Catherina
Catherina's JournalA blast from the past: NSA illegally tracked 1000s of civil rights & antiwar activists 1952 to 1974
By David Burnham, Published: March 27, 1983
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A Federal Court of Appeals recently ruled that the largest and most secretive intelligence agency of the United States, the National Security Agency, may lawfully intercept the overseas communications of Americans even if it has no reason to believe they are engaged in illegal activities. The ruling, which also allows summaries of these conversations to be sent to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, significantly broadens the already generous authority of the N.S.A. to keep track of American citizens.
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Over the years, this virtually unknown Federal agency has repeatedly sought to enlarge its power without consulting the civilian officials who theoretically direct the Government, while it also has sought to influence the operation and development of all civilian communications networks. Indeed, under Vice Adm. Bobby Ray Inman, N.S.A. director from 1977 to 1981, the agency received an enlarged Presidential mandate to involve itself in communications issues, and successfully persuaded private corporations and institutions to cooperate with it.
... In a nation whose Constitution demands an open Government operating according to precise rules of fairness, the N.S.A. remains an unexamined entity. With the increasing computerization of society, the conflicts it presents become more important. The power of the N.S.A., whose annual budget and staff are believed to exceed those of either the F.B.I. or the C.I.A., is enhanced by its unique legal status within the Federal Government. Unlike the Agriculture Department, the Postal Service or even the C.I.A., the N.S.A. has no specific Congressional law defining its responsibilities and obligations. Instead, the agency, based at Fort George Meade, about 20 miles northeast of Washington, has operated under a series of Presidential directives. Because of Congress's failure to draft a law for the agency, because of the tremendous secrecy surrounding the N.S.A.'s work and because of the highly technical and thus thwarting character of its equipment, the N.S.A. is free to define and pursue its own goals.
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'' If such forces were ever turned against the country's communications system, Senator Church said, ''no American would have any privacy left. ... There would be no place to hide.'' Over the years, N.S.A. surveillance activities have indeed included Americans who were merely stating their political beliefs. The agency first became involved in this more questionable kind of surveillance in the early 1960's when either Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy or the F.B.I. asked it to monitor all telephone calls between the United States and Cuba. This list of international calls was significantly enlarged during the Johnson Administrtion as Federal authorities became concerned that foreign governments might try to influence American civil-rights leaders. The N.S.A. gradually developed a ''watch list'' of Americans that included those speaking out against the Vietnam War.
According to the subsequent investigation by the Senate Intelligence Committee, a total of 1,200 Americans were targeted by the N.S.A. between 1967 and 1973 because of their political activities. The subjects - chosen by the F.B.I., the Secret Service, the C.I.A. and the Defense Intelligence Agency -included members of radical groups, celebrities and ordinary citizens. When it appeared that Congress might learn about the eavesdropping, the surveillance halted.
The Senate intelligence committee also discovered a second illegal surveillance program, under which the N.S.A., and its military predecessors, examined most of the telegrams entering or leaving the country between 1945 and 1975. The program was abruptly halted in May 1975, a date coinciding with the Senate committee's first expression of interest in it.
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Using the information thus gathered, the N.S.A. between 1952 and 1974 developed files on approximately 75,000 Americans, some of whom undoubtedly threatened the nation's security. However, the agency also developed files on civil-rights and antiwar activists, Congressmen and other citizens who lawfully questioned Government policies. For at least 13 of the 22 years the agency was building these files, the C.I.A. had access to them and used the data in its Operation Chaos, another computerized and illegal tracking system set up during the Vietnam War. At its peak, the Chaos files had references to more than 300,000 Americans.
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http://www.nytimes.com/1983/03/27/magazine/the-silent-power-of-the-nsa.html
Decades later, after they're busted again, we're expected to believe that they reigned in their scruples. Bullshit, it's more of the same with better computers.
From Spying on "Terrorists Abroad" to Suppressing Domestic Dissent: When We Become the Hunted
From Spying on "Terrorists Abroad" to Suppressing Domestic Dissent: When We Become the Hunted
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Truthout recently spoke with Boghosian, executive director of the National Lawyers Guild, about the ever-expanding government/corporate surveillance state.
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Heidi Boghosian: (...) Several other factors add to the urgency of this challenge: The Obama administration is on the defensive after Edward Snowden's disclosures and will likely invest even more resources to protect its perpetual "war on terror" campaign and the corporate partners that profit from this manufactured war. As the public, and certain legislators, express apprehension about mass surveillance, the executive branch and the NSA may enact more stringent measures to fortify and safeguard their highly sophisticated spying infrastructure.
On top of that, CEOs of telecommunications and defense companies such as Lockheed Martin, Verizon and Microsoft are allied with the administration, guiding telecommunications and anti-terrorism policies through the president's National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee. And in addition to the lucrative business of data mining, corporations continue to adapt and refine technologies of war, from laser microphones to motion sensing capabilities, with which to monitor civilians.
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We have created an entire new class of society that gathers and has access to classified information - an elite class that promises to grow as private companies seek increased revenue and as the government operates in unparalleled secrecy.
The majority of national intelligence, an astonishing 70 percent, is carried out by contractors. That translates into tens of thousands of analysts from more than 1,900 private firms who have performed intelligence functions over the past few years. Large contractors conduct most of the work, including Booz Allen Hamilton (which according to The New York Times, derived $1.3 billion in revenue from intelligence contracts), Northrop Grumman, L-3 Communications and Science Applications International Corporation (with 39,600 employees, a reported $11.17 billion in revenue as of 2013, and a recent $6.6 billion contract from the Defense Intelligence Agency).
In 2012, an estimated 1.1 million private contractors had security clearance. The number of federal employees with security clearance is 2.6 million.
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Not only is it easy for the US and its contractors to focus on activists, it is imperative that they do so. They must target social advocates in order to justify maintaining their budgets and their livelihoods. There are simply not enough "terrorists" in existence for the government to warrant the current level of intelligence spending. As a result, enormous federal resources are devoted to identifying and tracking activists who are portrayed as "extremists." Individuals who have helped bring about changes in corporate policies, such as animal rights or environmental advocates, are labeled domestic terrorist threats by the FBI.
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MORE: http://truth-out.org/news/item/18292-from-spying-on-terrorists-abroad-to-using-massive-surveillance-to-suppress-domestic-dissent-when-we-become-the-hunted#.UhU5L4gTrVo.facebook
Statement from Bradley Manning, on the occasion of his being sentenced to 35 years in prison
Statement from Bradley Manning, on the occasion of his being sentenced to 35 years in prison
August 21, 2013
Bradley Manning: "Sometimes You Have to Pay a Heavy Price to Live in a Free Society"
The following is a transcript of the statement made by Pfc. Bradley Manning as read by David Coombs at a press conference on Wednesday after Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison.
The decisions that I made in 2010 were made out of a concern for my country and the world that we live in. Since the tragic events of 9/11, our country has been at war. We’ve been at war with an enemy that chooses not to meet us on any traditional battlefield, and due to this fact we’ve had to alter our methods of combating the risks posed to us and our way of life.
I initially agreed with these methods and chose to volunteer to help defend my country. It was not until I was in Iraq and reading secret military reports on a daily basis that I started to question the morality of what we were doing. It was at this time I realized in our efforts to meet this risk posed to us by the enemy, we have forgotten our humanity. We consciously elected to devalue human life both in Iraq and Afghanistan. When we engaged those that we perceived were the enemy, we sometimes killed innocent civilians. Whenever we killed innocent civilians, instead of accepting responsibility for our conduct, we elected to hide behind the veil of national security and classified information in order to avoid any public accountability.
In our zeal to kill the enemy, we internally debated the definition of torture. We held individuals at Guantanamo for years without due process. We inexplicably turned a blind eye to torture and executions by the Iraqi government. And we stomached countless other acts in the name of our war on terror.
Patriotism is often the cry extolled when morally questionable acts are advocated by those in power. When these cries of patriotism drown out any logically based intentions, it is usually an American soldier that is ordered to carry out some ill-conceived mission.
Our nation has had similar dark moments for the virtues of democracy—the Trail of Tears, the Dred Scott decision, McCarthyism, the Japanese-American internment camps—to name a few. I am confident that many of our actions since 9/11 will one day be viewed in a similar light.
As the late Howard Zinn once said, "There is not a flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people."
I understand that my actions violated the law, and I regret if my actions hurt anyone or harmed the United States. It was never my intention to hurt anyone. I only wanted to help people. When I chose to disclose classified information, I did so out of a love for my country and a sense of duty to others.
If you deny my request for a pardon, I will serve my time knowing that sometimes you have to pay a heavy price to live in a free society. I will gladly pay that price if it means we could have country that is truly conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all women and men are created equal.
http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2013/8/21/bradley_manning_sometimes_you_have_to_pay_a_heavy_price_to_live_in_a_free_society
FISC Opinion Holding NSA Surveillance UNCONSTITUTIONAL (October 3, 2011)
EFF prevailed in court; govt to release today 2011 FISC order finding part of NSA program unconstitutional. The ODNI will declassify three FISC court decisions today.
The first one is already up
Entire ruling here: October 3, 2011 FISC Opinion Holding NSA Surveillance Unconstitutional
NSA acknowledged to FISC that "'upstream collection' of Internet communications includes the acquisition of entire transaction(s)." Whoops!
Small extract: the court was "troubled" about "substantial misrepresentation" and "repeated inaccurate statements made in the government's submissions"
I'm still reading.
NSA scooped up ~56,000 emails of Americans per year with no connection to terrorism from 2008-2011
WASHINGTON August 21, 2013 (AP)
By KIMBERLY DOZIER AP Intelligence Writer
Associated Press
The nations' top intelligence official is declassifying three secret U.S. court opinions showing how the National Security Agency scooped up as many as 56,000 emails annually over three years and other communications by Americans with no connection to terrorism, how it revealed the error to the court and changed how it gathered Internet communications.
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper authorized the release Wednesday.
The opinions show that when the NSA reported to the court in 2011 that it was inadvertently collecting as many as 56,000 Internet communications by Americans with no collection to terrorism, the court ordered the NSA to find ways to limit what it collects and how long it keeps it.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/nsa-collected-thousands-us-communications-20026969
This footnote from the just-declassified FISA court ruling on unconstitutional NSA surveillance is extraordinary
"NOT WITTINGLY"
Arrest that perjurer NOW.
LIVE: Bradley Manning Defense Attorney David Coombs’ Post-Sentencing Press Conference
This fight is NOT over. Please sign & RT this petition to commute Bradley Manning's sentence https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/commute-any-sentence-given-bradley-manning-his-crimes-honor-his-service-country-whistle-blower/n10fZ7ZM … #Manning
EDIT: NEW LINK TO LIVESTREAM: http://rt.com/on-air/manning-defense-press-conference/
Firedoglake is livestreaming the event, starting around 1:30PM from the Hotel at Arundel Preserve, just minutes away from Ft. Meade. From the Manning Support Network: “Mr. Coombs will respond to the sentence and discuss upcoming legal avenues of redress for his client. This will be the first time since 2010 that Mr. Coombs has taken questions from the press regarding this case.”
Tonight, supporters of Manning will hold a rally at the White House at 7:30 PM , with a march to follow. If you’re not in the DC area, you can check your local chatboards or the Bradley Manning Support Network for affinity actions in your area.
http://dissenter.firedoglake.com/2013/08/21/live-bradley-manning-defense-attorney-david-coombs-post-sentencing-press-conference/
Pardon Bradley Manning campaign launched – sign the petition and show your support!
NSA Program Found Unconstitutional Went On For 3 Years; Started Right After Telcos Got Immunity
NSA Program Found Unconstitutional Went On For 3 Years; Started Right After Telcos Got Immunity
from the law-breaking?-what-law-breaking? dept
A further delve into the latest NSA surveillance bombshell from the WSJ highlights the ridiculousness of the claims that there were "no violations" by the NSA over the years. We've been aware for a while that the FISC ruled a certain NSA program unconstitutional, but the details had been kept secret. It only came out that something was found unconstitutional a year ago, through the efforts of Senator Ron Wyden. Since then, people have been digging for more. The DOJ finally has agreed to release a redacted version of the FISC ruling after fighting it for a while, but as we wait, some more details have been coming out. Last week's Washington Post story about abuses claimed that this particular program wasn't reported to the FISC for "many months."
Yet, as we mentioned last night, the WSJ article claims that the program actually went on for three years:
For example, a recent Snowden document showed that the surveillance court ruled that the NSA had set up an unconstitutional collection effort. Officials say it was an unintentional mistake made in 2008 when it set filters on programs like these that monitor Internet traffic; NSA uncovered the inappropriate filtering in 2011 and reported it.
No biggie. The NSA just illegally collected information that clearly violated the 4th Amendment (even the rubberstamp FISC says so!) for three years. But there's no abuse. No sir. No problems at all.
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And, you wonder why the key part of CISPA was to basically extend blanket immunity on privacy violations between not just telcos and the government, but basically all tech companies. The more immunity the government grants, the more "legal" all its actions become. It's sickening.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130821/01021524265/nsa-program-found-unconstitutional-went-3-years-started-right-after-telcos-got-immunity.shtml
Center for Constitutional Rights Condemns Manning Sentence, Should Have Never Been Prosecuted
#Manning’s barbaric treatment & sentence, a testament to lengths US gov will go to silence those who dare shine a light on its wrongdoing
https://twitter.com/theCCR/status/370220252065320961
Press Release
Center for Constitutional Rights Condemns Manning Sentence, Whistleblower Should Have Never Been Prosecuted
August 21, 2013 – Today, in response to the sentencing of Pfc. Bradley Manning, the Center for Constitutional Rights issued the following statement.
We are outraged that a whistleblower and a patriot has been sentenced on a conviction under the Espionage Act. The government has stretched this archaic and discredited law to send an unmistakable warning to potential whistleblowers and journalists willing to publish their information. We can only hope that Manning’s courage will continue to inspire others who witness state crimes to speak up.
This show trial was a frontal assault on the First Amendment, from the way the prosecution twisted Manning’s actions to blur the distinction between whistleblowing and spying to the government’s tireless efforts to obstruct media coverage of the proceedings. It is a travesty of justice that Manning, who helped bring to light the criminality of U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, is being punished while the alleged perpetrators of the crimes he exposed are not even investigated. Every aspect of this case sets a dangerous precedent for future prosecutions of whistleblowers – who play an essential role in democratic government by telling us the truth about government wrongdoing – and we fear for the future of our country in the wake of this case.
We must channel our outrage and continue building political pressure for Manning’s freedom. President Obama should pardon Bradley Manning, and if he refuses, a presidential pardon must be an election issue in 2016.
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.
http://ccrjustice.org/newsroom/press-releases/ccr-condemns-manning-sentence%2C-whistleblower-should-have-never-been-prosecuted
True words my friend. I wish he had processed Snowden's plea more thoughtfully
President Obama had a way out. He still does but the way out is shrinking ever day.
Jacob Appelbaum @ioerror
Do you believe that the treatment of Binney, Drake and others influenced your path? Do you feel the "system works" so to speak? #AskSnowden
10:00 AM - 17 Jun 2013
Snowden's Answer:
Binney, Drake, Kiriakou, and Manning are all examples of how overly-harsh responses to public-interest whistle-blowing only escalate the scale, scope, and skill involved in future disclosures. Citizens with a conscience are not going to ignore wrong-doing simply because they'll be destroyed for it: the conscience forbids it. Instead, these draconian responses simply build better whistleblowers. If the Obama administration responds with an even harsher hand against me, they can be assured that they'll soon find themselves facing an equally harsh public response.
This disclosure provides Obama an opportunity to appeal for a return to sanity, constitutional policy, and the rule of law rather than men. He still has plenty of time to go down in history as the President who looked into the abyss and stepped back, rather than leaping forward into it. I would advise he personally call for a special committee to review these interception programs, repudiate the dangerous "State Secrets" privilege, and, upon preparing to leave office, begin a tradition for all Presidents forthwith to demonstrate their respect for the law by appointing a special investigator to review the policies of their years in office for any wrongdoing. There can be no faith in government if our highest offices are excused from scrutiny - they should be setting the example of transparency.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023033003
Reuters left out the part about illegally wiretapping Salt Lake City for 6 months
I hope the WSJ piece is available to non-subscribers soon.
Both David Sirota and Trevor Timm mentioned this as being in the subscriber-only article.
NSA read all emails and texts going into and out of Salt Lake City for six months in the lead up to the 2002 Olympics http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324108204579022874091732470.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories …
https://twitter.com/trevortimm/status/370001532600602624
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Name: CatherinaGender: Female
Member since: Mon Mar 3, 2008, 03:08 PM
Number of posts: 35,568
