ACLU Sues the FBI on Antiwar.com’s Behalf”

Posted on by Standard Reply

The American Conservative magazine reports that The American Civil Liberties Union has sued the Federal Bureau of Investigation on behalf of Antiwar.com, the well-known website devoted to opposing war and interventionism.

Daniel McCarthy writes that “…editors of Antiwar.com have known for some time that the FBI has had an eye on them. Naturally enough, they used the Freedom of Information Act to request bureau’s files on them and their organization—but the FBI hasn’t been forthcoming.”

The ACLU has sued to get the information that the FBI won’t provide voluntarily. Recent revealations of federal investigations of the Associated Press and Fox News provide a context for this lawsuit. Mr McCarthy writes that “Whereas the Justice Department’s investigations were meant to be in pursuit of national-security leaks, Antiwar.com seems to have been targeted based on nothing more than its name and mission: reporting critically on U.S. foreign policy.”

Full story from the American Conservative @ http://www.theamericanconservative.com/aclu-sues-the-fbi-on-antiwar-coms-behalf/

Renaissance Book Shop Profiled

Posted on by Standard Reply

The Riverside Press Enterprise has published a profile of the Renaissance Book Shop, the largest independent bookstore in Riverside, California.

‘Renaissance has carved a niche peddling books on history, science fiction, science, philosophy and foreign policy. “These are books for people willing to part with good money to learn things,” he said. That could be anything from “Forgotten Fatherland: The True Story of Nietzsche’s Sister and Her Lost Aryan Colony” to “The Rosa Luxemburg Contraceptives Cooperative: A Primer on Communist Civilization.” ‘

‘Dave Berndt, 67, a retired engineer and bibliophile, has been a Renaissance customer for 25 years. “There is nothing like this store in Orange and San Diego counties,” he declared, heading for the front counter, laden with a stack of science fiction.’

Read the full profile @ http://www.pe.com/business/local-profiles-headlines/20130522-retail-independent-riverside-bookstore-stays-the-course.ece