Exclusive: Homeland Security Kept Tabs on Occupy Wall Street

[kpete]

Exclusive: Homeland Security Kept Tabs on Occupy Wall Street
POSTED: February 28, 6:55 PM ET | By Michael Hastings

An internal Department of Homeland Security report obtained by Rolling Stone shows the agency was keeping its eyes on Occupy Wall Street, concerned about potential disruptions to transportation networks and infrastructure. The five-page memo from October, titled, “SPECIAL COVERAGE: Occupy Wall Street,” acknowledged the peaceful nature of the movement and made mostly anodyne observations from publicly available sources, but did warn of the potential for violence.

“Large scale demonstrations also carry the potential for violence, presenting a significant challenge for law enforcement,” the report states. The “continued expansion” of the protests would make it harder for police and “movement organizers to control protesters,” which could potentially put “critical infrastructure” in danger, it concluded. Thus, the report called for heightened “continuous situational awareness” of the movement as it expanded. Rolling Stone’s Michael Hastings argues this a potentially dangerous step towards a possible “covert and illegal campaign of domestic surveillance.”

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/national-affairs/exclusive-homeland-security-kept-tabs-on-occupy-wall-street-20120228#ixzz1nmsEt8LH
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2012/02/29/434603/dhs-ows/

[Fumesucker]

2. Kept?

As in past tense?

[leveymg]

3. If they admit to an inch, it means they've already taken an entire mile.

Why maintain the fiction that everyone to the left of Mitt Romney haven't already been profiled as some sort of "threat," and every e-mail, tweet, on-line post and phone call isn't swept up, stored, and analyzed under the extremely broad provisions of the revised Patriot Act?

The alleged "potential for violence" posed by OWS is a sham and a pretext for Total Information Awareness-type data-mining and social network linking programs. The First and Fourth Amendments of the US Constitution have been gutted and are largely meaningless.

Every political movement, sporting activity, and commercial activity in the US "also carr(ies) the potential for violence" and disruption of "critical infrastructure." DHS might as well be tracking the NBA on the same basis - they'd stand a far better chance of catching illegal activity, such as gambling and point-fixing schemes.

[JDPriestly]

5. Violence has occurred around and after sports events in Los Angeles.

June 18, 2010|By Sam Allen and Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times

Despite a massive Los Angeles police presence Thursday night, sporadic violence broke out near Staples Center after the Lakers defeated the Boston Celtics in the NBA Finals.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/18/local/la-me-0618-lakers-20100618

KTLA News

11:53 a.m. PDT, June 15, 2009
LOS ANGELES -- Celebration turned to near riots in Los Angeles after the Lakers defeated the Orlando Magic to win the NBA finals Sunday.

The Los Angeles Police Department says about 25 people were arrested and eight officers were injured after some threw rocks and bottles, damaged police cruisers and set several small fires in the streets outside Staples Center.

http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-lakers-violence,0,2092771.story

And then there was the Democratic National Convention. The police over-reacted to the throwing of plastic bottles. Throwing any object can be dangerous -- but plastic bottles do not warrant quite the reaction that occurred here.

Tuesday, August 15 -- In a joint press conference Tuesday afternoon organized by the Independent Media Center, representatives from the Shadow Convention, the American Civil Liberties Union, Global Exchange, D2KLA and the Green Party denounced the use of force by police against protesters last night as unwarranted and brutal, and called for an independent investigation of the Los Angeles Police Department's actions.

An estimated 15,000-20,000 people gathered for a permitted rally and concert next to the Staples Center, which was notably peaceful and lively. At around 8:00 PM, a handful of protesters threw plastic water bottles and other largely harmless objects over the fence that separated their rally from the convention center. Hundreds of police officers responded with measures startlingly disproportionate to the instigation of a few.

http://www.alternet.org/story/9630/?page=2

Odd. You don't hear of violence when the parties hold their state conventions.

Homeland Security is a full employment for right-wingers program. Its budget should be cut. Local police officers can handle these situations.

[Lint Head]

4. This proves how ridiculous Homeland Security is. OWS is transparent. You can keep tabs by just

watching television or skimming the inner tubes.