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We're Conflating Proper Dissent and Terrorism
It's both misguided and distracting to direct our homeland security efforts against protesters.
A secretive, unaccountable, post-9/11 homeland security apparatus has increasingly turned inward on American citizens.
The evidence includes everything from controversial airport body scanners to the FBI's raids last September on antiwar activists' homes in Minneapolis and Chicago. A federal grand jury investigation in Chicago was recently expanded.
Unless the erosion of proper legal safeguards is halted, we risk a return to Vietnam-era abuses on the part of the FBI and other security agencies.
Agents are now given a green light, for instance, to check off "statistical achievements" by sending well-paid, manipulative informants into mosques and peace groups.
Forgotten are worries about targeting and entrapping people not predisposed to violence.
Forgotten also are the scandals that came to light just months before 9/11 of decades-long FBI operations involving "top echelon informants" (high-level violent criminals) such as Boston crime boss Whitey Bulger.
Even if government officials are well-intentioned, the current tactics and incentives have opened the floodgates of error and opportunism.
Most important, what's been forgotten is that the protection of civil liberties does not weaken our overall security but actually helps to strengthen it.
When security agencies expend their energy against war protesters and environmental advocates, they lose effectiveness in preventing real terrorist violence.
No agency connected the dots before Nidal Malik Hasan allegedly killed 13 and wounded over 40 at Fort Hood, or before airline passenger Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to detonate his "underwear bomb" on Christmas Day 2009, or before Faisal Shahzad planted his car bomb in Times Square.
Tragedy was averted in the latter two incidents only because alert people happened to be on the scene. Yet the perpetrators of these three major events on U.S. soil were in direct communication with the same Yemeni cleric who was allegedly connected to three of the 9/11 hijackers.
A good place to begin reform is by challenging the handful of words in the "Patriot Act" that enlarged the definition of "material support of terrorism" to encompass "expert advice and assistance" given to designated "foreign terrorist organizations."
This phrase essentially makes mere advocacy of peace and humanitarian issues illegal with respect to groups listed by the State Department.
The Patriot Act thus condemns a large range of nongovernmental efforts, which have tended to be more effective than government-backed ones at furthering education, providing humanitarian assistance, and ensuring free and fair elections throughout the world.
Such a chilling effect only makes nonviolent conflict resolution and mediation more difficult and terrorism more likely.
Next, it's necessary to reverse the erosion of attorney general guidelines governing initiation of domestic investigations, which were adopted after the Church Committee uncovered abuses in the 1970s.
In one of its last official acts, the Bush administration lowered the level of necessary suspicion to the point where the FBI needs only deny that it is targeting a group based solely on its exercise of First Amendment rights.
Like the Patriot Act provision, this opens the door wide to FBI harassment of nonviolent activists.
In 2003, a spokesman for the California Anti-Terrorism Information Center said, apparently without thinking too hard, that evidence wasn't needed to issue warnings about war protesters: "You can make an easy kind of a link that, if you have a protest group protesting a war where the cause that's being fought against is international terrorism, you might have terrorism at that [protest]. ... You can almost argue that a protest against [the war] is a terrorist act."
In a similar vein, the Department of Defense asked on its annual mandatory antiterrorism test, "What is an example of low-level terrorism activity?" The correct answer was "protest."
But protest and civil disobedience are not terrorism. Until that distinction is made at every level of the security system, and proper institutional safeguards are implemented, the "war on terror" will continue to shred civil liberties while failing to prevent terrorist outrages.
The massive and largely irrelevant data collection now occurring only adds hay to the haystack, making it even harder to see patterns and anticipate events.
"Top Secret America" needs to ask itself who is more guilty of furnishing "material aid to terrorism" -- its own operatives, or the activists and protesters it so wrongheadedly targets.
58 Comments so far
Show AllA number of pro-Palestine activists in the USA (nine in Chicago) currently face Grand Jury charges because of the Patriot act, a brave woman named Maureen Murphy among them. They are involved with non-violence and conflict resolution work on behalf of Palestinians.
Better hope, then, that they're rubber boots!
You'd better get a move on, before your country emulates one from long ago, where it became a crime to say "Good morning" instead of "Heil Hitler".
Better hope, then, that they're rubber boots!
You'd better get a move on, before your country emulates one from long ago, where it became a crime to say "Good morning" instead of "Heil Hitler".
"...it doesn't matter whether it's on the left, the right or center: Stalin and Pinochet were at opposing ends of that continuum..."
That is more or less how Orwell explained it in various fiction pieces and essays; though, I don't think he was around to notice the rise of Pinochet.
The US empire views any opposition to its hegemonic domination of the planet as "terrorism". That is why they lump together al-Qaeda, WikiLeaks and peace protesters as terrorists. It is not the tactics that the imperialists are concerned with, it is simply the fact that they are all standing up to the US empire, that is why they are all considered terrorists.
It is time to shed the illusion that we are living in a democracy. This is a fascist imperialist state that will attempt to crush any and all opposition, whether home or abroad.
All out January 25! http://www.stopfbi.net/
DC-CPH
exactly right!
Ms Rowley is to be commended for denouncing the repression of dissent.
But she is wrong to think the correction needed is to focus on "terrorism".
The entire war on "terrorism" (relabeled as 'overseas contingency operations')
is a sham.
The military operations are directed, among others, against so-called extremists, Taliban, radicals, militants, hard-liners, zealots, die-hards, and especially "insurgents" who resist foreign occupation. And not just the active, but all the "potential enemy" and supporters, direct or indirect. As for anybody else just in the way, well ... collateral damage, or better safe than sorry.
It's aim is conquest, it is the crushing of all resistance.
What must be denounced is global militarism itself, all it's alleged "wars" whether on terror, drugs, or "mushroom clouds". What needs to be repudiated is the Pentagon goal of full-spectrum dominance of the world's people and resources. The inequities of wealth and power, and environmental havoc will not be corrected by more militarism, and more alliances with despots and drug lords.
Nice analysis. But the Pentagon repudiating full-spec dominance, forget it. They're way too invested to turn around now. Instead the military needs to be defunded by taking away people status for corporations. Corporations are not people and we the people will continue to be dominated by them as long as this blatant lie is accepted as truth. Starve the insanity - Buy locally, drive little or none, invest in your community.
Revoke the Federal Reserve charter and prohibit the U.S. government from borrowing. Force it to either tax outright, or pass legislation to inflate the currency without debt or interest, and spend it into the economy rather than loan it. That will make war impossible to sustain through direct taxation, because people will see it. Right now we're loaned our own money at interest, which is taken right out of our pockets through inflation with the creation of loaned currency. We're made to pay back what was taken from us at interest. This is surreptitious taxation and is used covertly to fund perpetual warfare, 'national security state', 'too big to fail' banks, and endlessly enriching the industrial war machine. It corrupts our entire political process.
and how about a concept of having own currency
edweg
We are way way beyond Vietnam era abuses.
Anyone who hates corporate exploitation of workers, environments, and consumers is, quite obviously in the eyes of the politicians of the Corporate States of America, a terrorist.
You have a keen grasp of the obvious.
chaokoh: It's good that you can recognize something you can aspire to.
The fundamental posture of our burgeoning imperial, hollow authoritarian security state is founded on the classic delusion of the paranoid psychotic: He Who Is Not With Us Is Against Us.
To the "advanced class" of (most) CD commenters, this may seem like belaboring the bleeding obvious. But Ms. Rowley's editorial or "op-ed" is plain truth and wisdom intended for a general audience. Good for her.
Still, I fear the Empire is too far along this path to perdition to be deterred by modest, sporadic, fitful citizen outrage.
"He Who Is Not With Us Is Against Us."
I prefer JC's original: "those who are not against us are for us."
don't go looking for enemies where there are none.
speak out when you see wrong, or accept complicity.
Obedient Servant,
Agree completely that this nation is too far along the path. Things will only get uglier and worse for not only this nations people, but that of people the world over.
We had a chance to roll back the insanity long ago in our nations history. Many people have sounded the alarm and have been marginalized, maligned, or dismissed outright
Eisenhower's famous farewell speech is getting lots of play due to the anniversary date, but how many remember President Truman's Op-Ed published in the Washington Post on December 22, 1963 in which he, the man who established the CIA publicly called for the abolition of its special operations division. It's quite interesting, full op-ed linked here:
http://www.maebrussell.com/Prouty/Harry%20Truman%27s%20CIA%20article.html
What we have done in this nation since the end of WWII is set up an entirely new government structure comprised of unaccountable intelligence and security agencies. In many respects, the original masters have lost control of their creations. They no longer serve the purposes for which they were created, if indeed they ever did.
We now have our intelligence agencies openly engaged in actual warfare and virtually nobody in positions of power think anything of having civilian intelligence agencies having and employing weapons of war.
The lunatics have definitely taken over the asylum.
Yes. The constitution says that only congress has the power to declare war, but intellignece agencies seem to side with the executive branch and use the secrecy excuse to dodge congressional control.
Not only have the lunatics taken over the asylum, but the fascists have taken over the government. With the complicity of a bi-partisan (one party) congress.
"... the Empire is too far along this path to perdition to be deterred by modest, sporadic, fitful citizen outrage."
Unfortunately, I think you're right about that. We have turned a corner, it seems, from which there is no turning back. This is particularly true when it comes to the equating of legitimate dissent with "terrorism", and all of the potential ramifications of that (i.e., stripping dissenters of their rights, locking them up indefinitely, torturing them to death, etc.)
I remember when the warrantless wiretapping program was exposed back in 2005, speaking to friends about it, the common refrain was, "Well, I don't mind if they are listening to my phone calls, because I don't have anything to hide. I'm not a terrorist."
I would try to make the point that historically, the government has used its power to crush legitimate dissent, not just those who actually pose a threat to our security. I would point to examples in history such as the Palmer Raids which decimated the labor movement, and the FBI's attacks on the civil rights movement, including Martin Luther King. "Don't you see?" I would plead, "if we let them get away with this unlawful surveillance, they will eventually use it to crush legitimate movements for social and political change!"
Usually, in these discussions I was met with a confused look and a shrug of the shoulders, before the conversation would turn to more important matters such as football.
That was five years ago. Today, I believe it is even worse. Now, we see the government actively going after antiwar and international solidarity groups such as these activists in Chicago and Minneapolis. Now, concerned citizens like myself can say, "See?! I told you they were going to do this!" But it doesn't matter. The average citizen has no clue what the US is doing around the planet and when they are shown what the US doing by an outfit like WikiLeaks, the reaction is generally hostility to the truth-tellers.
When it comes to the attacks on peace and justice organizations, it seems to me the general public could not be more apathetic about it. They generally seem to be in agreement with the government that these weird socialist types are probably in cahoots with the terrorists. If not, who cares anyway. Activists are "the others", and normal people just don't concern themselves with these weirdos..
You may be right about the general public being too busy just scraping by, but I also think there is a fundamental lack of understanding about the role of grassroots organizing in creating change. Isn't there something of a disconnect when 70% of the people are opposed to the wars, yet there is no end in sight for those wars, and no matter who people vote for, nothing changes? I've always been confounded by the complacency of the American people, but these days it's just inexplicable..
Anyway, we'll see what happens. One test will be the upcoming "national day of action" scheduled for Jan. 25 in support of the activists currently being targeted by the FBI for their First Amendment activities (stopfbi.net). If people really care about our constitutional rights and the importance of dissent in an age of war and terror, then we should see a large turnout to support these persecuted activists. We'll see...
Thanks for Stop FBI ref. I'll be at NY Fed Plaza on 1/25.
I know exactly how you feel -- I have dabbled in various levels of involvement with antiwar groups including ANSWER, UFPJ, and the new SDS. All of them seemed problematic for various reasons, and at this point seem to be borderline defunct organizations. Part of the problem may be that the very cause of antiwar organizing seems to be less relevant than these groups imply. Not that the wars don't have to stop -- they do. But this is just one piece of such a larger problem, namely the fascist-imperialist-plutocratic-totalitarian-corporate dictatorship, which by the way, is raping and pillaging the entire planet and poisoning the earth, air and water. Yes, the wars are wrong, but EVERYTHING is wrong!! Why focus on just the wars?
Perhaps, however, the campaign against FBI repression is just what is needed to reignite some kind of movement in this country. If people stand idly by while the government so openly acts to crush dissent under the guise of counter-terrorism, then the game is over. Not only will we be struggling to overcome the general complacency of the American people, but also the very real fear of government reprisals, which will becoming much more blatant moving forward.
" I don't mean to knock all web activism, but ultimately, people en masse need to step away from their computers and into their communities and streets."
We need 250,000 to just sit down in the streets of Manhattan at noon and refuse to move. The cops will beat many to near death. They may kill a few. They will certainly arrest enough to crowd the jails to overflowing. But it needs to be done in Manhattan, DC, Chicago, and every other big city. The media will not be able to ignore it.
The whole world is watching.
DC: Great post.
As for your other one (9:04 AM), one problem is that so many buy the stories repeated endlessly through the MSM. Therefore, rather than siding with those who have stood up to expose the injustices in our midst, they instead buy the official narrative and PRESUME these individuals are guilty of acts that have compromised U.S. security. Much of the public has already been conditioned to accept the meme that such persons are acting in a terrorist capacity. There's a reason why the press is considered the 4th Estate. The loss of the fairness doctrine, along with the deregulation that allowed a handful of broadcast companies to take control of media (which by symbolic extension = the nation's mind) represents an insidious war on ideas. Naturally, it runs parallel to the actual wars that utilize more direct forms of weaponry. Hitler and other absolute rulers understood the need for propaganda. The U.S. elites learned well from history's monsters.
Thanks Siouxrose. Yes, they have had it all figured out for quite some time. They knew exactly how the American people were going to react to 9/11, which is why it was important that the buildings came down. It wasn't enough to just allow the terrorists to fly planes into the towers, those buildings had to come down for maximum psychological impact. It was equally important that the official narrative was made clear instantly, so that the people wouldn't have the time to think it through for themselves. We were told within an hour of the towers coming down that the attack "had the hallmarks of al-Qaeda." We were told within a day that al-Qaeda did it because they "hate our freedoms." They invaded Afghanistan within a couple weeks and passed the Patriot Act within a month. By month two, we were being told by the Attorney General that fretting over "phantoms of lost liberty" only "gives comfort to the enemy." He told us to "watch what we say," remember?
And here we are, nine years later. Within the decade they have institutionalized the most draconian policies imaginable, with the Supreme Court even upholding the "expert advice" clause of the Patriot Act, which will open the floodgates for prosecution of any organization that the US government deems to be a terrorist sympathizer.
It's all rather obvious in my view that this was all part of a carefully crafted plan. 9/11 was an inside job.
>>He told us to "watch what we say," remember?<<
Press secretary Ari Fleischer said, literally, "Americans need to watch what they say." I felt that was a bit chilling.
"Usually, in these discussions I was met with a confused look and a shrug of the shoulders, before the conversation would turn to more important matters such as football."
I was in exactly one of those discussions today with a friend I haven't seen in some time. Then the conversation turned to golf -- so I guess it wasn't exactly, not going to football. Drives me nuts.
Totally with you on your entire comment. It's like trying to climb a mountain in a hurricane.
In this upside world of evil America spreading terror around the globe, peace-loving citizens are branded terrorists and actual terrorists are given awards.
DOWN TOWN, DC, RWe2 late, O.S.... all powerful posts. Thank you.
precision statement
edweg
Colleen, Get real, 911 was an inside black op and the so-called Christmas bomber got on a plane from Africa sans passport. Are you kidding? An American can't board a plane for the USA without a passport. Why are these LIES by the press glossed over? Why? To induce FEAR in the sheeple so the crooks can spend money ad nauseum. War is the biggest business. Profits are buried in the phony patriotism of the ignorant masses. Have a nice day and thank you for your service.
think of that heyday of protest - civil rights, anti-war, etc. how long ago that seems. but few would argue with the idea that as bad as it was then, things are rediculously worse now. and what becomes the mechanism most effective in channelling our resistance?
in one sense, we're on it right now. this medium could be much more extensively utilized for organized movements both promoting positive alternatives to mainstream society, and protests targeting specific issues.
who knows but that one day we may yet again take to the streets. personally, i would never rule that out.
but i'm not holding my breath. let's just get used to our current reality. we are actually sitting on a goldmine.
Nothing posted here or anywhere will work. The tubes are too fractured. It will take going to the streets. And people might be inclined were they not too busy trying to put food on their families.
The system is working.
"a return to Vietnam-era abuses on the part of the FBI and other security agencies."
what? you think they've just been shopping for 40 years?
Please don't say WE are conflating. The only confusion is intentional, by those in power who stand to gain by suppressing all dissent--them, not us.
it appears that the author still thinks of herself primarily as an American and then as an individual.
Thank You, Coleen.
Let me to some improper dissent. This may not be the most appropriate article to put these things out there, but what the heck.
I just a 60 Minutes piece where a couple of Secret Service crazy assassin experts explained that, after interviewing all of them who weren't dead, that they all were bonkers in pretty much the same way, that they all acted alone, that "politics" had nothing really to do with what they did except to maybe, as in Loughner's case, to provide a little content. According to these guys all of them realized that committing their crime did not solve their problems. Even Sirhan Sirhan? I'd always heard he claimed not to know or remember why he did what he did if he did it.
Bits and pieces of Loughner's story keep being released to the media a bit at a time, and we hear about a lot of things that we don't get to see, such as his poetry.
But some of the questions that I haven't heard be asked are:
Where did he get the $500 to buy the gun? Wikipedia says he got "fired from his job at Quiznos" then "underwent a personality transformation." What was his personality like before he transformed? Did he have the money saved up and put aside? What about the money he used to check into a Motel the night before the shooting? Where did that come from?
Are efforts being made to question him and see if somebody might have (perish the thought) put him up to it? Or has his court appointed lawyer advised him against speaking? Have they met and discussed things?
Is he still sitting in his cell with that same smirk on his face refusing to talk further?
I'm not saying he was framed or was part of a conspiracy, but I can't help but wonder.
have you met an interactive web site you can interact with, without login or/and solve a capcha pazzle?
/all sites must protect themselves due to being constantly threatened by well financed firms whose sole porpoise of existence is to disrupt potential communication on the net - it's kind of american taliban movement - what cia fbi and home security have to tell about it?
/are they against this activity at all?
edweg
"When security agencies expend their energy against war protesters and environmental advocates, they lose effectiveness in preventing real terrorist violence."
Working as designed. When the German police expended their energy against jews and communists and gays, they lost effectiveness in preventing real terrorist violence (a fascist takeover).
CHAOKOH: Substitute Muslims and "illegal" aliens and the recipe is being cooked again.
Thank you, Coleen Rowley, for your insights and for speaking out. Thousands of us should be writing such letters and sending them to our hometown newspapers every day.
United States citizens have been inviting continual abuse of Constitutional and human rights beginning since the day they believed the orthodox account of the 9/11 attacks fabricated by the Bush Administration and unchallenged by "hope and change" Nobel Peace laureate Barack Obama. Until the "crime of the century" receives a full, open, and thorough investigation, including careful examination of the flaws of the orthodox account and consideration of alternative narratives, the climate of fear will persist, as will the violation of rights.
Quite right, Futhark. None of this would have happened had the people wised up and examined the facts about that horrible day, i.e., taken an empirical, scientific approach to it. No Patriot Act, no Rendition, no torture, no invasion of Afghanistan or Iraq. The official story is plainly falsifiable, and has been proven false in its central claims, yet people go on as if it were true...very odd. Denial is a huge element in human psychology. And one must remember that the work of the purveyor of disinformation is much easier than that of the truth teller. The former has only to confuse and raise doubt (via disinformation); the latter must have a coherent argument that is compelling. And, lest we blame the people too much, we should recognize that there are probably hundreds if not thousands of full time purveyors of disinformation on the govt. payroll.
yes...one of my pat comments regarding disinformation is that the damage is done twice...
not only is one fed the wrong information, but the feeding satiates the original hunger for truth...
Some of you must be too young to remember why we fought in VietNam, how WW2 was designed, the bus riots, the Watts riot, the dead people in their graves all around the world because of imperialist US.
Can you see beyond the tower debacle at all? You all keep talking as if that was a point in history that defines our government..hell.no. It is a direct result of all yours' failure to listen to people like Zinn, Chomsky, King, and way earlier people...even old IKE who KNEW the whorporates would rape and pillage the world in the name of security, when it would really be for wealth. Oil in the Middle East, minerals like emeralds in Afghanistan...to name the current thieving.
I get so disgusted at the stupidity that even liberals say here. They seem to be on some sort of intellectual boophah so they sound good, and just keep the words flowin like a toilet runover full of crap.
from the article:
~ But protest and civil disobedience are not terrorism. ~
no, the continual, oppressive response of the overlord is...
steal land via murder and treachery, manufacture money and product, force workers to earn money to pay you for temporary use of the land via rent or mortgage, and entire lifecycle of product via cost of ownership, service and disposal...repeat ad nauseum...
charging others for resources at gunpoint is terrorism...
we live that one all the time...
ditto drug laws...consensual crimes...
anyone else getting tired of being guilty of being human?
I think GWB had it right, bad pronunciation and all.
It's terra-ists they're after. That is to say, the earth, all its supporters, and everyone on it. If you believe the earth has a right to exist, you are the enemy.