A hidden world, growing beyond control

[Ichingcarpenter]

These are some of the findings of a two-year investigation by The Washington Post that discovered what amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight. After nine years of unprecedented spending and growth, the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.

The investigation's other findings include:

* Some 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the United States.

* An estimated 854,000 people, nearly 1.5 times as many people as live in Washington, D.C., hold top-secret security clearances.

* In Washington and the surrounding area, 33 building complexes for top-secret intelligence work are under construction or have been built since September 2001. Together they occupy the equivalent of almost three Pentagons or 22 U.S. Capitol buildings - about 17 million square feet of space.

* Many security and intelligence agencies do the same work, creating redundancy and waste. For example, 51 federal organizations and military commands, operating in 15 U.S. cities, track the flow of money to and from terrorist networks.

* Analysts who make sense of documents and conversations obtained by foreign and domestic spying share their judgment by publishing 50,000 intelligence reports each year - a volume so large that many are routinely ignored.



More;

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/articles/a-hidden-world-growing-beyond-control/1/



Meals on wheels anybody?

[xchrom]

1. du rec. nt

[Coyotl]

55. Be sure to watch the FRONTLINE special April 30 = Top Secret America

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/topsecretamerica/#b

[xchrom]

58. +1

[siligut]

2. And there is no indication that we are any safer for it

Underscoring the seriousness of these issues are the conclusions of retired Army Lt. Gen. John R. Vines, who was asked last year to review the method for tracking the Defense Department's most sensitive programs. Vines, who once commanded 145,000 troops in Iraq and is familiar with complex problems, was stunned by what he discovered.

"I'm not aware of any agency with the authority, responsibility or a process in place to coordinate all these interagency and commercial activities," he said in an interview. "The complexity of this system defies description."

The result, he added, is that it's impossible to tell whether the country is safer because of all this spending and all these activities. "Because it lacks a synchronizing process, it inevitably results in message dissonance, reduced effectiveness and waste," Vines said. "We consequently can't effectively assess whether it is making us more safe."

This isn't the smaller government the RW whines about, but it should be.

[KoKo]

22. +1

[dixiegrrrrl]

64. Which supports argument of those who say

the massive amount of data spying and wiretapping and internet snooping is almost impossible to sift thru in a timely fashion.

[siligut]

67. Maybe the timely sifting of data is another function of the NEW Data Center in Utah

Under construction by contractors with top-secret clearances, the blandly named Utah Data Center is being built for the National Security Agency. A project of immense secrecy, it is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks. The heavily fortified $2 billion center should be up and running in September 2013. Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.” It is, in some measure, the realization of the “total information awareness” program created during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its potential for invading Americans’ privacy.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1

Also makes one wonder if the two year investigation by the Washington Post just "can't handle the truth".

[dixiegrrrrl]

69. We can hope which ever contractor is building it

is as competent as the ones who built The Green Zone or the F-35, or those new Navy boats that develops cracks when launched.

[dotymed]

3. It would probably be impossible to

determine how much this costs us. This is money taken from the needy in America for no good reason.

[KG]

4. another massive pork project. boy, who didn't see that coming?

[magellan]

5. The next time anyone whines about needing more spending cuts

...I'm sending them the god damned link to this article.

They don't know how much all this claptrap costs??? Fuck the GOP. Fuck austerity.

[KentuckyWoman]

6. and not one of those people could stop the bombing

but no doubt grandma will still get fruisked at the airport.

[SCVDem]

7. Grandma can afford to fly? nt

[MissNostalgia]

8. Lets be real on this

I'm sure all these security and intelligence agencies do all day is spy on exes, petty enemies, celebrities, and random people of their own obsession, overall just tax payer covered stalking.

[formercia]

12. Or watch porn on their high-speed, secure networks.

Professional bad actors already know about communications security and using non-traditional means of financing. The people that need to be caught don't publish their Manifestos on Web sites or frequent chat rooms. They don't broadcast their intentions because they know the airwaves and Internet are monitored 24/7. They just do it.

[NoMoreWarNow]

9. thank you-- this crap is the first thing that needs to be cut

is it affected by the sequester at all?

[Triana]

10. GWB created this mess....

...I distinctly remember his creating the "office of homeland security" after 9/11 and shoving FEMA under it and a bunch of other gov't orgs. FEMA hasn't worked since Clinton was in office. This is likely why.

[zipplewrath]

19. Honey attracts flies

And money attracts federal agencies. An awful lot of what you are seeing here is merely public and private organizations "following the money". Many of these organizations existed in one form or another prior to 9/11 but got themselves reclassified as "home land security" or "anti-terrorism" in order to get funded. It is the problem of federal agencies, the way to play the game is to get funded, then figure out what to do with the money.

It happens to some extent in social services too. You figure out where the money is going, and then try to get involved. More than one decent federal aid program has been damaged by having its scope expanded, or wildly altered, because the money was "already there". So Food Stamps starts out under the department of Agriculture to help starving farmers, and ultimate expands to include inner city populations that never saw and farm, and have wildly different needs. Which is why you can't buy dish soap with food stamps, but you can buy steak.

[dixiegrrrrl]

62. And JP Morgan make 550 million a year from its monopoly on Food Stamp debit cards.

Been following that story for some time now...Food Stamp program switched to debit cards, and the TBTF bank makes the money from it...sheesh.

[haikugal]

27. Yeah...

that and his agency of faith based policy so we could have religion in our government...which Obama has kept along with so much else...

http://www.allgov.com/departments/executive-office-of-the-president/council-for-faith-based-and-neighborhood-partnerships?agencyid=7269

The Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, formerly the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, was established by President George W. Bush just nine days after he took office in January 2001. The office is part of the Executive Office of the President, responsible for expanding the opportunities for faith-based and community organizations to receive federal funding. Through these faith-based and community organizations, the federal government can award grants through 11 agencies and provide social services to individuals. These agencies include the Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Justice, Labor, Agriculture, Commerce and Veterans Affairs, plus the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Corporation for National and Community Service, and the Small Business Administration.

More at link.

[Coyotl]

59. One way tio overthrow a government is to create an overlay structure to control everything

This kind of reorganization allows bring in new people to control the existing chain of command

[Brickbat]

11. K&R. Everyone should be talking about this, but I think the scale is so big we feel we can't.

It's so big, it seems intractable and almost benign. God, what a fucking nightmare.

[snappyturtle]

26. +1 It's all so over whelming. I'm certain that is the point TPTB want to get across. nt

[ReRe]

52. Nobody would believe you...

...if you told them. They'd call you a "conspiracy theorist."

[libdude]

13. Whose baby?

This baby or perhaps these babies belong to someone or more specifically someones, Senate and the House created this crap. The reality is that most Senators and Representatives are more concerned about re-election, retaining office, keeping their corporate sponsors satisfied. Cut seniors off Meals On Wheels, kick kids off Headstart, cut WIC, heat assistance, etc.
Oh a fellow politician had to stand in line for an extra hour or two, cutting into their vacation, hell no. This has to be addressed, now.
Is this the final throws of an irrelevant political system?

[Moostache]

45. I don't know about irrelevant, but it sure is broken.

Whether or not is is truly broken beyond all repair is marginally up for debate but there is little doubt the current system is rigged beyond the will of the people to serve only the will of the donors...

[peace13]

14. From day one it was clear that Homeland Security was a leach....

Last edited Tue Apr 30, 2013, 03:47 PM - Edit history (1)

Born to divert money into the pockets of the corporations. Looks like it is thriving. They managed to hog tie actual functioning agencies like the Coast Guard and turn the entire system into a malfunctioning , power grubbing monster. One that does not answer to the people. They do not have to even tell your family that they have you. Forget about letting the people know if they even have successful arrests. They do not report their business.

The boogie man is big business. $ush poking his head out lately reminds me of how many lies we were told and how many rights he was responsible for taking. It also reminds me of how many Americans were foolish enough to vote for him. ...enough to put the steal in play. We really are ignorant.

[xtraxritical]

24. ^This^, asset forfieture, and public domain confiscations. The Constitution

is just old paper folks.

[Egalitarian Thug]

30. Hardly anyone in the U.S. has any idea of the kind of things that are being done every day to

perfectly honest people. Even some people which most of us would consider rich are ruined forever by this reagan induced travesty.

Eminent domain has always been used to enrich the politically and socially favored at the expense of those that don't matter.

[peace13]

34. We sail on the Great Lakes and Homeland Security is all over the place!

On land it's the SUV's everywhere to be found. On the water they chase you down like a shark, always coming from behind...where were you, where you going, where do you live....on and on! Every weekend!

One night I heard a radio broadcast at one in the morning instructing all people on board a sailboat to lay on the deck and be prepared to be boarded! I contacted the local Coast Guard officer that we stay in touch with and he said he didn't have any idea what that was about. I told him they would have to shoot me before I would lay on the deck in the dark of night for any kind of inspection! No one answers to anything and it can be frightening!

The local papers never say if arrests were made or how the border security is coming. This is clearly an act against the people! Intimidation at it's finest!

[xtraxritical]

61. I forgot to mention debtors prisons.

[leftstreet]

42. +1

[Hotler]

15. More big government n/t

[WinkyDink]

16. The word one seeks is "boondoggle." AKA: "Graft"; "corruption"; "grand larceny."

[KoKo]

21. yes...all of those. "9/11" the Supplier of Jobs for the masses after Business

Interests outsourced the good paying jobs overseas.

Now the "Shadow Government" is the employer as the result of allowing fear, terror and war to give them the opportunity to live off the taxpayer.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

39. Except for Obama. Thankfully, we don't have to worry about that or his retirement plans.

[Jerry442]

17. Even if all these people were ultra-competent...

..the intelligence they produced would be useless because they'd bend it to suit their own agendas anyway.

[tclambert]

18. Meals on Wheels? You're so funny. How can the Military Intelligence Complex make money on that?

Delivering food to poor people and homebound invalids? That sounds like that "winning hearts and minds" type of warfare that our military just doesn't do. Now spying on poor people and invalids . . .

[KoKo]

20. Recommend....!

[gopiscrap]

23. part of the problem is that

we don't pay attention!

[Samantha]

25. Bush* oversaw the largest growth in our history of government expansion during his pResidency

but it is, of course, all Obama's fault.

Sam

[wolfie001]

28. Homeland Security is a A Big Massive Govt Jobs Program...

For Republican white males 25-50 initiated by the dumbest Prez we ever had.

[Coyotl]

60. Precisely, a crony welfare program.

[JDPriestly]

29. Much prefer meals on wheels and welfare and why don't we subidize people who want to surf all day?

Best cure for Al Qaeda. Get those guys out on surf boards and let them ride the waves.

Honestly.

Maybe we could save taxpayer money if we privatized and outsourced this work. In fact, why don't we just hire Al Qaeda to investigate Al Qaeda? That would be the simplest thing.

Ohh! I forgot. We are already paying Karzai somewhere in the gazillions for that very purpose.

[magical thyme]

31. bookmarking to read and weep later. nt

[toby jo]

32. 3 for the Washington Post. Clone yourselves and keep at em!

[Spitfire of ATJ]

33. Now they need to disclose the covert part of government creating enemies.

[99th_Monkey]

35. "I can hire 1/2 the population to kill the other 1/2"

So said 19th Century railroad tycoon, Jay Gould, while hiring strikebreakers to
break a union strike.

Rings oddly familiar in the "counter-terrorism" context.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

36. Irony alert. They're spying on us to protect our "freedoms".

[Moostache]

46. Nah....we gave up freedom when it got too scary.

Now we just want "security" and has was quoted long ago - "Those who would give up their liberty for security deserve neither."

The post-9/11 USA is a shell of what it once was...we lost the war on terror as soon as the Patriot Act was passed, now its just the slow circling of the drain of history that remains...

[L0oniX]

37. We're not just giving up freedom for security.

No one feels secure when there's no food.

[YOHABLO]

38. Does it matter who is President or who serves in Congress? >>>

The country is being run by the Pentagon, the CIA and the FBI ... the police state is here and our Democracy has been deleted. It's over folks ..over.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

40. Want to get support for Meals on Wheels? Just explain to someone higher up that they can use it to

spy on the seniors.

[Octafish]

41. Capitalism's Invisible Army

Them's in the know get to go go go.

[Mosby]

43. blank spots on the map...

Pretty good book that talks about the pentagon's secret world.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0451229169

[Curmudgeoness]

44. There is a lot of money to be made in fear.

And this is what the monster is feeding on.....sounds like a B-rated sci fi movie.

[Fuddnik]

47. We truly are now a police state.

[azurnoir]

48. 854,000 people hold 'Top Secret' clearances?

how the eff is it 'Top Secret' then?

[Ichingcarpenter]

49. top secret documents X 10000

Which goes into the millions of secret shit they hide.

[defacto7]

50. Terrorism's true vision

was not 9/11 or any other act of terror as we envision it... it was this!

The slow but sure pillaging, emaciating and disintegration from within was probably the only real goal. America eating itself. The question is... who are the real terrorists?

[pansypoo53219]

51. YIPPEE! MORE HAYSTACKS!!!

[blkmusclmachine]

53. The POLICE STATE <> be fed. It has a voracious appetite.

[90-percent]

54. It's already paying off

This massive and redundant police state security system just recently averted a terrorist attack at this years Boston Marathon!

-90% Jimmy

[dixiegrrrrl]

65. But...didja notice.......

they are using the old "cookbook"...

Terrorist attack...check
poison letters...check
claims of chemical weapon use in new target country....check.....

same game plan as before billions of dollars in bloated "security" apparatus

[Coyotl]

56. Bush's legacy = The Redneck Money Train = Billions and Billions funneled to cronies and supporters

There has never in the history of the world ever been such a huge Conservative Welfare Program as this. Niot only do they get tons of money every month, but we will have to pay their pensions for twice as long as they are on the job. Lots of these people can retire with full benefits after 20 years on the job. It is nothing more than a massive transfer of wealth to paranoid rednecks.

You'd think John Birch was America's God! NOT

Top Secret America http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/topsecretamerica/#b

[Solly Mack]

57. K&R

[MrScorpio]

63. I held a top secret security clearance once

This is no surprise to me.

I'm happy to leave that life behind.

[librechik]

66. The National Security Establishment has had a death grip on America since the early 60s

we are fools to think we still have a democracy with all that extra-legal, extra judicial activity going on, growing and growing...

[truedelphi]

68. An excellent read and a very decent book detailing what goes on is

To be found in the novel "Harbor," by Lorraine Adams. This book details the life of an Algerian refuge, as he takes up his new life in the USA.

As Amazon reviews details: A tremendously acclaimed and exquisitely realized novel of literary suspense, Harbor recounts the adventures of Aziz Arkoun who, at twenty-four, makes his way to America via the hold of an Algerian tanker and the icy waters of Boston harbor. Aziz soon finds himself a community of fellow Algerians, but their means of survival in this strange land begins to remind him of the dangerous world he was desperate to escape. As the story of Aziz and his friends unfolds, moving from East Boston and Brooklyn to Montreal and a North African army camp, Harbor takes us inside the ambiguities of these men's past and present lives. When Aziz discovers that he and his circle are most likely under surveillance, all assumptions, his and ours, dissolve in urgent, mesmerizing complexity.
####

Now one thing to note - when reading the book I realized part of the author's message relates to how the War on Terror now utilizes one of the key components of the war on drugs. When someone is discovered who likes killing and violence, they are not deep-sixed into a jail, but asked to snitch on anyone they know, naming them as being complicit, regardless if they are or aren't.

And the person who is into violence becomes a protected asset of our government, as an informant or agent provocateur for one agency or another. meanwhile the people they have snitched on become ripe for the role of patsies.