Domestic Spying on Democratic Activists - our cartoon on it

[Neil Lisst]

When Bush starts lying tomorrow night about his domestic spying program, remember this, DUers:



Michael Isikoff
Newsweek

Jan. 30, 2006 issue - The demonstration seemed harmless enough. Late on a June afternoon in 2004, a motley group of about 10 peace activists showed up outside the Houston headquarters of Halliburton, the giant military contractor once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney. They were there to protest the corporation's supposed "war profiteering." The demonstrators wore papier-mache masks and handed out free peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches to Halliburton employees as they left work. The idea, according to organizer Scott Parkin, was to call attention to allegations that the company was overcharging on a food contract for troops in Iraq. "It was tongue-in-street political theater," Parkin says.

But that's not how the Pentagon saw it. To U.S. Army analysts at the top-secret Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), the peanut-butter protest was regarded as a potential threat to national security. Created three years ago by the Defense Department, CIFA's role is "force protection"—tracking threats and terrorist plots against military installations and personnel inside the United States. In May 2003, Paul Wolfowitz, then deputy Defense secretary, authorized a fact-gathering operation code-named TALON—short for Threat and Local Observation Notice—that would collect "raw information" about "suspicious incidents." The data would be fed to CIFA to help the Pentagon's "terrorism threat warning process," according to an internal Pentagon memo.

continued here ...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10965509/site/newsweek

[Neil Lisst]

1. it's tied to the Isikoff article in Newsweek

[Neil Lisst]

2. once more for old times sake ...

when we get GDP back ...

[Straight Shooter]

3. Expect to hear the term "disruptor" used more and more frequently

And that term will morph into "enemy of the state" soon enough.

All our civil rights are circling the drain.

edit: too tired to type, what a long, discouraging day. Time to shut it down. :(

[Neil Lisst]

4. so far, all Bush has done is clamp down on political opponents

Oh, he loves to talk tough, but he hasn't caught Osama, or zawahiri, or Zarqawi, or the anthrax guys.

The border is porous, but he wants to claim he's protecting America.

All he's protecting are his own anti-American ways.

[Neil Lisst]

5. Can I offer you a sandwich?

[annabanana]

6. This is just the beginning, I suspect.

It will not get much notice until a huge celebrity is hauled off for street theatre. The celebrity will then be swift boated.

(Hey Neil... no jelly?)

[Neil Lisst]

7. Thanks annabanana!

We had jelly in the second draft, but it looked too much like lunchmeat, so we nixed it.

This one actually ran yesterday, but I sat on it for DU since yesterday was all Alito!

I covered Alito last Thursday, and kicked it up again today on the Alito board. Hopefully, today we get rid of the Alito board and get back to the the GDP board.

[oasis]

8. Good reminder of why it should be called "domestic spying".

[Neil Lisst]

9. Supposedly, they got info on it by cruising Dem boards, like DU

There are agents of the gov. reading these boards, looking for things to find that they think are "threats," all so they can try to intimidate.

[Neil Lisst]

10. I want to remind everyone they are being watched here.

It's important to know your statements may be taken in the worst possible way, unfortunately. We're dealing with people who are looking for a reason to find Dems a threat.

[Neil Lisst]

11. Yeaaaaaaaaaaa! GDP is back!

here, have a samitch


just don't let the Bush domestic spies catch you